“le contrat social” is scored for two instrumental groupings. Ensemble 1 is made up of wind instruments, piano and percussion, Ensemble 2 for strings and harpsichord, featuring a boy soprano. The music for Ensemble 1 is mechanical in effect, with an underlying piano theme borrowed from Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto. In contrast, Ensemble 2 is delicate and static. The strings are always muted and the harpsichord is given material that resembles a music box. The boy soprano sings the words from Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius’s "Consolation of Philosophy" (Consolatio Philosophiae). He wrote this text in 526 A.D. as he awaited his execution for his efforts to equalize the distribution of wealth in Italy. He addresses those same issues and emotions that were at the heart of the Romantic movement: the longing for transcendence coupled with a profound nostalgia for a ‘naturalistic’ past where greed and war do not exist.