"skin, echo, memory, marrow" was premiered in March 2022 by the Bienen Contemporary/Early Vocal Ensemble at Northwestern University, conducted by Donald Nally.

The piece contains only 12 different words:
deluminesce
dysmorphic
echolalia
glossophagia
gossamer
marrow
memory
nowhere
remain
skin
sorrow
sulphur

The words are broken up into small units of sound, sometimes sub-syllabic, and presented in combination and juxtaposition, reducing the words to sound objects that can be compared and layered.

skin, echo, memory, marrow

Benjamin J. Penwell writes music and lives in Chicago. He is a PhD candidate in Composition & Music Technology at Northwestern University, and holds degrees from Boston University (M.Mus, Composition & Music Theory) and University of Oregon (B.Mus, Composition).  //  His music explores texture & timbre, drone & sustain, quiet & silence, noise & consonance, beating & acoustic phenomena, and tuning & microtonality. He likes fermatas.  //  He is interested in extreme metal, ambient and drone music, harsh noise, and early music.  //  He likes guitar pedals & digital sound processing, distortion & power chords, reverb & delay, synthesis & sound design, and recording & audio editing.

skin, echo, memory, marrow

benjamin j. penwell