In the central section in recitative style (accompanied by clarinet multiphonics, 'cello harmonics, and various vibrato and glissando effects in harp and accordion), fragments from four of Frescobaldi's Arie musicali of 1628–30 are fitted by the soprano to the last Ming emperor's suicide speech of April 1644, which translates: I am not the prince of a fallen kingdom, but ye are her subjects all.
A contrived seventh part for the soprano allows her Frescobaldi fragments to be heard at last with their original Italian text, which closely parallels the words of the unhappy Chinese ruler: May the hour chime out when you will triumph victorious over the pride of Thrace [i.e., the Turks]….The vain pleasures that I receive out of friendship are at present sources of reproach and accusations….
To begin with, Turkish and Chinese phrases hear each other out with diplomatic finesse, but eventually overlap and dovetail in a 'new world order' of mutual dependence entailing no loss of melodic autonomy.
The soprano chants random Turkish vocables of the ‘terennüm’ type, and then intones Chinese verses celebrating the universal peace symbolised by the Lunar New Year's Day audiences of the Qing emperor.
The fugue's twenty-four parts are really twice twelve, in that a melodic voice is invariably paired with a rhythmic partner (usually a string instrument struck with the wood of the bow, or plucked, but also timpani and harp).
After surreal interruptions by each of the twelve fugal pairs in incipit, the last four notes of the descending Ottoman scale turn into a quotation of a Frescobaldian motif from the first movement, ushering the whole symphony to a full close on C.