Commissions/Premieres

Material from Divum Ficta - Live-Set  
The first performance of Divum Ficta will be in Fall 2021

Divum Ficta / Lucky Skies (electronics only)

Commissioned by Li-Teng Huang and PIPAEnsemble
Pipa: Li-Teng Huang
Cello: Joe Wan

2025.05.03 Zhongshan Auditorium, Taipei City, Taiwan

群峰層浪 (Layering waves across the mountain peaks)，給琵琶、大提琴與電子音樂
(2025)

此作品受黃立騰與琵琶雅集委託，以台北的相關地景與記憶為發想創作，於二零二五年春季完稿。

在《群峰層浪》中，我所聚焦的是環山縱走，當風吹越山嶺、層疊的群草化成一片浪濤的景象。──在我的記憶中，在山嵐與磺氣氤氳間，春夏時是滿山綠草如茵，入秋之後則披上雲霧與芒草交織成的蒼茫。在除了風聲之外只剩下寂靜的峰頂，偶爾可以望見遠方的海，一片無盡湛藍、亦是一海未知的深遂。自從十多年前搬至沼澤地帶旅居之後，山逐漸於我賦予了特殊的意義：它象徵遺世獨立的境地，象徵不斷流逝的時間與無盡憧憬，也見證了天地萬物的恆常與多變。關於山嶺群峰的記憶是美麗、感慨、深刻、並且疼痛的。我在樂曲中探索琵琶、大提琴、以及電子音樂之間的，跨越時空與文化的對話，以共構一個有機的聲景空間：如同人生的波瀾，層層疊疊推向孤寂的峰頂，推向永無止盡的未來。

Layering waves across the mountain peaks (2025) for pipa, cello, and live electronics

Adrift

Dream Gloaming (2025) for fixed media
*Originally for 4 channels, here is the stereo remixed version.

Music Composition: Chen-Hui Jen

Poem in Chinese is AI-generated by Chen-Hui Jen's language model. 
English Translation / Editor: Chen-Hui Jen

《暮之沉降》

在未醒與未眠之間
聲音尚未找到名字
只是一縷呼吸
隨暮色，散落為霧

有光未至
卻在眼皮下漾動
像河的暗潮
將一切牽向無岸

Dream Gloaming

In the liminal space between waking and sleeping,
A sound yet unnamed
But a breath
fades into haze with the twilight.

Light hasn’t arrived,
yet it flickers beneath the eyelids—
like a hidden river current,
drawing everything toward a shoreless drift.

Dream Gloaming (2025) for fixed media - Stereo Remix

Alto Saxophone: Chun-Hao Ku
2025.08.02 @Forum Music Auditorium (Taipei, Taiwan)

Still Deepening (2025) for alto saxophone and live electronics

A cloud burst is a sudden, very heavy rainfall, sometimes accompanied by hail and thunder, which is capable of creating flood conditions. The piece, for amplified piano trio and electronics, is an aphoristic composition that leads the listener into the storm, exploring sounds, gestures, textures, and timbres associated with water and rain.

Performance by the Neave Trio.

Cloud Burst

Crossed Wires is an immersive composition for amplified viola, percussion (featuring vibraphone and glockenspiel), and electronics, commissioned by the Piedmont Duo.

The piece revolves around sounds associated with telephones, communication, and miscommunication, weaving a narrative that spans both historical and modern devices. It incorporates the auditory essence of antique phones, mid-century landlines, and contemporary cellphones. The soundscape includes clicks and beeps from picking up, setting down, or turning off phones; dial tones; telephones vibrating and ringing; busy signals; out-of-service messages; fax machines; customer service interactions; "hold music"; answering machines; and more.

Crossed Wires also delves into instrumental synthesis, exploring the timbral relationships between the themed sounds and the instrumental palette. Hundreds of string and percussion recordings are integrated with the communication-themed materials, layering textures and transforming the original recordings into instrumentally synthesized interpretations. This fusion creates a dynamic interplay between the organic and electronic, blurring the lines between traditional instrumentation and auditory imagery.

Performance by the Piedmont Duo.


Crossed Wires

Into the tree waves, for solo piano
林壑聽濤，為鋼琴獨奏
(2023)

此作品於2023年二月，我在美國紐約柯普蘭之屋擔任駐村作曲家期間開始執筆創作，同年夏季完成定稿。

在駐村期間，我終日被靜謐的樹林圍繞，觀賞枝葉間的晨昏變化，因而在鋼琴上找尋這些充滿靈感的聲音並譜成此曲。在那段享受著寂靜、遺世獨立的日子裡，我聽見了許多美麗的瞬息：在清風吹拂中的枝葉擺動、在雲彩霞光中變化的天色、偶而透出的月光、從遠處傳來又逐漸逝去的火車、風鈴、與鐘聲……

全曲的結構便如在風中搖曳的樹濤般，充斥著近似即興的流動節奏與彈性速度變化，在意境上大致分為幾個連續的段落：風起光曳、樹影呢喃、清風拂濤、漸暮之鐘、風止明月。《林壑聽濤》作為我生命中最為寧靜優美的一段時光印記，這首樂曲受委託於、並題獻給我的鋼琴家好友陳宜鍾。

I began this work during my residence in February 2023 at the Copland House in Cortlandt Manor, New York, while a recipient of the Copland House Residency Award, and completed it during the summer of the same year. 

During those days at the Copland House, I was surrounded by quiet woods and constantly watched the changing light between branches day and night.  I was inspired to explore my reflections on the piano and then create this work.  Enjoying such a peaceful solitude, I heard many beautiful cross-sensory moments: dancing leaves in the wind, changing glows over the sky, sporadic moonlight penetrating through the dark woods, occasional trains, wind chimes, and bells approaching and fading into the distance.  

The work’s syntax resembles the tree waves in the wind and is filled with a constant rhythmic flow and flexible tempo that evokes a spontaneous nature and consists of five continuous states: wind rising from the dancing lights; whispering tree shadows; in the breezy waves; fading bells in twilight colors; and moonrise over the calming woods.  This work, into the tree waves, reflects one of the most exquisite memories in my life and was commissioned by and is dedicated to my dear pianist friend, Yi-Chung Chen.

into the tree waves (2023) for solo piano

Performed by the String Noise Duo and the composer at the Roulette in NYC, October 4, 2023

I composed in the canopy of mist… 在林霧中 for the String Noise Duo from Fall 2022 through Spring 2023. The work was conceived as part of program that would contains works by Alvin Lucier and new works written in memory of Alvin. I drew my primary inspiration for the work from a Fall trip I took with my wife to the high forested mountains of Taipingshan 太平⼭ in Taiwan, a trip where the sky was always bathed in drifting fog or differing strengths of cold rain and mist. While hiking or just looking out the window I was frequently struck by how both static and dynamic these scenes were. Thinking of either the constant movement or dynamic stillness in many of Alvin Lucier’s works, I composed this work with a number of fluid sections that reflect my memories of different moments from that trip.

in the canopy of mist… 在林霧中 was premiered at the 2023 ISCM Miami New Music Festival. The work is dedicated to Conrad Harris and Pauline Kim Harris and written in memory Alvin Lucier, whose music has and continues to deeply change and enrich the way I listen.

September 28, 2023
Miami, FL

in the canopy of mist… 在林霧中 (2023) for two violins and live electronics

Performed by Ku Chun-Hao and the composer at the Forum Music, Taipei on August 2, 2025

“Echoes from a Mountain” for soprano saxophone and live electronics is poetically inspired by
traditional Tibetan Buddhist ritual music – puja in Tibetan. In particular, the many different types
of timbral and microtonal trills as well as the use of many direct repetitions are meant to evoke the music that the Rgya-gling – a traditional Tibetan double-reed instrument – performs in this music. In addition, following this inspiration the work ends with a rhythmic and tone-based transcription of a Chinese reading of the Great Compassion Dhāraņī (大悲咒)played in the highest non-altissimo register of the soprano saxophone to evoke an image of shrieking vultures circling the flesh and bones of a desiccated body.

I composed “Echoes from a Mountain” for my good friend Chun-Hao Ku, who greatly helped me
better understand the mechanisms that go into performing the saxophone and the premiered the work in March 2025.

Jacob David Sudol
May 15, 2025
Kaohsiung, Taiwan 

Echoes from a Mountain (2025) for soprano saxophone and live electronics

Performance of Kari Besharse's "Palus" commissioned by Accordant Commons on March 18, 2016 at Automata Los Angeles
 Performers: Tany Ling, Argenta Walther, Stephanie Aston

Kari Besharse Palus

Performance of Carolyn Chen's "fly blue between light" commissioned by Accordant Commons on March 18, 2016 at Automata, Los Angeles.
Performers: Marja Liisa Kay, Tany Ling

Carolyn Chen fly blue between light

Performance of Chen-Hui Jen's "In Fading Colors of Autumn Hills" commissioned by Accordant Commons on March 18, 2016 Automata, Los Angeles.
Performers: Tany Ling, Argenta Walther, Stephanie Aston

Chen-Hui Jen In Fading Colors of Autumn Hills

Performance of Michelle Lou's "untitled for D.T.," commissioned by Accordant Commons, on March 18, 2016 at Automata, Los Angeles.
Performers: Argenta Walther, Stephanie Aston

Michelle Lou untitled for D.T.

Performance of Fernanda Aoki Navarro's "H," commissioned by Accordant Commons, on March 18, 2016 at Automata, Los Angeles.
Performers: Marja Liisa Kay, Stephanie Aston

Carolyn Chen fly blue between light

Accordant Commons

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