Seeing Through - for viola and piano
Commissioned by Les Ecoles d'Art Américaines de Fontainebleau and premiered by Corley Friesen-Johnson (viola) and Fanny Bracco (piano) in July 2023.

Recording of performance by Brian Hong (viola) and Han Chen (piano) of NEXUS Chamber Music in Chicago, Il in April 2025.
Image: Reflected Moon by Norman Lewis

Seeing through is a continuation of my recent work that has drawn inspiration from the work of abstract expressionist painter, Norman Lewis. While doing research on Lewis, I came across his work Reflected Moon, on a gallery’s website. This painting uses a style that is characteristic of much of Lewis’ work, where there are seemingly straight lines and pointed edges that are blurred to give a hazy shadow—almost as if I am looking at clear lines without my glasses. However, this painting not only has these entrancing lines and shadows where I am drawn into focus but am constantly eluded, but also features an orb-like shape in the center of the painting, perhaps the moon as the title describes. That this is the only shape that has a clear definition immediately draws me into the center of the painting and gives the sensation that the other hazier shapes are emanating outwards from it. My overall experience of this painting is one of fluid and buoyant motion, of a luminous world where we are constantly moving but simultaneously frozen in the middle with the central orb. Seeing through is an indirect representation of my experience of this painting where there are active textures of single line that grow into holistic harmonies, a serene section of steady 8th notes colored by the viola that feels both suspended and cascading, and all centers to one moment in the middle of the piece where the piano plays stopped notes in the piano colored by viola harmonics. Seeing through was written for the Ecoles d'Art Américaines de Fontainebleau for premiere in July 2023.

Seeing Through - for viola and piano

Justin Weiss is a composer and conductor whose music explores relationships between the visual arts and music through the intersection of lyricism, liminality, fragility, and textural play. Justin’s music has been recognized with a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Prix Langage Musical from Les Écoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau, the Walter E. Aschaffenburg, and awards and recognitions from institutions such as ASCAP, Society of Composers, Inc., and The American Prize, Tribeca New Music, and YoungArts. 

Justin’s music has been performed internationally by ensembles including Quatuor Diotima, the Cleveland Chamber Symphony, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Grossman Ensemble, TAK Ensemble, Ekmeles Vocal Ensemble, Sandbox Percussion Quartet, and ~Nois Saxophone Quartet. Justin is the conductor of the University of Chicago New Music Ensemble, a co-founder and conductor of the new ensemble, Mycelium New Music, and has premiered dozens of pieces internationally. Justin studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the Royal Academy of Music in London, and is a PhD Fellow at the University of Chicago where he studies with Augusta Read Thomas.

Seeing Through - for viola and piano

Justin Weiss - Composer