Name: Two Pieces for solo piano by Benjamin Webster
Duration: 10 min 22 s
Description: Premiere performance by Arseniy Gusev, on March 7th, 2024 in New Haven, Connecticut.

Premiere performance by Arseniy Gusev, on March 7th, 2024 in New Haven, Connecticut.

Two Pieces for solo piano

Live performance by the Viridian Strings on August 28th, 2025 in Traverse City, Michigan.

Air On Haydn's Name

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Gary Gygax (1938-2008) - Given all of the artistic and scientific people I've covered so far, why write an Hommage to Gary Gygax, the creator of the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons? When I set out to write this series, I wanted to pay respects to people who inspired me to create. Gary was the first. I was introduced to D&D in the 3rd grade, and I became fascinated with it immediately. I used to sit in class drawing dungeon maps on graph paper instead of listening to my lessons. This was my first real creative outlet, and where I first encountered the mechanics of telling a story. For instance, if I drew a long hallway on the graph paper, and then drew in a secret door halfway down on the left wall, this in itself posed many questions - questions that I had to answer. Why is there a secret door here? What is it hiding? Is it an object of significance relating to the rest of the story? Is it a dangerous monster, sealed away forever? How does that relate to what the adventurers are going through? My 3rd-grade mind was sent wandering with almost endless possibilities. Through Gary's creation, I learned to craft a narrative - a skill that became invaluable in writing music. How could I not write an Hommage to Gary?

Hommage à Gary Gygax (Official Album Version)

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Eddie Van Halen (1955-2020) – Eddie Van Halen, guitarist of the band Van Halen, was, simply put, the person that inspired me to become a musician.  I remember the moment vividly.  It was 1984—I was 11 years old—sitting in my dad’s recliner, listening to Van Halen’s album 1984 on his Walkman.  The beginning of side B (of the cassette) starts with the song Hot for Teacher, and features this blazing explosion of finger tapping from Eddie.  I heard that, and right then and there, I decided I was going to learn to play the guitar.  Much of the piece uses the tapping pattern that Eddie used in Hot for Teacher, as well as nods to moments from Jump and Eruption.

Hommage à Eddie Van Halen (Official Album Version)

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Neil Peart (1952-2020) - One of my earliest true musical influences was the Canadian prog-rock band Rush. Considered by many to be one of the greatest rock drummers in the history of the genre, Neil Peart introduced me to many advanced musical concepts long before I stepped into the halls of a music school. These concepts included odd time signatures, mixed meters, metric modulations, thoroughly composed rhythms, and intense but metered virtuosity. I have always been captivated by his drum solo from their 1988 live tour release A Show of Hands. Neil plays a masterfully composed and executed drum solo in the middle of their legendary instrumental YYZ. In it, Neil created a simple melody on the glockenspiel in opposition and contrast to the thundering drum rhythms of the rest of the solo. It's this melody, the rhythms from the drums, and the YYZ Morse Code rhythm that I focused on in this Hommage.

Hommage à Neil Peart (Official Album Version)

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano and Looper Pedal

Hommage a Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) – Living life as a synesthete, Pollock’s work has always fascinated me.  Looking at these huge canvases, for me, is like setting off an explosion of sound in my head.  For this work, I wanted to try to represent that aurally.  Using his painting Convergence as a model, I assigned the various colors present in that work to different musical sonorities.  Then, I literally traced a path through the painting, and translated the painting into music.  The material on the looper represents the white/gray background, with the played material representing everything else sitting on top of it.

Hommage à Jackson Pollock (Official Album Version)

Commissioned by Clara Kim
Completed October 6, 2025

Threads Strung Bare is a reflection on the unassuming significance of well-worn, frayed clothes. Growing up, I would wear the same shirts as long as I could, often to the point that their hems would come undone and their seams split apart. It wasn't any kind of fashion statement; many of these shirts were cheap memorabilia, given out at the start of a school year or at some youth event. I came to see them as little time capsules during years of rapid change among my friends and me. My family was always too sentimental to toss out my old clothes even after I had long outgrown them, and so my motley shirt collection has always made the same journeys across the globe that I have.

Musically, Threads Strung Bare is composed of two main ideas: the first a sparse, almost pointillistic soundworld filled with flared harmonics and wide leaps, and the second a warm, cyclical sequence of triads in the violin's lowest reaches. The two, initially separate, blend together, lush harmonies fraying away into spare harmonics and worn, distant tones accelerating into richly felt tapestries. The piece moves between these worlds, evoking the poignant nostalgia of gradually dissipating childhood memories.

All thanks to Clara for commissioning, recording, and helping revise the piece.

Threads Strung Bare, for solo violin

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Mandy Morris (1980-2002) – Amanda Akers Morris was, put quite simply, my first love. I met her when I was an undergraduate at the University of Texas, and I was fascinated by her from the start. She was a very talented singer, but also an artist and poet. She possessed an insatiable curiosity and felt things deeply. Tragically, in 2002 while auditioning in NY for graduate school, she was struck by a vehicle and lost her life. To say that all of this changed me fundamentally as a person would be an understatement. I was confronted by true loss and true grief for the first time in my life, and it would be years before I really fully recovered from it – well, as “fully” as is possible. 

At Mandy’s funeral, her mother gave me a CD labeled “For our Tony.” It was a series of recordings that Mandy had made of songs that she had written - just her in a practice room playing piano and singing. Some were complete songs, but others were just fragments of ideas. It was one of these unfinished fragments that I latched onto to build this Hommage.


Hommage à Mandy Morris - Official Album Version

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a John Dowland (1563-1626) – While I was a Doctoral student at Indiana University, I got to fulfill one of my dreams—to study the Renaissance lute with master lutenist Nigel North.  The music of John Dowland has always resonated strongly with me, and I have performed many of his works over the years, on classical guitar, lute, and even electric guitar.  This Hommage uses his song In Darkness Let Me Dwell as a kind of backdrop, or skeleton.  My own interpretations of his music, as well as many veiled quotations from his other works are woven into the fabric of this piece.

Hommage à John Dowland - Official Album Version

Composer currently based in New Haven, CT.

Two Pieces for solo piano

Benjamin Webster

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