AND I PAINT STARS WITH WINGS is composer Stanley Grill's most ambitious album to date, presenting several related works for larger ensembles. Expanding on the same themes that influence most of his work, the music on the album represents the composer's attempt to influence the minds and hearts of those who hear it in such a way as to encourage thoughts about the possibility of world peace, as well as music composed in an attempt to translate something about the nature of the physical world. At the core of the works on the album is the string orchestra, an ensemble that is particularly well suited for composer's delicate sound landscape based on Renaissance influenced modal, contrapuntal writing, employing extended, interweaving lines of melody. The one work for string orchestra alone, Pavanne (for a world without war), is the first in a series of works for various instruments belonging to the composer's Music for Peace project, composed, as described by the composer "after having made a decision that my music needed to serve another purpose besides the obvious one of touching the hearts of those who listened to it. However unlikely of success, that purpose is the achievement of world peace." The work, intended to encourage a spirit of non-violence in those who hear it, imagines music that might be played in a world without war.