New Premieres and a New Album Release
This spring, check out my new setting of the Dean Young poem, “I Saw My Life Go By in the Coyote’s Jaws” at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. The amazing Sharon Harms will sing!
In July, I’ll be off to France to teach at the Etchings Festival with Georg Friedrich Haas and Fred Lerdahl. What an honor! Last year, I taught alongside Haas in Florence–an incredible experience. And at Etchings, the ensemble Harperc will permiere a new work for vibraphone and harp.
Some exciting performances this fall, including a work on the Festival of New American Music!
And finally, check out this new release! Twin Suspension featured on Extreme Measures II.
Upcoming Performances:
• Tuesday, May 21st, 2013. 5:30pm.
I Saw My Life Go By in the Coyote’s Jaws
Breakthroughs: Creativity Across the Disciplines
Sheerr Room, Faye House. 8 Garden St. Cambridge, MA.
• Friday, July 12th, 2013 8pm.
New Work for Laszlo Hudacsek, percussion; and Virgnie Tarrete. harp
Etchings Festival. Chapelle de St. Catherine du Port. Auvillar, France, July 7-14. 2013
• Tuesday, November 5, 2013 8pm
End of Winter. From Songs from the Wild Iris.
Festival of New American Music. Sacramento State University.
Empyrean Ensemble.
• Friday, November 22nd, 2013 7PM
End of Winter. From Songs from the Wild Iris.
Mondavi Center. UC Davis.
Empyrean Ensemble.
Sound Icon Premieres New Chamber Concerto
Last Saturday, Sound Icon gave an amazing premiere of my latest chamber work Flight out of Mind. The work is challenging and Jeffrey Means conducted it beautifully. I’m grateful for my collaboration with this excellent group. Thanks for all involved! To read more about the concert and my piece, here is a wonderful review of the event by the Boston Musical Intelligencer:
“The first movement’s surface-level motives—doppleresque “musical gestures that evoke sensations of flight,” —belied the subtlety of the underlying counterpoint. It was this counterpoint that gracefully drove the movement from an opening with detailed, busy polyphony to a homorhythmic texture over a drone at the electrifying end. This kind of compositional eloquence comes only from a combination of discipline and intuitive formal mastery. After a lighter and ethereal central movement, the finale presented a series of thundering crescendos, the last of which was poetically marked by the gradual decay of an isolated residual tone. In all, the symphonic scale of the piece just seemed to bulge at the restraints that the chamber genre placed upon it.”
–BMI
Upcoming Sound Icon Premiere
On March 23rd, Sound Icon will premiere my new work for chamber orchestra, Flight out of Mind. I’ll post more about the new work soon. Save the date! Saturday, March 23rd, 2013. 8PM Boston University CFA Concert Hall. More details about Sound Icon here.
Faremis Visuals Video of my time at the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard
A video by Faremis Visuals of my time at Radcliffe. They spent a day during my fellowship getting to know my work routine and capturing some nice images of Harvard Square and the Radcliffe Institute. This is above and beyond, and a beautiful gesture!
Last Friday, February 22nd, my new work Translucent Windows was premiered by Eric Hewitt and the Boston Conservatory Wind Ensemble. It was a joy to work with these excellent musicians. Below, I posted the program note and recording:
The idea of architecture as a metaphor or even a conduit for psychological states is something explored in much great literature. The channeling of these states, for example in Italo Calvino’s short stories The Argentine Ant or Smog, or his seminal work Invisible Cities, brings to my mind the idea of a translucent window: at once a metaphor for the veil or mask, and for the pursuit toward clarity of something outward, something beyond. Perhaps a more specific example is that of stained glass, used to illuminate religious allegory and myth.
Translucent Windows is written for a lean assortment of instruments in the wind ensemble (nine winds, seven brass and two percussionists) so that I can balance large ‘architectural’ sounds with a murmuring, translucent texture.
Translucent Windows
I. Augury
II. Divination
Upcoming Events for 2013
Happy New Year! Here are some performances you will want to check out in 2013. In all cases, new works I’m composing right now are going to be programmed with excellent repertoire by top ensembles and soloists. Hope to see you at some of these exciting events!
February 22nd, 2013. 8pm
Translucent Windows
A premiere for the Boston Conservatory Wind Ensemble
Boston Conservatory Theatre
March 23th, 2013. 8pm
Flight out of Mind
A premiere for Sound Icon
Boston University’s CFA Concert Hall
March 24th, 2013. 8pm
New Work for Jay Campbell, Aaron Boyd and Conor Hanick
Clark University, Razzo Hall
May 21st, 2013 New Work for Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies
Breakthroughs: Creativity Across the Disciplines
Sheerr Room, Faye House
July 12th, 2013 8pm
New Work for Laszlo Hudacsek, percussion; and Virgnie Tarrete. harp
Etchings Festival. Chapelle de St. Catherine du Port. Auvillar, France, July 7-14. 2013
Post in Sequenza 21
Thank you to Christian Carey for posting my thoughts on Elliott Carter to Sequenza 21! You can read it here.
