NOTES ON THE COMPOSITIONS

Listed in reverse chronological order

Lightning Slingers and Dead Ringers
(2008, 21 minutes, for piano and sampler)
Premiere by Lisa Moore in Canberra, Australia, May 8, 2008
US premiere at the Bang on a Can Marathon, New York, May 31, 2008
Score available for sale wth samples for the application "Kontakt3"
Commissioned by the Meet the Composer's Commissioning USA
and The Argosy Fund for New Music

Lightning Slingers and Dead Ringers was composed for Lisa Moore, who performs the piece on piano and sampler. Instead of using a pre-recorded electronic track, I incorporated electronic sounds using a sampler (essentially a digital recorder controlled by a piano-style keyboard) so that Lisa could use her great piano technique and interpretive skills in both the acoustic and electronic realms. “Lightning Slinger” is an archaic term for a telegraph operator, and an apt simile for a pianist who translates musical ideas into an electric medium - not to mention the fact that Lisa’s virtuosic part shows off her ability to sling plenty of lightning herself. “Dead Ringer”, which means an exact substitute, is a term that was first coined at racetracks when a superior lookalike horse would be substituted to foil the bookies and beat the odds. The dead ringers in this case are samples of piano sounds: the detuned, retuned, pinging, sliding, and rattling sounds are altered piano, prepared piano, and inside the piano techniques, which sometimes resemble guitar, bass, and even synthesizer sounds. Towards the end of the piece the machines step in, incorporating samples drawn from factory environments along with vintage analog Serge and Arp synthesizers. The machine sounds were taken from the vast library of factory environments that I recorded in Nuremberg, Germany during a residency designed to combine art and industry. In the end, the piano part takes its cue from the samples: propelled by driving rhythms and dense tonalities, the piano becomes part of the machine itself. All of the samples were recorded and edited on Native Instrument’s Kontakt3 sampler.

Almost Truths and Open Deceptions
(2007, 21 minutes, cello chamber concerto for cello, percussion, piano,
2 violins, viola, and contrabass)
Premiere by Felix Fan, with David Cossin, Blair McMillen, Nurit Pacht,
Jennifer Choi, Max Mandel, and Robert Black, at Merkin Concert Hall,
New York, May 3, 2007
Score and parts available for sale
Commissioned by the Kaufmann Center, with funds provided by the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust

Almost Truths and Open Deceptions is titled for the almost-unisons (almost truths) that clash and glissando towards a mass of open D strings (open D-ceptions) played by all of the string players. As I wrote the piece, I assembled an ensemble of frighteningly talented musicians, and kept each player’s personality and individual skills in mind as the work developed. This chamber cello concerto is the culmination of several years of working with cellist Felix Fan, and getting to know this fine musician’s dynamic playing style and unique energy.

The Wanton Brutality of a Tender Touch
(2006, 12 minutes, for piano)
Premiere by Blair McMillen at the Tenri Cultural Institute, New York,
September 8, 2006
Commissioned by Blair Mcmillen

When I composed The Wanton Brutality of a Tender Touch I wanted to make use of Blair McMillen's great technique and enthusiasm. The title was inspired by a recent televised brawl: one baseball player wrapped his arm around another player's waist, and drew him in close in order to deliver a wicked roundhouse punch. In one graceful series of movements, what looked like a fleeting moment of tenderness became an unbridled expression of fury. I was intrigued by the idea of creating a piece that borders on brutal, yet is delivered with Blair's flawless precision and accuracy.

Overvoltage Rumble
(2006, 13 minutes, for bass clarinet, percussion, sampler, guitar, cello, and contrabass)
Premiere by The Bang on a Can All-Stars at Merkin Concert Hall, New York City,
February 22, 2006
Commissioned by the People's Commissioning Fund

Overvoltage Rumble was written for the Bang on a Can All-Stars, and composed specifically for these six fine musicians. The group's unique instrumentation (which includes amplified acoustic instruments and electric guitar) inspired me to explore a dynamic, shifting balance between the All-Stars' acoustic and electric sounds. I recently unearthed recordings I made of a vintage Serge analog synthesizer and an Arp 2600, which provided the jolt that would further electrify the piece. I sampled the recordings, which were a pack rat's stash of swooping, buzzing, and rattling analog synthesizer sounds, and arranged them across the keyboard of my sampler. This gave me immediate access to a huge variety of sounds, in a set-up that would have been impossible on the original instruments. Lisa Moore plays the synthesizer part live on the sampler: instead of fiddling with pesky patch cords (like we did in the old days) she can use her energy and highly developed piano skills to perform with the ensemble. In acoustic sections of this piece the musicians echo the rich, complex analog layers and drifting oscillators of these bygone analog beasts, and focus on one note while modulating timbre and small fluctuations of pitch. The bass and bass clarinet both duel (or rumble) with the synthesizer in solos that contrast acoustic sounds with the synthesizer's wild electronic flotsam and jetsam. The drums hold down a steady five against seven beat, using a clangorous collection of metal and a low-tuned snare drum. The technical savvy of the All-Stars allowed me to combine electronic sounds with acoustic sounds, and their great musicianship inspired me to push it a little further, incorporating polyrhythms, multiphonics, and many of the extended techniques that the musicians have mastered.

A Sideways Glance from an Electric Eye
(2006, 8 minutes, for a virtual version of Henry Cowell's Rhythmicon)
Released on "The Art of the Virtual Rhythmicon" Innova, 2006
Commissioned by Sonic Circuits

Working on the Virtual Rhythmicon was both addictive and challenging.  It was only after I finished the piece that I discovered that my Airport card was defective.  I wound up writing a piece that developed slowly, because the on-line Rhythmicon could not react quickly to my key commands, which in the end reinforced my fondness for the unpredictable qualities of broken instruments.  The piece shifts between pure overtones and detuned sounds generated from sustained sawtooth and triangle waves, inspired in part by a review that compared the original Rhythmicon to a reed organ.  I snuck in some recordings of cellist Joan Jeanrenaud's harmonic sweeps, introducing a human element that mingles with the machine.  The title, A Sideways Glance from an Electric Eye refers to the photoelectric cell used in the original Rhythmicon.  Thanks Joan, Philip, Nick, and Henry.

In This Dream that Dogs Me
Live music for choreographer Karole Armitage
(2005, 55 minutes, for percussion, sampler, guitar, and cello)
Premiere by Danny Tunick, Annie Gosfield, Roger Kleier, and Felix Fan
at the Duke Theater on 42nd Street, New York, November 30, 2005
Commissioned by the American Music Center's Live Music for Dance program
and the Rockefeller Foundation's MAP Fund

The music for "In This Dream that Dogs Me" was composed for this project, with the addition of some existing work. In developing the piece, Karole and I discussed the concepts of calligraphy on the page, representing the writer's hand and the expressive power of each individual character. Much of the music explores this dynamic relationship of the fluid, continuously changing movement of calligraphy in the foreground, supported by sustained, subtly shifting sounds in the background, representing individual calligraphic characters on a page. For example, the cello traces fluid, sinuous figures over a shifting tapestry of interwoven timbres consisting of bowed marimba, sustained guitar, and altered sampled string sounds. Melodic fragments reappear in altered forms, as characters and words do in language. All of the sampled sounds, played live on a keyboard, are altered forms of acoustic instruments, and are drawn from recordings of piano, strings, and percussion. Detuning and digital manipulation translates these sounds into their own musical language, just as calligraphy evolves and mutates over time. Parts are written expressly for each performer, and the ensemble makes use of its varied backgrounds, from classical traditions through free improvisation, rock, and blues. The musical materials in the three movements of this piece vary widely in density and character, ranging from languid dreamlike solos to intense rhythmic explosions for the ensemble. Within this varied context, there is always a focus on the movement of calligraphy and how these fluid, kinetic, characters wind and shift in an ever-changing musical environment.

Uphill Slides and Knockdown Dives
(2005, 12 minutes, for percussion and cello)
Premiere by Felix Fan and David Cossin
at the Muzik3 festival in San Diego, California, April 13, 2005
Commissioned by the Muzik3 Festival

Uphill Slides and Knockdown Dives was written for Felix Fan and David Cossin, two fine musicians who love to play together, The "uphill slides" refer to the many glissandi played on the cello. The "Knockdown Dives" make reference to a strong, loud, percussion part, that shifts from strong and steady to wild and wobbly

Wild Pitch
(2004, 13 min, for cello, percussion, and piano)
Premiere by Felix Fan, David Cossin, & Andy Russo,
Merkin Concert Hall, New York, December, 2004
Commissioned by the Muzik3 Festival, San Diego

Wild Pitch was written for Felix Fan, David Cossin, and Andrew Russo. Excited about working with this new trio, I wanted to create a piece that would emphasize the group's raw energy while incorporating many of the unusual techniques that each of the musicians has developed. The cello part clashes and slides between conventional tuning and quarter tones, fueled by Felix Fan's unique intensity and dynamic playing. Percussionist David Cossin plays a drum set augmented by his collection of Chinese cymbals, hand bells, a broken gong, and other collected objects, in a part that leaves plenty of room for interpretation and improvisation. Andrew Russo alternates tremolos with inside-the-piano techniques that use a baseball, steel guitar slide, and mallets, in a piano part equally influenced by Fats Domino and George Crumb. The title, Wild Pitch, reflects the piece's unpredictable sliding intervals and quarter tones, as well as the sense of a game gone momentarily out of control. The piece was finished during the 2004 world series, and Wild Pitch also refers to some very odd pitching that contributed to the historic Red Sox victory of the 2004 baseball season. A baseball-related title seemed especially appropriate after we discovered that Andy Russo's father, who was a catcher in the minor leagues, knew my distant cousin, Ruben Amaro, who was a shortstop, scout, and trainer for the Phillies.

Echoes of the Copper Octopus
(Reflective, Malleable, and Very Tenacious)
(2004, 13 min, percussion quartet)

Premiere by SO Percussion, Merkin Concert Hall, New York, December, 2004
Commissioned by the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust for Performance at Merkin Hall

When I first met with So Percussion to discuss this piece I was impressed by their ability to blend, a quality more commonly found in a string quartet than in a percussion quartet. Their common experiences and group dedication have resulted in an ensemble that I often considered to be one large instrument - kind of a percussion octopus. In order to emphasize this unity while creating timbral contrast I wrote for four very distinct groups of instruments: two orchestral setups (one pitched, one non-pitched for the most part) and two less traditional setups (one drum set with brake drums, one collection of oddly tuned metal and woodblocks). Echoes of the Copper Octopus is a four-man, eight-handed brew of melodic copper pipes, echoing bass drums, and crashing gongs. Glockenspiel blends and clashes with detuned metal. Marimba tangles with unpitched woodblocks. Timpani are used as resonators to alter the pitch and timbre of tam tams, almglocken, and finger cymbals, and an orchestral bass drum gets a kick in the pants from a kick drum.

Knuckleball

Brawl
(1998, 10 minutes, for saxophone quartet)
Premiere by ROVA Saxophone Quartet, San Francisco, June 1998
Recorded by ROVA, on Annie Gosfield's
"BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" CLICK TO LISTEN Tzadik, 1998

Brawl was composed for Rova with the intention that they would leave their mark on it: using solo sections, cutting contests, and a combination of notated and loosely structured sections. The beginning of the piece is fully notated, and improvisational techniques are incorporated as the piece progresses. Brawl was composed during a residency at the Djerassi Foundation in Woodside, California. According to Forms in Music (J. Humphrey Anger, 1900) a "brawl" is "an old French dance in commom time, of a gay character." This "Brawl" is not exclusively in common time: in reference to Dr. Carl Djerassi's birthplace, it also uses compound Bulgarian rhythms. On June 4, 1998, (a few days after the piece was completed) a much-publicized brawl took place in New York City, in which 40 drunken firemen terrorized a Manhattan bar, fought tooth and nail, exposed themselves, and caused general mayhem.

Brooklyn, October 5, 1941
(1997, 4 minutes, for piano, baseballs, and baseball mitt)
Premiere by Guy Livingston, at Bruno Walter Auditorium, Lincoln Center, New York, December 1997
Recorded by Guy Livingston (one minute version) on "Don't Panic: Sixty Seconds for Piano", Wergo (Germany) and Harmonia Mundi (USA) 2001

When asked to compose a piano piece representing Brooklyn for a concert commemorating the 100th anniversary of the unification of the five boroughs of New York City, I was inspired by the 1941 Dodgers vs. Yankees baseball World Series, thus coining the phrase "World Serial Music". The piece is named for the date of the notorious fourth game of the series. My mother, born in Flatbush (in Brooklyn, New York) was a wildly enthusiastic 12-year old Dodgers fan at the time, and was recently reminiscing about watching this memorable but heartbreaking game at Ebbets Field. At the top of the ninth inning, a hair's breadth away from the end of the game, Dodgers pitcher Hugh Casey struck out Yankee Tommy Henrich with a pitch that should have ended the game in a 4-3 Dodger victory, which would have tied the series at two games apiece. Instead, the ball rolled under catcher Mickey Owen's glove, getting by him and allowing Henrich to reach first base safely. The Yanks went on to score four more runs to win, 7-4, and turn the series around. Shaken by their unexpected loss, the Dodgers lost again the next day, and the Yankees won yet another world championship.

Brooklyn, October 5, 1941 is performed with two baseballs and a catcher's mitt, which are used to strike both the piano keys and the strings and soundboard inside the piano. The score gives instructions to have additional baseballs available to the pianist, should he, like Mickey Owen, suffer the mishap of letting the ball get away. Playing the piano with baseballs and a catcher's mitt produces different sounds and tonalities than the traditional method of playing with the fingers: new groups of notes and rapid sequential chords become possible by rocking the balls both side-to-side and back-and-forth on the keyboard, and wider spans are reached with the aid of the mitt. Sounds also differ inside the piano, using the baseballs to mute strings and strike the metal soundboard under the lid. Speed is enhanced, and the technique of rocking the baseballs creates a distinctive machine-like flurry of notes and tremolos. Although I know of no previous works composed for piano and baseballs, this is a tip of the hat to the late Nicolas Slonimsky, who performed Chopin's Black Key Etude by rolling an orange on the piano keys.

Cram Jin Quotient (1997, 8 minutes, for keyboard sampler)
Premiere by Annie Gosfield at "The Alternative Schubertiade", American Opera Projects, New York, September 1997
Recorded by Annie Gosfield on "An Alternative Schubertiade" CRI, 1999

In the same way the the "Alternative Schubertiade" focused on old versus new ideas, Cram Jin Quotient was inspired by the idea of contrasting antiquated technologies with modern digital manipulation. I was influenced by the sounds of 78 RPM records, and used digital technology to evoke the effects of an old 78: the pops and hisses of surface noise, the warbling of a warped record, the occasional skip, and the gradual degeneration of sound caused by repeated playing. Schubert's Quintet in C Major also provided inspiration, in its harmonic content, melodic fragments, and four-movement structure. Cram Jin Quotient was recorded as it was performed, on a sampling keyboard with no overdubs.

In Rides the Dust (1997 version, 11 minutes, for chamber orchestra)
Premiere by Bang on a Can's Spit Orchestra, conducted by Brad Lubman, at the Kitchen, New York, May 1997

In Rides the Dust was originally composed for Prague's Agon Orchestra. In 1997 it was rewritten for Bang on a Can's Spit Orchestra. The title refers to the elusive qualities of dust: the way it appears out of nowhere, dissipates, and settles. Ideas dovetail and overlap; while a new section rides in, a previous idea scatters, dissipates, and, like dust, finally settles. When the same idea reappears, it is in an altered form, as if scattered, swept up, and reordered. Often a melodic or rhythmic pattern is established, and then left to spread out and disintegrate.

The piece combines traditional and non-traditional techniques: contrasting detuned and microtonally tuned instruments with equal-tempered instruments, for example, or combining a notated score with improvisational techniques. The strings all use some form of scordatura; a single string is re-tuned microtonally to a specific pitch on all of the strings except the second violins. Likewise, the woodwind and brass instruments have many (approximated) quarter-tone bends.

Four Roses (1997, 6 minutes, for cello and detuned piano)
Premiere by Ted Mook and Annie Gosfield, New York, March 1997
Recorded by Ted Mook and Annie Gosfield on
"BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" CLICK TO LISTEN Tzadik, 1998

Three of the cello strings are tuned conventionally, and the "A" string is tuned 80 cents flat (just short of a semitone). This scordatura creates microtonal intervals between the open "A" string and the normally tuned strings. The keyboards use prepared piano and piano samples, tuned to a scale that is 32 notes per octave. "Four Roses" is the name of a rather inexpensive whiskey favored by my parents while they were courting. Although this piece was recorded three years before it was performed live, it has become a favorite that I have played with cellist Felix Fan, Joan Jeanrenaud, and others.

Freud
(1996, 4 minutes, composed with Roger Kleier For sampler and electric guitar)
Premiere by Annie Gosfield and Roger Kleier at the Audio Art Festival, Goethe Institute, Cracow, Poland, November 1996
Recorded by Annie Gosfield and Roger Kleier on
"BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" Tzadik, 1998

Freud utilizes unconventional approaches to bowing. The keyboard samples are bowed vibraphone sounds. The electric guitar is played using prepared guitar techniques and an E-Bow (electronic bow), a device that bows the strings of the guitar magnetically.

In Rides the Dust (1996, 11 minutes, for flute, tenor sax, trumpet, trombone, percussion, piano, guitar, cello, and contrabass)
Premiere by Agon Orchestra, conducted by Petr Kofron, New Music Marathon, Prague, November 1996
(See notes above)

Blue Serge (1996, 5 minutes, for sampling keyboard)
Premiere by Annie Gosfield at Festival Solo in Lucerne, Switzerland, May 1996
Recorded by Annie Gosfield on "BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" Tzadik, 1998 and on "Bring Your Own Walkman" Staalplaat, 1997

I recorded samples of a Serge modular synthesizer and an old Arp 2600 in Michael Murphy's studio in Saint Louis, with Murphy and LaDonna Smith twiddling the knobs along with me. These analog synth sounds were altered, modulated, combined, and sampled, which gave me access to several different sounds at once, and allowed me to create clusters and densities not possible on the original instruments.

Lost Night (1995, 12 minutes, for chamber orchestra and sampler)
Premiere by the Crosstown Ensemble, conducted by Eric Grunin, New York, December 1995
Commissioned by the Minnesota Composers Forum and the Crosstown Ensemble

The piece incorporates detuned strings and piano samples, using scales and tunings composed more by ear from random elements than strict microtonal systems. Generally, if all goes well, the tuning has a life of its own and the instruments' detuning become more pronounced by the end of the piece. Open strings are re-tuned in increments of cents as indicated in the score, and the string parts are primarily open strings or harmonics.

My fascination with detuned sounds started at age 14 on a riverboat in New Orleans; the sheer power of a wildly out of tune calliope blasting out "Basin Street Blues" and "Way Down Yonder in New Orleans" gave those old standards a new life for me. The same can be said for a brass band in Oaxaca's zocalo, and for a guitarist named Wichita picking an out of tune version of "Wildwood Flower" at the Johnny Mack Brown High School, tempering sentimental cliches with a richness only achieved by beating pitches and wild card tunings.

The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory
(1995, 11 minutes, for percussion, sampler, guitar, cello, contrabass)
Premiere by The Annie Gosfield Ensemble, Festival of Radical New Jewish Culture, New York, September 1994, revised version premiered by the Bang on a Can All-Stars, at Great Performers at Lincoln Center, New York, May 1995
Recorded by the Bang on a Can Allstars on "Cheating, Lying Stealing" Sony Classical, 1996, and on "Bang on a Can Classic" Cantaloupe Records, 2002
Recorded by The Annie Gosfield Ensemble on Gosfield's
"BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" CLICK TO LISTEN Tzadik, 1998

I wrote The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory shortly after moving to New York. I was thinking of my grandmother, who had moved to New York from Poland 70 years earlier, and had worked in sweatshops and factories. As to the title, "The Manufacture" refers to my grandmother's factory days, "Tangled" describes the detuning of the piano sounds and their displacement on the keyboard, and "Ivory" refers to the piano keys themselves. I used a sampler (an instrument similar to a digital tape recorder connected to a piano keyboard) to reproduce piano and prepared piano sounds and to alter their pitch, duration, and timbre. The sampled sounds vary in density and change within the piece from multiple layers of detuned piano sounds, for example, to a single piano harmonic or a lone snap of the sustain pedal. The piece incorporates some elements of improvisation, including solos for the guitar and bass.

Second Avenue Junkman
(1993, 4 minutes, for piano, guitar, and percussion)
Premiere by The Annie Gosfield Ensemble, at the Festival of Radical New Jewish Culture, New York, September 1993
Recorded by Annie Gosfield, Roger Kleier, and Greg Cohen on "Irving Stone Memorial Concert", Tzadik, 2004

Second Avenue Junkman was written for my band's performance at the first Festival of Radical Jewish Culture, curated by John Zorn, at the Knitting Factory in New York. It's a simple tune in C minor that was inspired by stories of my grandfather, Abraham Starobin, looking for scrap metal on Second Avenue with his donkey cart and his donkey (who was named Nickolai and stabled on Prince street!) He wasn't called a junkman, he was called a scrap metal dealer, but "Second Avenue Scrap Metal Dealer" just doesn't have the same ring. Many decades later, I moved to Second Avenue, and although it's changed drastically, and the Yiddish theaters that he used to frequent have disappeared, I still look out the window and think about him.

Nickolaievski Soldat
(1993, 7 minutes, for sampler, guitar, and percussion)
Premiere by The Annie Gosfield Ensemble, Festival of Radical New Jewish Culture, New York, September 1993
Recorded by The Annie Gosfield ensemble on
"BURNT IVORY AND LOOSE WIRES" Tzadik, 1998

This work was named for my great-grandfather, who was conscripted into the Czar Nickolai's army at age 11 from the village of Konotop in the Ukraine. At the time it was common for young Jewish boys to be kidnapped and forced into military service. Keyboards use detuned piano sounds, in which scales vary from octave to octave, and different microtonal scales are juxtaposed for each of several layers on the keyboard.