It was given its world premiere by the clarinetist Kari Kriikku and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Sakari Oramo in Finlandia Hall, Helsinki, on September 8, 2010.
Saariaho described this decision in the score program notes, writing, "It came as a surprise even to me that the work began to come alive in its space, and that the clarinet – itself a unicorn – plays only some of its music in the soloist's position.
Hearing, Sight, Smell, Touch and Taste form a chain that resolves in the concluding A mon seul désir (an anagram of the title) in a remarkable synthesis and development of the work's content.
Kriikku is invited, Musgrave-like, to move around the auditorium and audience in a live performance and though the recording does not really capture this spatial aspect little musically is lost.
He specifically criticized the blocking of the soloist, choreographed for that British premiere by Peter Sellars, remarking, "Neither Saariaho's beautifully terraced solo and orchestral writing nor Kriikku's phenomenal playing needed that.