Wow, I am surprised how clearly the un-amplified plucking of guitar strings comes through.

Premiered at the University of Iowa's LOUi concert on December 1st 2017. 

Electric Guitar - Jacob P. Simmons
Violin - Andrew Willette
Double Bass - Will Yager

Program Note -

Lineation-Transmutation is an investigation of stochastic/Markovian improvisation. The instrumentalists are provided specific instructions governing sectional local details that result in global surfaces that delineate progressive structures that gradually interpolates from continuous to diffuse sonic material.

Lineation-Transmutation - Electric Guitar, Violin, and Double Bass - 2017

Autumn floor (2017-8), for flute and electronics.
Para flauta e sons eletroacústicos (2017-8)
Chão de Outono foi criada em colaboração com a flautista Valentina Daldegan. A peça é baseada no poema homônimo de Mario Quintana e busca, através do texto poético, explorar as fronteiras entre fala e flauta. A sonoridade da recitação do poema foi ponto de partida para a definição de aspectos como articulação, ritmo e contorno melódico, enquanto seu universo semântico trouxe à tona imagens, espacialidade e caracteres que se fazem presentes na peça.

Performance em 11 de abril de 2018
Valentina Daldegan (flauta)
Davi Raubach (difusão eletroacústica)

Confira o vídeo da estréia em 18 de julho de 2017: https://youtu.be/l3-ULyfGk2k

Chão de Outono (2017-8)

Matthias on violin
Sasha on flute
Jerry on cello
Anthony & Valerie on prepared piano

Predetermined pitches in each geometric cell
Other elements are open to interpretation in response to the graphic
Travel through energy line of choice
Prepared pianist tracks and gives indication of time

Z reaction (open work)

My arrangement of Frank Zappa's "Time Is Money", performed by ABSTRAI ensemble at the Cecília Meireles Hall in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on April 26th, 2019.

Performers:
Doriana Mendes, soprano
Pauxy-Gentil Nunes, piccolo
Andrea Ernest Dias, flute
Rodrigo Vila, alto sax
Pedro Bittencourt, baritone sax
Jeferson Souza, bassoon
Mariana Salles, violin
Pablo de Sá, cello
Marina Spoladore, piano
Fabio Adour, electric bass
Zeca Lacerda, drums and percussion
Leonardo Labrada, conductor

Frank Zappa arr. Martin Herraiz - Time Is Money [ABSTRAI]

WORLD PREMIERE RECORDING of Frank Zappa's previously-unheard "Number 9", performed by ABSTRAI ensemble at the Cecília Meireles Hall in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on April 26th, 2019.

Performers:
Andrea Ernest Dias, alto flute
Cesar Bonan, clarinet
Pedro Bittencourt, alto sax
Jeferson Souza, bassoon
Mariana Salles, viola
Pablo de Sá, cello
Fabio Adour, electric bass
Zeca Lacerda, vibraphone
Leonardo Labrada, conductor

Frank Zappa arr. Martin Herraiz - Number 9 [ABSTRAI]

桑原ゆう｜Five Images-In Nomine (2018-19) for six musicians
1st prize in the international composition contest "Breaking Music"
recorded live from Music Tomorrow - finale del concorso "Breaking Music" at Teatro Dal Verme, Milano, Italy on April 11, 2019
premiered by Syntax Ensemble｜Maruta Staravaitova (fl), Marco Ignoti (cl), Anna D’Errico (pf), Dario Savron (perc), Francesco D’Orazio (vn), Michele Marco Rossi (vc), Pasquale Corrado (cond)
published by Edition Gravis: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2605_Five-Images-In-Nomine.html

Five Images-In Nomine (2018-19) for 6 musicians

Performed in a reading session by the University of North Texas Symphonic Orchestra, Jack Buddenhagen

In Lincoln, Nebraska, there is the International Quilt Study Center & Museum. Walking through the museum, I can’t help but feel a sense of duality: the richly decorated patterns, but the somewhat nostalgic quality that can come with the medium. I’m particularly drawn to flowers and brocade fabrics; fields of intricately designed flowers line the wall and fill your vision. This piece is full of crossing and repeated patterns laid across each other, at times interacting, and sometimes more exposed. At times, the sounds are encompassing and warm, wrapping the listener in a blanket of sound, others are sparse and open. Overlapping notes and phrases create subtle cadences and nearly tonal reminisces. Underneath all of this harmonic wrapping is a unifying pulse connecting the material, and keeping the threads together.

Image: 
"Rose Wreath" - from 1870-1890, Marie Landis
From the International Quilt Museum, University of Nebraska - Lincoln. 

https://www.internationalquiltmuseum.org/quilt/20080400116?fbclid=IwAR2qxEPNpiTlVixJWMaLWjwqdKr6Ly-MTwwxRpS_QdTnhqM5uWXQzP0W7hY

Walls of Brocade Fields

Dedicated to and premiered by soundcloud.com/ligamentduo: Anika Kildegaard (soprano), soundcloud.com/will-yager (double bass) at The University of Iowa, October 27, 2019

On a poem by E. E. Cummings with the same title (poets.org/poem/r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-g-r)


                                     r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r
                           who
  a)s w(e loo)k
  upnowgath
                       PPEGORHRASS
                                                       eringint(o-
  aThe):l
               eA
                    !p:
S                                                                        a
                                      (r
  rIvInG                              .gRrEaPsPhOs)
                                                                         to
  rea(be)rran(com)gi(e)ngly
  ,grasshopper;


Drawing by: Jafar Sadeghi
instagram.com/jafarsadeghi1/

r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r (for soprano and double bass)

Audiodrome is a piece inspired by the David Cronenberg movie, Videodrome. The piece involves a lot of found sounds in various different contexts and relationships

Audiodrome

This album is made up of recorded noises and sounds I found around Chicago in my first two and a half months of living here.

produced by djgroundruledouble

i made this instead of watching the dnc

Joseph Norman recently completed the Doctoral Degree in Music Composition at the University of Iowa where he also had been Research Assistant/Composer/Sound Technician to the Department of Dance for three years. Dr. Norman was advised by Dr. David Gompper. Previously, Dr. Norman studied with Dr. Joshua Levine, Dr. Nomi Epstein, and Dr. Lawrence Fritts. Dr. Norman has participated in private lessons with Laura Elise Schwendinger, Richard Causton, Mikhail Malt, Grégoire Lorieux, Ketty Nez, Dimitri Papageorgiou, Elanie Lillios, David Lang, Joseph Dangerfield, Augusta Read Thomas, and Louis Karchin. 

Dr. Norman's music has been performed at the Exchange of Midwest Collegiate Composers UMKC and University of Colorado in Boulder, the Midwest Composers Symposium in the University of Michigan and the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music, SCI at the University of Iowa, and the Alba Music Festival in Alba, Italy. He has also had works read and premiered by the JACK Quartet, Accroche Note, LIGAMENT, Sonic Apricity, the Center for New Music at the University of Iowa, and LOUi, the Lap Top Orchestra also from University of Iowa. Additionally, Dr. Norman has composed collaboratively with actors, dancers, choreographers, and filmmakers. He is also active as a performer with experimental music duo Aligned at Variance and has taken part in IRCAM's Electroacoustic workshop in 2017.

Dr. Norman completed his Master's Degree in Music Composition at the University of Maryland while under the tutelage of Dr. Thomas DeLio and Dr. Lawrence Moss. Prior, he received his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Music Composition and Classical Guitar Performance from St. Mary's College of Maryland. While there Mr. Norman studied composition with Dr. David Froom and Dr. John Leupold, and classical guitar performance with
Dr. Orlando Roman.

Dr. Norman explores novel formal conceptions that involve organizations/transformations of multiple conceptual strata. These strata differentiate, recontextualize, and evolve towards individuated trajectories over the course of each piece. Each strata can comprise one of myriad parameters from pitch, timbre, time, texture, space, register, to density. Aesthetically, he values music that is evocative of visceral reactions and represents sonic transformation.  Dr. Norman's influences include: Chaya Czernowin, Rebecca Saunders, Brian Ferneyhough, Tristan Murail, György Ligeti, Iannis Xenakis, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Giacinto Scelsi, and Anton Webern.

Lineation-Transmutation - Electric Guitar, Violin, and Double Bass - 2017

Joseph Norman - Composer

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Jacob P. Simmons

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