Short overview
Written for chamber ensemble against the 1928 silent adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 tale. The score moves in close register to the narrator's confession — pulse under image, dread timed to edit, fever rising in cells that refuse to cadence. The print itself is the collaborator; the ensemble doesn't underscore it so much as inhabit it.
Poe is a recurring subject in Whitney's catalog — see also The Fall of the House of Usher (2008, chamber ensemble). The 2026 Pinch Records release makes The Tell-Tale Heart available as a recorded work beyond live-to-image performance.
