The word "ballad" implies a tale or narrative, and while there is no literal story being told there, I found myself thinking of the two performers as co-travellers in a terrain - or as dance partners - and the music as sometimes like a song they sing together, sometimes a landscape they cross, sometimes a mood, sometimes a monologue, and sometimes a fine line they trace. In the end, it is a ballad about the cello and the piano, and the way I hear them together. - Linda Catlin Smith