This piece consists of an improvised prompt wherein the performer inhales and exhales slowly turning the inhales and exhales into screams. I recorded my performance of this prompt in a few different spaces. Through recording the prompt in different spaces and orchestrating them for a 4.1 speaker array I created a fixed media layer. 

Axis is a structured improvisation for bowed guitar and electronics. This piece has three sections the first of which is percussive and noisy. The sound grows until it explodes into the second section which consists of a drone texture. This section is based on the overtone series which is slowly detuned. Finally, the third section blends these two ideas together and it adds lots of overtone melodies.

Drowning To Find Beyond is a piece made for Sandra Coursey and was written for Keytar and Electronics. Coursey had been working with multiple keyboard instruments like the organ, piano, and harpsichord which inspired me to write using mainly sounds from different keyboard instruments, primarily piano, organ, and synthesizer. Since the keytar mimics instruments I thought of it as a “real fake instrument” because it is a midi controller and does not produce any sounds without software. Since distorted electric guitar had similar sonic properties like the piano’s envelope and blended with organ’s sustained sounds through feedback techniques I incorporated it into the piece. After combining the keyboard instruments and guitar’s timbres I layered thick microtonal harmonies to make a fixed media layer. The synthesizer sound is produced by the performer live over the fixed media.

Integrating Ghosts is a composition for clarinet (B-flat and bass), flute, piano, and electronics. The piece is based on the sonic morphology of an archetypal gesture consisting of an attack followed by a resonance. The conceptual framework is based on two contrasting emotional states, hope and loneliness. In order to communicate these emotions through music I created two contrasting sonic ideas. Hope is represented by static and stable sounds, loneliness by unstable and active sounds. Integrating Ghosts’ harmonic content was inspired by the idea of creating non-equal-temperament vertical sonorities that contain beatings or various “colorations'' through their microtonal intonation. In addition, the source material for the electroacoustic layer is derived from recordings of an early 1970s PolyFusion synthesizer and an impulse response recording from a conch shell.

Taken Pieces Broken Whole is a piece whose sonic morphology was based on a scream. To transduce the scream through the ensemble the cellos are constantly using overpressure and other noisy techniques to distort their sound while the pianos drone with powerful low frequencies. The two pianist also slam large clusters to create big bursts of explosions.

Stealing Time is a saxophone solo that utilizes electronics. The piece consists of the performer mainly trilling microtonal intervals in an ascending pattern with endings punctuated with multiphonics and growling. I consider this piece to partially be a perceptual study where the sonic space of the saxophone is slowly filled by an ascending gesture of trills. As this sonic space is filled the length of the individual trills becomes faster and the intervals of the trills get closer. This allows for different perceptions of the same gesture as it becomes filled with different trilled intervals based on the overtone series. I also consider the trill itself to be a liminal state in between two sustained notes and a melody. Although I do consider this piece to be a perceptual study for the audience I also consider it a piece of music that has its own narrative as well.