"Vessel dates from 2011 and is written for two sopranos, alto and seven instrumentalists. Agócs combines English, Hebrew and Latin poems with interrelated subjects. They represent "three perspectives on a lover addressing her beloved (or child or loved one)". It is economically scored, and each performer is sharply profiled. It’s music with a timeless appeal."– MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL
"Vessel acts as a meditative, lyrical aftermath to the dizzying colors and twists of the previous music. At least relatively speaking: set for two sopranos, alto and seven instrumentalists, the music simultaneously delivers three poems in three languages – English, Hebrew and Latin Texts – building over a bed of shifting tempi and orchestral colors until only a single, repeated piano note is left to drift into (as the English text, by E.E. Cummings, declares) "the deepest secret nobody knows." - WQXR NEW YORK, Q2 ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"Music that seems to come directly from nature...it reveals a wonderfully accessible lyricism that unfolds with both drama and complexity…colorful and individual music that takes risks with both the ideas and the use of the instruments" - THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS, Citation for the 2014 Arts in Letters Award in Music
"Also sublime is Vessel, which utilizes the medieval technique of multiple simultaneous texts to create something unmistakably modern." THE BOSTON GLOBE