Anatomy of Angels is an original composition for clarinet, cello and piano, composed in response to maquettes by Bernini in the Vatican Museum. It was commissioned by Amabile (Lesley Schatzberger, Nicola Tait-Baxter and Paul Nicholson) and first performed by them, at Late Music, York in November 2024. It explores themes of growth and decay: each of the five movements begins with a single idea to which other layers are added, but the original idea remains present throughout, serving as the frame around which the structures have been built. Towards the end of each movement the music subsides (or decays) to a single idea again, but not necessarily the one with which it began. The movements overlap slightly, to form a continuous musical span in which the senses of decay and re-growth become part of the same process, and - in movements two and four - the added layers deliberately suggest a sort of baroque melodic movement to make the connection more tangible in the music’s content.