Concert Music

Piece for Piano with a looper pedal with reverb effects, pre-recordings, EQ level adjustments, and narrator.

Text from Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven".

Jordan Chen, piano
David Dest, narrator
Charles Stacy, composer/audio mixer

Original piano recording, Houstan Hall, Boston Conservatory
Subsequent performance, Jordan Hall, NEC

Hommage à "Voiles" for Electro-Acoustic Piano, Looper Effects Pedal, and Narrator

This piece for string quartet is meant to illustrate crashing down onto the surface of an alien planet and then the atmosphere and environment around (inspired by New Horizon's recent visit to Pluto)

Worcester Chamber Music Society
Krista Buckland Reisner, violin 1
Rohan Gregory, violin 2
Peter Sulski, viola
David Russell, cello

Performed in Ipswitch Hall, Boston Conservatory

Thumbnail: NASA, Pluto's Atmosphere

Approximating Atmosphere 9 - for String Quartet

Short piece inspired by a kinetic sculpture at the MIT Museum. Also inspired by "The Knight Bus" soundtrack in The Prisoner of Askaban, and, unfortunately, me trying to see how many quotes for Stravinsky I can write in one piece.

Recorded by Transient Canvas
Amy Advocat, bass clarinet
Matt Sharrock, marimba

Recorded at The Record Co., Boston, MA
Mixed by Jamie Rowe

another dream machine - for Bass Clarinet and Marimba (and optional Flexatone)

Escaping the Tomb (excerpt from "A Short Quest for an Ancient Relic")

Originally composed for Andover Dance Group
Performance recording: 7 MAR 2016, Mission Dolores Basillica

Dreams of Terpsichore - Ballet for Flute, String Trio, and Percussion

ANNA STACY, mezzo-soprano
CHARLES STACY, viola
CHRISTOPHER WALTER, piano

Une nuit j’ai dormi le soleil allumé
Un tango d’interrogations me demandait la lune
Je n’aurais su lui répondre
Que cette fameuse lune était bleue de lointaine
De vingtaine mon âge ingrat se suffisait à la lumière de paraffine
Mais le soleil toujours allumé s’inquiétait de sa défunte soeur
Je lui promis pour soulagement pour ce ciel en nature morte
Un Manuel de Falla qui pour minuit ferait naître un amour éternel
Celui où se conjuguent
Les gestes habiles d’un soir revêtu.

A night I slept, the sun illuminated
a tango of questions asked me for the Moon
I could not know how to answer
that this famous moon was blue from far away
Of my twenties, my ungrateful age was sufficient by the light of paraffin
But the Sun, still turned on, worried about his deceased sister
I promised him relief for the skies in still life
A Manuel de Falla, which, for midnight would give birth to an eternal love
the one in which together they meld
the skilful gestures of a coated evening.

Le soleil allumé - a short song for medium voice, solo string, and piano

FORREST EIMOLD, piano/organ
CHARLES STACY, celeste
SERGIO DE IUDICIBUS, harpsichord
CHRISTOPHER WALTER. piano

Broken Suite for Keyboards is an experiment in a variety of techniques for repetition from aleatory and tone-rows to fugues. Each movement starts with a tonal exposition, but quickly transforms into separate section that explores different styles, sets of notes, and tempos. The first movement, for organ, explores chromaticism, and more specifically, how pitches a semi-tone apart played by the organ interact. The short second movement explores different modes and utilizes the fantastical sounds of arpeggiated celeste. The longer third movement, for piano, inspired by the music of Messiaen, explores the repetition of motifs and note sets. The minimalist fourth movement, for harpsichord, draws inspiration from Bach. The fifth movement combines the four instruments – and the four musicians use stopwatches in order to correctly change the group of notes being played. In the entire piece, the chords of E minor, A♭major, F# minor, and B♭major (in that order), recur, mostly at the conclusion of each movement, and complete, in the bigger pictures, the final tone-row of the piece:
E, G, B,   A♭, C, E♭,   F#, A, C#,   B♭, D, F

Alliteration (Piano)

TIFFANY TIEN, vibraphone
- Text by ERICA NORK -
All things good are wild and free,
Light as a whistle in raw wind,
Breathless and alive
 
Light off for the warmth that must be Spirit!
Some raw spring, new wind, wading
In the ebbing and flowing of feeling,
Shimmering,
Watching bright filaments float on.
 
Two hands pressed upward. So, this,
This is light, the soul of all that’s good
And restless and alive: in a moment,
Nothing, yet all of it, all at once. 

15 MAY 2016 Fidelio Society

Bright Filaments, Shimmering - a prayer for choir and vibraphone

Royal Academy Contemporary Ensemble
St. Ethelburga's Bishopgate

27 JUN 2017

Royal Academy Contemporary Ensemble

REASONS WHY IT LOOPS IN MY HEAD - for soprano and ensemble

Composer & Producer
Soundtracks for all media
Genre-defying electronic music
Violin and keys for The Fightscuffs

cbs3music@gmail.com