BESIEGED unites three contemporary composers whose choices of texts are widely varying: Stacy Garrop sets stories of Lydia Davis in which decay and disintegration are metaphors for old age and isolation. Robert Maggio alternates psychiatrist Dr. Alzheimer’s notes on his first diagnosed patient with her confused, frightening experience. And Christopher Jessup looks skyward, with Whitman, to ponder unanswerable questions about our being in relation to the stars. The Crossing, with its signature expressive precision, brings these works together, balancing sadness and wonder into a coherent journey of clarion sound.