I composed TWENTY COVIDITTIES between July 31st and Oct. 19th, 2020 amidst suffocating smoke, impending conflagrations, destructive riots, politico-ideological turmoil, all whilst in the throes of a pernicious global pandemic. These are intended to evoke various events that occurred during this tumultuous time period, especially from the perspective of one residing in Portland, Oregon (an acknowledged epicenter of civil unrest).

TWENTY COVIDITTIES Op. 116 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs 17 MUSICOSYNCRATIC QUIRKS, CROTCHETS, MAGGOTS & MOOD SLIDES from HERR DOKTOR SQUIRCLE'S INEXTRICABLE "NEW PERPLEXITY" Op. 127 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. 

ABSINTHIAN PERFUMIGATIONS evokes the partakement of rich, sweet liqueurs and exotic, decadent desserts amidst drowning in one’s irrevocable sorrows and self-recriminations. American composer Ernesto Ferreri describes this piece as “a splash of harmonic colors with cunningly devised cascading figurations.” KAKADMISCHES DIORAMA is a quasi-satirical representation of the infectious diarrhea produced in academic music departments worldwide. RESTING ON ONE’S QUARRELS is what one does when a pestiferous Internet troll has been quietly laid to rest. NIGHT THOUGHTS are what keep one tossing and turning into the wee hours when one’s brain is afire with intrusive and obsessive cogitations. THE DANCING ROBODUNCES OF DUMMKOPFSBURG was composed in homage to those obstinate souls who persist in their denial of the Death, Destruction, and Damnation besieging them from every quarter. TEEMING IMPERMAFROST is a colorful musical visualization of all the deadly viruses, poisonous bacteria, toxic gasses, and dangerous vermin that are being resuscitated by the progressive melting of our planet’s polar ice caps. REQUIESCAT was composed in memory of Noland’s friend and collaborator, composer/pianist ART MADDOX (1940-2020), who was a brilliant musician with a powerful intellect and a warm, generous spirit. RAPTUROUS HARRUMPHS are synonymous with snoot farts. ELEVEN-LEGGED WALTZ OF THE HARVARD RESISTANCE MOVEMENT is the battle song (without words) of disgruntled Harvard students. FIX SEXATION is a spoonerism for you-know-what as delineated by its rigid fixation on E-flat minor (the key associated with unappeased concupiscence). ELEGY IN HOMAGE TO OUR FOUR-LEGGED LOVED ONES was composed for the purpose of consoling those grieving the loss of their beloved feline/canine companions and/or any other furry quadrupeds for which they feel a deep and abiding affection. It was created as a companion piece to Alkan's Funeral March on the Death of a Parrot. NYMPHONYMANIACAL MINX ROLLICK is a tribute to incorrigible coquettes who chronically tease but fail to please. JADE IN THE WOODS was composed in honor of women (and, yes, men too!) who have been round the block a couple times too many. WE ARE NOT BEMUSED is a solemn admonition to those harboring vain delusions that they can get away scot-free with bamboozling persons of unimpeachable moral integrity. PANEGYRIC IN PRAISE OF THE EMPERORS OF TELEGRAPH AVENUE was composed in tribute to an enduring nose count of titular emperors who have governed the famous avenue, south of the UC Berkeley campus, since time immemorial. NIHILIST MODERNSKY CHIC is a companion piece to KAKADEMISCHES DIORAMA insofar as it spoofs the feigned high seriousness of would-be modernist fashionistas. In the spirit of quaint provincialism, WILDWOOD REVERIE was composed with confidence that anyone who has ever hiked the breathtakingly beautiful (well-nigh Brahmsian) Wildwood Trail in Forest Park, Portland, Oregon will identify with its distinctive ambience. Upon hearing this fantasy, American conductor/composer Keith Clark concurred that its mood was, indeed, reminiscent of aforesaid trail.

For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com.

17 MUSICOSYNCRATIC QUIRKS, CROTCHETS, MAGGOTS & MOOD SLIDES.…

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs RESTING ON ONE'S QUARRELS, Op. 127, No. 3 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: https://garynolandcomposer.com/

RESTING ON ONE'S QUARRELS, Op. 127, No. 3

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs KAKADEMISCHES DIORAMA, Op. 127, No. 2 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at:

KAKADEMISCHES DIORAMA, Op. 127, No. 2

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs THE DANCING ROBODUNCES OF DUMMKOPFSBURG, Op. 127, No. 5 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

THE DANCING ROBODUNCES OF DUMMKOPFSBURG, Op. 127, No. 5

GARY LLOYD NOLAND performs his NIGHT THOUGHTS for piano, Op. 127, No. 4. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

NIGHT THOUGHTS for piano, Op. 127, No. 4

ABSINTHIAN PERFUMIGATIONS for piano, Op. 127, No. 1 performed by the composer. Rich, lush, and luxuriously decadent. Imagine, if you will, partaking of a sumptuous dessert in an elegant café whilst pipe-dreaming euphorically of a profusion of improbabilities, and then topping it off with an absinthe espresso.… For more information on Gary Lloyd Noland, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

ABSINTHIAN PERFUMIGATIONS for piano, Op. 127, No. 1

Composer Gary Lloyd Noland performs his VARIATION ON AN INVISIBLE THEME for piano, No. 2, Op. 142, No. 8 (March 25th, 2023). For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

VARIATION ON AN INVISIBLE THEME for piano, No. 2, Op. 142, No. 8

COVOID from COVIDITTIES Op. 116, No. 1 portrays the Silent Assailant wreaking havoc everywhence and everywhither whilst remaining invisible to its victims, seemingly operating in a vacuum.
To read more about composer Gary Lloyd Noland, please visit his website at: https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

COVOID from TWENTY COVIDITTIES Op. 116, No. 1

QUARANTENACIOUSNESS is about maintaining a façade of unruffled composure and sanity during this global meltdown.
To learn more about composer Gary Lloyd Noland, go to his website at:https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

QUARANTENACIOUSNESS from 20 COVIDITTIES, Op. 116, No. 2

Composer Gary Lloyd Noland performs his COVIDÉCADENSE for piano, Op. 116, No. 5 (August 12th, 2020).  For more information on Gary Lloyd Noland, go to his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

COVIDÉCADENSE for piano, Op. 116, No. 5 (Aug. 12, 2020)

For more information on composer Gary Lloyd Noland, go to his website at: https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

COTTAGE FEVER from 20 COVIDITTIES, Op. 116, No. 3 (Aug. 18, 2020)

DESECRATION from 20 COVIDITTIES, Op. 116, No. 4  (Aug.20, 2020)

Resides in Portland, Oregon. Grew up in Berkeley, CA. Born in Seattle.  PhD, Harvard. “Gary Noland is one of the great composers of the 21st century.”—JACK RUMMEL, KGNU 88.5 FM, Boulder CO, “...iconoclastic, stylistic potpourri standards of giddy humor, no holds barred soup to nuts and high spirits.”—ROBERT LEVIN, pianist, musicologist, composer, "...a fleet-fingered, ebullient performer ... bright, witty and engaging.”—CHRISTIAN CAREY, SPLENDID MAGAZINE, “...distinctive, inventive ... subversive ... You can hardly be indifferent to Noland’s music and so I would urge you to try it.” —ROGER BLACKBURN, MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL, “...set in a dizzying harmonic language that loops uncontrollably through a wide-ranging gamut of possible and impossible tonalities ... The general effect is like watching wet paintings of 19th Century musical memorabilia drip into frazzled 21st Century oblivion...” —ALLEN GIMBEL, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “Mr. Noland writes as a ‘time traveler’ in styles long abandoned by most composers as well as styles so new as to not have been imagined but by him. This he accomplishes naturally, convincingly, with originality and true passion. His command of all musical languages and his ability to traverse musical time is nothing less than remarkable. Listen!”—DONALD MARTINO, Pulitzer Prize winning composer, “...mind-bending spiraling of focus which is truly breathtaking ... spectacular...”—CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN, composer, sound poet & radio producer, “I'm amazed at your harmonic skill. Haven't seen or heard anything like it from any one else—except yours truly—certainly not from your generation. It falls somewhere between Strauss and Mahler. Especially like how you are able to slip in and out from the tonal to the atonal—or near atonal...”—GEORGE ROCHBERG, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “...court jester to the classical establishment...”—PAYTON MACDONALD, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...florid and juicy...” —RICHARD BUELL, THE BOSTON GLOBE, “...an incredible aural web ... a great ostinato of American kitsch. Sul pont never sounded so good.”—RUSSELL STEINBERG, composer, conductor of the LOS ANGELES YOUTH ORCHESTRA, “...I am bowled over by the expertise of your music: you use certain elements from the 19th century and from jazz, etc., and just at the moment when I am about to say, OK, what else is new?, you do a number of things, such as speeding up, becoming wildly dissonant, modulating to a distant continent, stopping completely and throwing some kind of total surprise ... you seem to know exactly when to do what and how much. I don’t know anybody else who can do it!” —ANDREW IMBRIE, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “... remarkable stuff...”
—MAX MORATH, American ragtime pianist, composer, actor & author, “...a loony composer from Oregon...” —MAX SHEA, WMUA 91.1FM, Amherst, MA, “Gary Noland is one of those 21st Century composers seeking to forge a new aesthetic based on older models that do not traffic in serialism or minimalism ... Zany waltzes, ragtime riffs, chorales, toccatas, and much else romp and tear through these depictions of superheroes and villains from his ‘chamber novels’; other pieces spoof serial music ... to grand operas ... and Jewish guilt.” —JACK SULLIVAN, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...Paranoid Ravel...”—ALEX DUNN, KZSU FM90.3, Stanford, CA, “...It’s a romantic romp, rhythmically robust yet melodically flirting with the nostalgia of cabaret, minus the sleazy diminution of spilled drinks and smelly ashtrays. Its elegance recalls Elgar, and the serious sides, a synthesis of those strange bedfellows Schubert and Ives. Composers hate it when their music reminds you of someone else’s, but writing within a tradition, Noland has incorporated divergent styles that, woven together, work. Cosmopolitan without snobbery, it’s intelligent, pleasurable and convincing.” —ROCKY LEPLIN, THE BERKELEY VOICE

VARIATION ON AN INVISIBLE THEME for piano, No. 2, Op. 142, No. 8

Gary Lloyd Noland, composer