I just saw these videos from a performance of Nine Tas directed by Mike Edgerton
at the University of Malaya. It’s great to hear the music return to this part of the world, since I began work on the piece while traveling in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Category Archives: Music
In the Backyard with Kelley and Matt
I’ve traveled long distances for gigs before, but Friday I’ll just walk around the corner and down the street for a backyard concert featuring Kelley McRae and Matt Castelein. (Weather permitting; In the event of rain we’ll be inside.) Kelley and Matt are wrapping up an album release tour for The Wayside. I’ll be opening with a song-oriented set of banjo and electronics pieces including at least one new tune. Hope to see you in the ‘hood!
Friday May 20 6:30pm
Kelley McRae
Holland Hopson
1523 13th St
Tuscaloosa AL 35401
Buy tix
Iron Giant Revives Metronome Quartet
Iron Giant Percussion will perform my work Quartet 60x88x120x208 for four metronomes at the Hoover Library Theatre tomorrow. The concert is part of a 20th anniversary celebration of the Birmingham Art Music Alliance. Quartet 60x88x120x208 was performed during BAMA’s first season of concerts (January 22, 1996). It’s one of my more widely performed compositions, but I don’t think it has been heard in Birmingham since then.
Thursday April 28 7:30pm
BAMA presents Iron Giant Percussion
Hoover Library Theater
200 Municipal Drive
Hoover AL 35216Free Admission
The program will also include music by Drew Pendergrass, Tom Reiner, Mark Lackey, Jody Landers, Monroe Golden and works by Iron Giant Percussion.
Download a .pdf score for Quartet 60x88x120x208
My Turn on the Turner Show
Tonight at 6pm I take my turn playing on the Turner Williams Jr. MFA Show. I’ve been bugging Turner as regularly as we run into each other about playing together some day; that some day has finally arrived.
Monday April 25 6pm
Turner Williams Jr. : MFA Thesis Exhibition and Performance Series
Sella-Granata Gallery
109 Woods Hall
University of Alabama
Tuscaloosa AL
Come check out Turner’s multi-layered collages and sculptures and his use of video feedback. I’ll be slinging banjo and other electronic implements of destruction/delight. Stay tuned for more musical guests at the exhibition through May 1.
Follows From Hummingbird
Here’s a recording of the premiere performance of Follows from Hummingbird for 3 or more sustaining instruments. The performers are Hillary Tidman, flute; Brad Whitfield, clarinet; and Laura Usiskin, cello.
I’m so happy with this first performance; the musicians nailed it. My scores often require a period of workshopping—work that reaches beyond typical rehearsal activity to include comparing alternate realizations, discussing timing, and lots of listening—so premiere performances can be risky. These performers, however, really embraced the spirit of the piece and pulled it off with elegance and aplomb.
The work is based on Hummingbirds (1997) a group of small Oil paintings on linen by the artist Enrique Martínez Celaya.
Hearing Metal 3
For the second time in a month I get to be a guest percussionist with the University of Alabama Percussion Ensemble directed by Tim Feeney. The concert is presented by Sonic Frontiers and features guest artist Greg Stuart. We’re performing Hearing Metal 3 by Michael Pisaro.
The work is for 16 suspended cymbals and electronics. The cymbals are bowed and activated by dropping beans, rice and millet on them. Such amazing sounds! Greg described one part of it in rehearsal as “listening to a radio tuned between stations.” If you know and love that sound (you know who you are), then you’ll understand why I’m so excited about tonight’s performance. If you’re bewildered or intrigued, you should come hear this. You’ll never listen to your radio (or look at beans, rice and millet) the same way again.
Carefully Unfolded Premiere by Wind Quintet Unfolds Sunday
My piece …then carefully unfolded and placed in… receives its premiere performance tomorrow at 2:30 pm. It’s a big work: 6 movements that each function as a kind of canon, a dronal piece that moves from sunny lydian to spacey locrian. The work is scored for any 5 sustaining instruments and is being performed by
- Barbara Harrington, flute
- Jim Sullivan, oboe
- Brian Viliunas, clarinet
- Tariq Masri, bassoon
- Kevin Kozak, horn
For readers keeping track, I posted about this piece in progress earlier.
Sunday April 10 2:30pm
BAMA presents An Afternoon of Music for Wind Quintet and Piano
Brock Recital Hall at Samford University
800 Lakeshore Dr
Homewood AL 35209
Cicada Consort Marathon
Tomorrow I’ll be performing as part of the Cicada Consort Charity Marathon. The music begins at noon and continues until 8pm. Proceeds from the event will benefit the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Disease Research. My performances will be in the sixth(!) concert of the day (around 5pm) and will include “Steel Bearing Load” for lap steel and computer, “Windowed Pulses” for transducers and computer (one of my radicans project pieces) and maybe a song for banjo and live electronics. Check out the full program.
Saturday March 26 12-8pm
Cicada Consort Charity Marathon
Moody Music Hall
Cicada Consort Charity Marathon
Moody Music Hall
810 2nd Ave
Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35401
Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35401
The event is free with a donation to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Disease Research through: http://
Follows From Hummingbird Premieres at AEIVA
Follows From Hummingbird, my brand-new piece for three or more sustaining instruments, gets its premiere on Thursday at the Abroms-Engel Institute for Visual Arts in a concert of chamber music inspired by the visual art of Enrique Martínez Celaya. The piece will be performed by Hillary Tidman, flute; Laura Usiskin, cello; and Brad Whitfield, clarinet. The event begins at 5pm with a reception and time to take in the artwork, followed by the concert at 5:30pm.
Thursday March 10 5:00pm
BAMA presents Chamber Music at AEIVA
University of Alabama at Birmingham Abroms-Engel Institute for Visual Arts
1221 10th Avenue South
Birmingham AL 35205
5:00pm Reception and art viewing
5:30pm Concert
Follows From Hummingbird is one of a series of pieces I’ve completed recently that uses a circular structure to organize musical modules. The middle section of this piece employs a spirograph-style traversal of the points around the circle which generates a charming flower shape in the score; a welcome side-effect of the process.
Remembering Austin Cobra Players
Shawn Feeney has posted an appreciation of the Austin Cobra Players. He writes of Zorn’s Cobra: “..it never dictates what to play, just how to interact.”