3 Love Songs was composed between March and July of 1985 for mezzo-soprano Heidi Dietrich, to whom the work is dedicated.

The entire work is structured upon cyclical patterns generated by the numbers 3, 4, and 5 on three levels: additive, multiplicative, and exponential. This structural foundation (which affects all parameters including pitch, rhythm, and text) is adhered to quite rigidly in the first song, though gradually less so in the second and third songs, there being a gradual trend from predominantly abstract to predominantly intuitive compositional processes. In addition to these formal considerations, there has been a manipulation of pitch materials within the second song in order to incorporate melodic fragments from Maurice Ravel's Rapsodie Espagnole and Cesar Franck's Symphony in D Minor (two works which are particularly relevant to the subject of 3 Love Songs), the resultant motivic material in turn forming the basis of pitch choices in the final song.

The following is a brief synopsis of the work, illustrating the various factors behind its progress from abstraction to intuition:

Song I:
• emphasis on planar (textural) elements;
• text presented intact;
• pitch material and attack points are fixed;
• with one brief exeption, voice and instruments remain within the range of an octave;
• texture and dynamics remain constant, though voice predominates over instruments.

Song II:
• emphasis on linear (melodic) elements;
• text fragmented into into individual words and syllables;
• some freedom with pitch material, though attack points remain fixed;
• range and dynamics are expanded, as is the degree of textural variety;
• relation of instruments to voice becoming less accompanimental and more integrative.

Song III:
• emphasis on points (timbre);
• text based entirely upon isolated phonemes;
• complete pitch freedom; attack points still fixed, though highly flexible;
• maximum variety in all parameters;
• instrumental and vocal parts fully integrated and relatively equal.

The text was written by the composer, specifically for this work:

[Spring!]
blossoming with a constellatory eye
Icarus (boyish charm) in
deep blue vernality...

as celestial being
surrounds verdant sky; above,
hyperborean dawn breaks thawing starlight
[Love!]