"When I came to Sydney from Russia in 1975 with my sister and parents, we took only a few belongings with us, including beautiful hand-embroidered bed linen. It was so valuable that we never used it. One day I wanted to take a look at these treasures but found that they had moth holes.

To ease the pain of losing the family heirloom, I decided to write this piece," says Elena Kats-Chernin. The result was a ragtime (the English word "rag" also means "shred"), interspersed with pauses symbolisin...