This piece is a work in progress being conceived in collaboration with actor and playwright Erin Mahoney. Erin’s play explores themes of family, identity, sexuality, and spirituality, and this composition is meant to capture the tension and loss of leaving the familiar.

Leaving Home

Katrina Montagna, soprano
Adam Foreman, percussion

Compositions

The Rider on the White Horse

Brandon Patrick George, flute
David Fung, piano

With Wings, for flute and piano

Live performance by C4 the Choral Composer/Conductor Collective
Conducted by Daniel Andor-Ardó
www.c4ensemble.org
www.soundcloud.com/c4ensemble

Excerpts from poetry by Brandon Jordan Brown
www.brandonjordanbrown.com

II. Elegy
A month ago,
she kept telling me
    there is a roof on the world.
That it sits on top of all the trees
    like a heavy stone. That she felt things 
        shaking
sometimes, and nothing
    that falls on our heads is
        brand new.
It all may look different,
    but it lands on you the same,
        like snow.

Audio recording by Brian Mountford

Devotion (live)

II. Elegy

Live performance by C4 the Choral Composer/Conductor Collective
Conducted by Daniel Andor-Ardó
www.c4ensemble.org
www.soundcloud.com/c4ensemble

Excerpts from poetry by Brandon Jordan Brown
www.brandonjordanbrown.com

I. When It Rains
I woke to see the pond had been working all night,
its belly loaded with so much rain it swelled
halfway up the yard. Rain for three days straight.

No pollen. No cold. Just premonitions of rusty blades.
The fish stay hidden in a corner of the marsh
where an old strip of fence has folded itself under the surface— 
broken pencil lead in nature’s skin.

All I want is joy—this is my unwhittled secret.
To be steady as unstained posts and sheet metal joints.
Heavy like water and heavy like wood.
From the other side of the window, I watch the one quietly learning

to surround the other. My grief, splintered and sunbaked.
Joy, rippling under the knees of the wind.
Yes, it’s beginning to be the only thing I can see.

Audio recording by Brian Mountford

I. When It Rains

Frozen
by Joseph Prestamo

Featuring Pierre Derycz, violoncello

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;One of my teachers described <i>Frozen</i> as a "stealth" electronic piece, because it begins with acoustic sounds and slowly deteriorates into a wholly electronic soundscape. The composition of this piece began with my observation of string players who often breathe in sync with their bowing. Some performers are so caught up in the music that they don't even notice it; others deliberately breathe in order to add energy and life to their sound. I've always been fascinated by the fact that a musician's very breath can be so intrinsic to the making of his art. Additionally, I am always drawn to the solitary, lyrical sound of an unaccompanied cello, and so these were the sounds that I chose as the raw material to being a lonely journey into unfamiliar places.

Frozen, for electronics

Felix Mendelssohn wrote eight books of short piano pieces entitled Lieder Ohne Worte (Songs Without Words). These modest little piano pieces enchanted me as a child. Without any context to understand the title, I always imagined that the songs had not been given words because the pieces carried a special meaning that couldn’t be put into words. This magic of musical expression that leaves room for experiences too abstract or complex to be described concretely still captures my artistic imagination today.

This is my first composition for classical guitar, and I am grateful to Kyle Miller for initiating the collaboration. I still have a lot to learn about this beautiful instrument. 

Recorded live on Dec 10, 2018

Song Without Words (solo guitar)

Hi. My name is Joey. I like to make things.

JosephPrestamo

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