Ekmeles.

Live, Crypt of the Church of the Intercession (New York, NY), 10 May 2019.

If a madrigal is an unaccompanied chamber-scale vocal work, intimate, reliant on knife-edge unanimity of purpose and gesture, dedicated to the illustration and evocation of a poetic text, then vo mesurando is a madrigal.  The Petrarch sonnet which lends detached phrases of its text, “Solo e pensoso,” describes an incommunicable state of inner torment, a compulsive evasion of connection and communication with humankind, and a denial of the possibilities of vocal eloquence—and so it is here.  The material and energies of the work are private, quite often simply inaudible, and aimed if they are audible at a space as close to the singers as possible.  The gently aggressive regularity of the gridded form; the fragmentary repetitions, sequences, and canons; the emergent shards of syllables and glimpsed phrases; these are all madrigalian figures that you are overhearing, but they are not for you.

vo mesurando (2012) for four high voices

an excerpt (last section) from the premiere of "pulled apart and yielding" on April 26, 2023, at De Roode Bioscoop in Amsterdam. composed for We Three (Teresa Costa, Rita Proença, Dafne Paris).

as a note: this piece is under revision — I wouldn't normally post just an excerpt of a piece when I'm rewriting it, but Teresa, Rita, and Dafne gave such a wonderful performance that I felt I had to share at least part of it.

pulled apart and yielding (excerpt, live) || We Three

"It's too late now. It will always be too late. Fortunately!"
Albert Camus, The Fall 

The Fall was begun during a residency at STEIM in Amsterdam in December 2011 / January 2012. I made many hours of recordings in and around the city of Amsterdam, with the intention of creating this large scale work.

Elements of the work were incorporated into Residual bits of sunlight, by Andersson Dance in Stockholm. 

The first movement of this work, Too Late, Too Far, was premiered at the International Summer Course for New Music Darmstadt in August 2014. 

The Fall (2014)

Anna Korsun FOS, performed by The Monochrome Project, recording of the premier performance at the festival Romanische Sommer 2024, Sankt Gereon, Cologne, on 5th June 2024. 

The Monochrome Project:
Marco Blaauw, Christine Chapman, Christopher Collings, Mathilde Conley, Mechthild Drop, Lucy Humphris, Markus Schwind, Laura Vukobratović

Anna Korsun, FOS, The Monochrome Project

Étude - SORA (2024)
for 8 soloists

Credit: Internationale Ensemble Modern Akademie 2023-24
Conducted by: Yannick Mayaud
Audio Engineer: Markus Güdel

premiered at Lucerne Festival
Photo Credit: © Lucerne Festival/Priska Ketterer

Étude SORA for 8 soloists

Concordance (2024)

Please, use headphones or good loudspeakers.

vacant lot (strange bird) (2023), for large amplified ensemble
commissioned by Ensemble Intercontemporain

Live Recording, Klangforum Wien

vacant lot (strange bird) (2023), for large amplified ensemble

Title: given to be heard
Year: 2025
3rd-Order Ambisonics Soundscape

*PLEASE LISTEN WITH HEADPHONES*

given to be heard [binaural soundscape]

performed by Yarn/Wire at Paine Hall, Harvard University on February 28, 2025

Laura Barger – piano
Julia Den Boer – sampler & MIDI controller
Russell Greenberg – percussion
Dennis Sullivan – percussion

recording: Anthony DiBartolo
mix: Isaac Roth Blumfield

Program note:

In English, the word "dream" has a positive connotation, but there is a thin
boundary between a dream and a nightmare, and our experience of dreaming
rarely fits neatly into either category. In dreaming, a fluidity emerges between
bliss and dread, and one's desire to escape reality can collapse at any moment.
Familiar places, people, objects, animals might emerge, and as we dream we
know that it is both really them and really not them at the same time. Something
both illusory and deeply real is happening. While you listen, try to fall asleep.

The electronics for this work were prepared at the Südwestrundfunk Experimentalstudio in Freiburg, Germany through their Workstay program with assistance from Thomas Hummel, sound designer, with recordings performed by James Morley, cello, and Rebecca Lawrence, double bass


Like a dream I can' t wake up from | for Yarn/Wire & electronics (2024-25)

This work is dedicated to Annette Vande Gorne and Musique et Recherches.

A series of memories interrupt, overlap and flow into one another on a summer's day.

This piece is made exclusively from field-recordings taken in Brussels and Ohain in July 2011 and was begun at the studios of M&R and completed in the composer's own studio.

The creation of this piece was supported by the PRS Foundation and the Bliss Trust.

The Sun Warms The Memory (2011)

Bludenzer Tage zeitmäßiger Musik 2019

Performed by Ensemble Distractfold:
Linda Jankowska
Emma Richards
Alice Purton

Recorded by Aaron Holloway-Nahum

sottilissime

phd fellow in multimedia composition @ brown university
mm royal conservatory of the hague '23

pulled apart and yielding (excerpt, live) || We Three

Isaac Barzso

Related tracks