Vn, va, vc. Score and Parts Composer: b. 1949.

Nicholas Sims-Williams was born in Kent in 1949. He began to compose music while still at school, studying theory with Paul Steinitz and composition with Sir Lennox Berkeley. He eventually chose to devote himself to languages rather than music as a profession. After studying Sanskrit and other oriental languages at Cambridge, he has pursued a successful career in this field and currently holds the position of Professor of Iranian and Central Asian Studies at the University of London.

In memoriam was written in 2001 as a tribute to three close friends and distinguished scholars of Iranian languages who all died in that year: Ron Emmerick, Neil MacKenzie and Ilya Gershevitch. The three instruments of the string trio, each of which in turn takes the leading part, symbolize the three colleagues. The music was inspired by the following lines by Emily Dickinson, which many musicians will know from the setting by Aaron Copland:

The world feels dusty
When we stop to die;
We want the dew then,
Honors taste dry.

Flags vex a dying face,
But the least fan
Stirred by a friend's hand
Cools like the rain.

Mine be the ministry
When thy thirst comes,
Dews of thyself to fetch
And holy balms.

In memoriam lasts about five minutes. For this first publication, the music was set by C.M.M. Nex and F.H. Nex from the manuscript.