This wild and virtuosic composition was written for Duo Fritz: Colin Sorgi, violin, and Jonathan Godfrey, guitar. As the title implies, it is a musical adrenaline rush, speeding forward from the beginning. It is highly chromatic and highly violent for the first couple minutes before winding down into a mesmerizing textural section that features guitar harmonics and muted violin trills. The music picks up once again and speeds to the finish, getting faster and faster, higher and higher until the music breaks down into pieces. The video below is of Delyana Lazarova, violin, and Jonathan Godfrey, guitar.
This work was written for the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble for the 2010 Aspen Music Festival. An Oneironaut is a person who is lucidly dreaming, which means that he or she is aware of the dream state. The work is cast in a single movement with three rough sections. The first section is similar to a prelude and fugue in structure, with an opening that suggests the violence and anxiety of the waking world. It features the cello and gradually descends into the second part, a fugato that is lead by the viola. The density of the music builds through the addition of contrapuntal lines into the middle section of the piece, an ethereal fantasy that features a series of cadenza-like passages for the piano. In the background is a dreamy murmur of vibraphone tremolos and doppler-like glissandos in the viola and cello. The final section returns to materials from the opening with a cello and viola duet that cites both the very beginning and the fugue subject. At this point, two unusual effects may be heard in the piano and vibraphone - the pianist uses magnetic tape tied to the low C string to create a shimmering bowed effect, while the vibraphone is pressing on its bars to bend the pitches.
Oneironaut's Journey was premiered on July 23, 2010 in Harris Concert Hall in Aspen, CO. Adam Matthes, viola; Paul Dwyer, cello; Sean Connors, vibraphone; David Friend, piano; and Sydney Hodkinson, conductor. Watch the video of this performance below.
Disintegration (2008) for flute, clarinet, guitar (acoustic and electric), violin, and cello duration: 9'
Composed in the spring of 2008, this was written for Michael Kannen's New Chamber Music Seminar. I was assigned to write for the surprisingly balanced ensemble of flute, clarinet, guitar, violin and cello, with the option that I happily took of writing for electric guitar. The piece revolves around the guitar plucking notes and the other four instruments sustaining and shaping them. I use two harmonic ideas – a symmetrical and all-combinatorial hexachord [0,1,4,5,8,9], contrasted with the pentatonic scale taken from the guitar’s open strings. The hexachord can be divided into two distantly related triads, but rarely is there any sense of traditional harmony, as the juxtaposition of the two triads is extremely dissonant. The introductory slow section may be described as expressionist in style, with fragments of melodic lines coming in and out of focus. The central fast section is highly charged and rhythmically unstable. In the final section, I gradually turn the electric guitar’s distortion higher and higher, while the strings grind away and the winds scream at the tops of their ranges.
There have been two performances of Disintegration, both at the Peabody Conservatory. It was premiered in May, 2008, by Ryu Cipris, flute; Greg Marsh, Clarinet; Greg Koenig, Guitars; Leah Greenfield, violin; and Dorotea Racz, cello. In 2009, it placed third in the Peabody composition department Prix d'Ete competition, and was performed on April 16, 2009 by Catherine Ott, flute; Greg Marsh, clarinet; Casey Smith, electric guitar; Kathryn Kilian, violin; and Dorotea Racz, cello. The recording below is of the second performance.
I wrote this for a couple of friends at USC who were putting on a joint recital in the spring of 2006. Most of the music is based on the harmonic series and I allow much freedom with tempo and rhythm, including some improvisatory sections for the cello.
This composition was written during my sophomore year for the spring jury. It actually started as part of a project for my orchestration class, where I wrote a brief composition for wind quartet. Later, that became the prelude to a double fugue and an elegy. Listen to the fugue, as performed by students at the Sarasota Music Festival:
During the Sarasota Music Festival in June of 2004, I was inspired by the virtuosity and musicality displayed by the students, especially the wind players. I had never written a piece for any sort of wind ensemble before, so I decided to try my hand at a woodwind quintet. I was still writing somewhat minimalistic music at the time, and the first movement I wrote, “Asphyxiation,” was very pulsing and breathless. Resuscitation focuses on sustained tones and undulating, though static, harmonies.
I was fortunate enough to have Asphyxiation premiered the following summer by students at the Sarasota Music Festival. The publicized premiere took place on a student participant concert on June 11, 2005, with Sandy Hughes, flute; Natasha Merchant, oboe; Benjamin Fox, clarinet; Kyle Wilbert, horn; and Dustin Seay, bassoon. Listen to this performance:
Resuscitation was premiered separately by students at USC in the composition department recital in November of 2005. It received two more performances by the Santa Monica Symphony Wind Quintet in March 2006.
