While writing Sen V, I tried to establish a connection between the accordion as an instrument and my personal listening impression of Tibetan Shômyô (Buddhist chants), which always sounds to me like a distant “moaning of the earth” with its characteristic deep and monotonous monophony. 

The note E, which can be heard throughout the piece as a kind of “sound line” in the background, traverses a total range of six octaves, beginning at the subcontra octave. 

Toshio Hosokawa