Primal Scream is a work for 4 toms, 2 cymbals, vibes, marimba and amplified voice. The piece was commissioned by the Charlotte New Music Festival in early 2014. The work is inspired by the primitive nature of the human mind and spirit. Buried deep within our subconscious are primal instincts, dreams and fears. In this composition, I was asked to write a "dramatic" piece for percussion soloist. After a few weeks of deep thought, the title and musical material randomly came to me. Rather than being inspired by a pre-existing text, I chose to use phonemes from the International Phonetic Alphabet. I did not want the piece to be associated with any words created by someone else, rather, I wanted the voice to be gibberish, a frenzy of nonsensical vocalizations, a representation of our inner animal. This recording is the live premiere performed by Josh Perry of the Iktus Percussion Quartet at the Charlotte New Music Festival in 2014.

"Primal Scream" for Percussion Solo (2014)

"Above Water" for amplified violin was composed during the summer of 2016. The title refers to a struggle, one that we all often refer to as “keeping our heads above water.” The overall structure of the composition falls into a quasi-rondo form. The opening melody is an interchange of open pitches and natural and artificial harmonics. The shifts in timbre presented in the opening melody becomes the primary thematic material, showing up in different forms as the composition progresses. The lyrical sections are juxtaposed with moments of grotesque sounds produced by means of grinding and scratching the bow against the strings along with double stops. Quarter tone harmonies are another staple of this piece. The use of a distortion pedal enhances the effects of the struggle, in which musical lines are layered to create a dissonant wall of sound, representing the barriers we encounter in our lives, all the while keeping our heads “above water”. Performed by Alexandra Birch at Arizona State University, November 2016.

"Above Water" for Amplified Violin (2016)

Composition for Soprano Sax, Alto Sax and Piano. Commissioned by Tyler Flowers

"Pendulum" for Soprano Saxophone, Alto Saxophone and Piano (2016)

"Sirens" was commissioned by the Ambassador Trio (Jack Liang, Jeremy Ruth and Patrick Englert)at Arizona State University. The piece is inspired by the Greek mythology of the sirens that lured sailors in and ended in their untimely deaths at sea. Many historians believe there were three greek sirens that lured the sailors to their deaths, perfect for this instrumentation. The sounds in the piece are also inspired by my 2 year old son (Jameson) and the pitch materials were derived from his musical toys, a total of 10 pitches from the 12 tone chromatic scale organized within a matrix.

"Sirens" for 2 Bb Clarinets and Bass Clarinet (2017)

This is an experimental piece I composed in which I took audio from a previous piece I composed in 2016 for Soprano and Piano and manipulated the sounds to create a new, fixed media composition. This is my first "serious" attempt at a acousmatic composition.

Drifting (awake) 2017

Commissioned by the Valencia International Performance Academy and Festival (VIPA 2017) for Ensemble Interface.

Spheres for Flute, Percussion, Piano and Cello

"Above Water" for solo violin, composed in 2016. Performed by Kurtis Parker at Bowling Green State University in 2018.

Lux Aeterna is my doctoral dissertation composition. The text, in its original Latin, is from the Requiem Mass. The pitch material for the four voices is directly derived from the original Gregorian Chant (B, C#, D, E, F#, G, A). The primary pitch materials for the instrumental ensemble are drawn from the overtone series, with the fundamental of B natural. As found in the natural overtone series, the chords produced in this composition include microtones found both naturally from the series along with microtones added by the composer to create harmonic friction. This treatment of microtonal materials is juxtaposed with the “pure” nature of the B minor modal scale sung by the 4 vocalists.
Lux Aeterna uses the performance space so that the sixteen performers and conductor surround the audience in an oval shape. Entrances of instruments are determined by their position around the audience and the way in which those sounds interact with one another across the space of the hall. The instruments are strategically placed so that timbres can be balanced in a specific way and the listener can hear the pitches blend in the acoustics of the hall. The goal is to create an immersive listening experience for the audience.
While composing this piece, which I started during my time in Boston and Spain last summer, I wanted to combine old musical elements with newer ones. I have always been interested in chant music and drones, and the way these sounds reverberate inside a large space, such as a cathedral. For many years I envisioned composing a sacred composition for choir and orchestra, and this finally was my opportunity to do so. The piece is inspired by darkness and light: not physically, but spiritually. Throughout the composition the darkness (the harmony in the instruments) is pitted against the light (the vocals). The struggle continues until the last section of the piece, when the opposing forces come out of the darkness and into the eternal light.

Lux Aeterna (2018)

Written for the Vienna Music Festival and performed by Ensemble PHACE for Flute (Bass Flute), Clarinet (Bass Clarinet), Violin, Viola, Cello and Double Bass. (NOTE: Long, quiet sections in this piece involve the performers pretending to play their instruments. They mimic playing what is notated in the score. This piece should ideally be seen in a video or live performance.)

"So how do we live, knowing that we will forget just about all of it — and that just about all of it will forget about us? Memories, like dreams, are essentially verbs rather than nouns — things we do, not things we have. Things we make. And ultimately, things we become, when everything else has been reduced to the spaces between the flickerings of a flame."
-Eben S. Scharwtz, Ph.D

Spaces Between (Ensemble PHACE)

Spaces Between (2018)

Performed by Ensemble Dal Niente at June in Buffalo in 2019. This is the American premiere of this composition, first performed by Ensemble PHACE in Vienna, Austria in 2018. Moments of silence in this composition are actually filled with the performers mimicking playing their instruments.

190606-Ensemble Dal Niente Par

Spaces Between

In my composition "hinge" I wanted to create something different from my other works in the past, yet familiar to me in my dreams. The combination of Piccolo, Percussion and Viola is by no means a standard instrumentation, but I was excited by the potential of this unorthodox grouping of instruments. When beginning work on this piece, I remembered something that my first composition professor told me years ago, in which he said “you just have to squeeze through the cracks and hinges.” That word, “hinge,” always stuck with me. What he was referring to was the struggle of an artist (and life), finding any which way possible to make it through to the other side. I waited many years to use this in a composition, always waiting for the most opportune moment to do so. It didn't truly come into fruition until years later when raising my newborn son while working on my doctorate degree. As a matter of fact, when I played a rehearsal recording of this piece for my wife, she said she heard swing sets. I thought to myself “that is perfect, the sound of swings, as if in a distant landscape, a meeting of past and present worlds.” 

This recording is the premiere, performed by Erinn Frechette (Piccolo), Stephanie Wilson (Percussion) and Matt Darsey (Viola)at the Providence Chamber Music Series in Charlotte, North Carolina.

hinge (2018)

The music of Christopher Mitchel has been performed and read by such artists and groups as Irvine Arditti, Ensemble Interface, Ensemble PHACE, and Ensemble Dal Niente. His works have been performed and featured at the Outside the Box New Music Festival, the Charlotte New Music Festival, the North American Saxophone Alliance Regional Conference at New Mexico State University, the Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice at the New England Conservatory, Clarinetfest 2017 (International Clarinet Association) in Orlando, Florida, the Valencia International Performance Academy and Festival in Valencia, Spain, the Biennial North American Saxophone Alliance National Conference at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, the 2018 Bowling Green State University Graduate Student Music Conference, the 2018 Vienna Summer Music Festival, the World Sax Congress in Zagreb, Croatia, and the 2018 Belgian Clarinet Academy in Belgium, Iceland, Idaho State University, Dickinson State University and most recently at the June in Buffalo festival at the University at Buffalo, the New York Viola Society in New York City and Clarinetfest 2019 (International Clarinet Association) at the University of Tennessee.

Christopher Mitchell

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