The music is abstractly inspired by the genus of redwood coniferous trees called sequoias of the Northern California coastal forests.
What fascinated me about sequoias, those giant California redwood trees, was the balancing act nature had achieved in giving them such great height.
Peter G. Davis of New York gave Sequoia modest praise, writing:There is nothing startlingly original about Tower's score—in its content, structure, or instrumentation—but surely we are beyond the stage when every fresh statement by a composer must be completely without precedent.
This music suggests techniques of Bartók, Stravinsky, Hindemith, Prokofiev, and other past masters, but the influences have been smoothly digested and Tower has unquestionably added a vital voice all her own.
[...] What gives Sequoia its expressive individuality, I suspect, is the strong poetic impulse that motivates the notes as they translate a visual image into sound.