In Bed is the result of a collaboration between myself and the poet Kenneth Koch that occurred last spring. As a student in Koch's creative writing class at Columbia, I was forced to confess all kinds of artistic endeavors in which I was interested and relate them to our poetry discussions; thus, it was not long until he discovered that I was a composer. He suggested a collaboration when he heard some of my music, which made me very happy since I had not curried much favor with my poetry, and we set about finding the right poem.
As any diligent and well-wishing student, I had been reading my professor's books outside of classÑand my attention had already been drawn to In Bed. With its unique poetic structure and refined wit, it suggested an interesting and challenging approach. Some aspects of the poem were changed: in its original published form, the work is considerably longer and the sub-poems follow a different order. My rearranging of the text was in an effort to express the musical shape that I thought would best serve the poem.
In Bed was first performed on July 12, 1996 at the Aspen Music Festival by the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, with Randolph Lacy singing and Adam Flatt conducting.