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In the new version, the orchestra accented Ursula’s verses with a resonant cimbalom, spooky woodwind chords and a booming church organ.

There is music that seethes and soothes — its every last, creepy twang of a cimbalom or bludgeon of brass conceived and executed with flawless clarity of gesture and precision of timbre.

These seven songs, a highlight in this album of Kurtag’s vocal works, pass in just over nine minutes: dark little pools of fervor, articulated by Ms. Narucki with precision and tenderness and accompanied by just the percussive cimbalom, played here with richly pianistic resonance by Nicholas Tolle.

He suggested trying instruments that don’t go together, duets between surprising pairs—like a violin and cimbalom, which ended up working for the film.

It’s a world that ends, in his telling, with both a bang and a whimper: apocalyptic brass chords alternating with a hushed stillness, off which rises a mist of cimbalom and suspended cymbal.