Upcoming Performances!!!

Yes that’s right two University of Miami ensembles are actually crazy enough to agree to play my music.  I have no idea what they are thinking, but who cares.

On April 27 at 8:00 P.M. the Frost Trombone Choir will be premiering a new work, “Of Moments and Visions” on their Spring Concert.  The concert is in Gusman concert hall and the ensemble is sounding great so everybody should be there.

Then on April 29 at 7:30 P.M. the Frost Clarinet Choir will be performing another new work, “Ice-9″, on their Clarinet Day Concert.  The concert will be in Clarke Recital Hall and since I am also in clarinet choir and will be playing on the concert that’s all the more reason for people to come out.

So the music.  I’ll start with “Of Moments and Visions”.  I began writing this piece back home in Dallas over my winter break.  Its very introspective, even meditative, a very winter piece of music.  It contains obvious minimalist influences, building to a gigantic climax which quickly dies down, ending without really resolving.  After finishing this piece I spent months trying to find a title, and finally I came across a poem by Octavio Paz titled “El Mismo Tiempo” or in English “Identical Time”.  Sadly I cannot use an excerpt of the poem for the program note of this piece.  But I’ll go ahead and post the excerpt of the english translation that inspired the title.

As I write I hear the river go by
not this
that which is this
The back and forth of moments and visions
blackbird on a grey stone
in the clarity of March
black
center of clarities
Not the marvelous presented
but the present sensed
the presence with nothing more
nothing more full and abundant
It is not memory
nothing thought nor desired
Not the same hours
others
are always others and are the same
they enter and expel us from ourselves
they see with our eyes what eyes do not see
There is another time within time
still
with no hours no weight no shadow
without past or future
only alive

 

So anyways heres a .pdf file and an mp3 (only listen to if you really don’t want to wait for the concert, since this is being performed in a month and I’ll get a recording so that will be posted eventually)

Of Moments and Visions.pdf

Of Moments and Visions.mp3

I’ll post info about the clarinet choir piece in a day or two so stay tuned.

Cleveland Orchestra Reading Session No. 1

So sadly despite what the title of this post would lead you to believe this was not an orchestral reading.  But it was a reading of piano trios consisting of musicians from the Cleveland Orchestra, and I have to say it was amazing.  Getting to hear the trio I’m working on played by such a high caliber of musicians was a pretty ridiculous experience.  They gave a lot of constructive criticism that is really going to help me finish the piece.

The piece by the way is a work for piano trio called “A Mad Tea Party”.  Obviously its inspired by Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” and I’m currently working on the first movement titled “No Room”.

The trio will be coming back in April to read the pieces again after we finish them.  And I will probably get a recording of that but I don’t think I will be allowed to post it on here.  But not to worry I already have a potential performance of the piece lined up for next year.  I’ll post a score and midi when the piece is finished but in the meantime here is a link to a slideshow of photos from the session