Performed by Tara Hanish at Cleveland State University, May 2013

(with a nod to Michael Hersch for the "car on the highway" effect I stole!)
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Program Note:

Sonata for Unaccompanied Cello No. 1 is a two-movement meditation on indecision, false starts, and the unkept promises we make to ourselves while still retaining hope of redemption. To convey the anxiety these themes arouse, each movement makes extensive use of the tense intervals of the major and minor seventh, and minor ninth. The work also exploits my fondness for the timbral qualities found within the cello’s lower range, and utilizes the harmonic and melodic idioms of Spanish flamenco music that have become such a part of my musical identity (namely the use of open strings as pedal tones in creating the genre’s characteristic haunting, yet beautiful harmomies.) Additionally, having never composed for solo cello before, I sought to place myself more in the mindset of the performer and consequently composed the piece on a flamenco guitar, re-tuned to a standard cello setup.

I was very inspired to write for solo cello by two pieces of the repertoire in particular - the solo cello sonata of György Ligeti, a twentieth-century Hungarian composer, and the first solo cello sonata of Michael Hersch, an acclaimed contemporary American composer. As a small tribute, my sonata opens with a loose quotation of the short opening motif of Hersch’s sonata and closes with a loose quotation of the closing motif of Ligeti’s.



Cello Sonata No. 1 - II. Allegro  (2013)

Performed by Kate Oney and Joshua Fedenholz at Cleveland State University, 2013

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Program Note:

Duo for Piano & Viola is a pensive, somber, one-movement work that follows a fairly basic melody and accompaniment style. It is more personal than most of my other works and was composed during a particularly demanding period for me. Its primary features are a spartan but evocative texture in the viola and a harmonic backdrop rich with tonal clusters. A closing coda brings a rhythmic ostinato (repeated pattern) in the piano that fluctuates between varied harmonic backdrops as the viola slowly enters for one final statement. The piece ends in a cluster of three tones separated only by half steps to create a feeling of indeterminate tension.

Duo For Piano & Viola (2013)

Electroacoustic Duet for two flamenco guitars - one live and acoustic and the other having gone through digital processing.

Performed by Kris Magnuson at Cleveland State University, May 2013 & 2013 Cleveland Ingenuity Festival

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Program Note:

Duet por Taranta (“Duet in the style of a Taranta”) was conceived as a duet between two guitars - one recorded and the other performed live, with the recorded portion passing through extensive processing (accomplished with Apple’s Logic Studio music editing and production software.) While not completely faithful to the song form, both parts utilize much of the harmonic and gestural language of the free-form Taranta, one of the more provocative palos (styles) of flamenco guitar. For a Taranta, a standard tuning is used, but with an atypical (for guitar) tonal center of F-sharp, which, when combined with extensive utilization of certain open strings as drones, produces a stirring effect with its haunting harmonies.


Duet Por Taranta  (2013)

Performed at Cleveland State University, May 2013

Ariel Clayton - 1st Violin
Andrea Belding - 2nd Violin
Tom Bowling - Viola
Tara Hanish - Cello
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Program Note:

String Quartet No. 1 is a two-movement work composed in 2012-2013. Completed in the final year of my master’s program, the piece represents the culmination of two years of study as a graduate student at Cleveland State University.

The first movement is relatively through-composed (non-repeating, continuous, lacking a rigid, pre-compositional formal plan.) It is unified, however, by a rhythmic germ introduced by the first violin in the opening statement that will make its return in a variety of different contexts throughout the movements. The first movement also makes occasional use of the aleatoric techniques, where the performers are given specific boundaries within which to improvise for fixed time periods.

After its brief, melancholic and tonal introduction, the second movement heralds a more spirited, frenetic approach to tempo, meter, and rhythm than the first. At times, material from the first movement is interspersed and reinterpreted with the new material and sensibilities of the second, and aleatoric techniques make a more significant return, as well. And in an attempt to mimic the pained wailings of a human voice, the second movement also introduces microtones to heighten the tension of the tonal, mirrored opening and closing sections of the movement.



String Quartet No. 1 - I.  (2013)

Duet for Cello and Bass Clarinet

Performed by David Russell (Cello) and Pat O'Keefe (Bass Clarinet)for the 2012 Cleveland Composers Recording Institute.
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Program Note:

Minerva is a single-movement work named after the Roman goddess of wisdom and sponsor of music & poetry, trade & commerce, magic, and defense. Each of the work’s defined sections corresponds to one these facets of Roman antiquity over which the goddess presided.
The piece opens with harmonic glides in the cello and swirling, improvised tone sets in the bass clarinet to embody a scene of high winds and gulls at a busy seaport. The ensuing percussive pizzicato and hand slaps of the cello (along with a peculiar response from the clarinet’s) characterize magic and ancient sorcery. The somber, lyrical section that comes next is a pensive reflection on the emotional pull of music and poetry. A short meditation on wisdom follows, with a self-assured, measured approach in the clarinet over a minimalist ostinato in the cello. The closing section depitcts defense, and opens with an aggressive, percussive attack of hand slaps on the cello with the clarinet heralding a call to arms in the low register. As the cello transitions through pizzicato to arco, the tension raises, and war appears imminent.

Minerva (2013)

Short toccata for solo piano.
 
Performed by Geoff Burleson as part of the 2013 Cleveland Composers Recording Institute.

Toccata for piano (2013)

Written for the Ensemble Contemporain de Montréal, Ecnegreme is the product of a thoroughly different compositional process than I was accustomed to as primarily intuition-based composer. Beneath its spartan texture, dynamic range, and performance requirements lies a highly formalized aesthetic – form, tempo, rhythm, and the distribution and evolution of the tone sets used are all organized according to principles of the overtone series and emergence theory (specifically that of fractal geometry.)

While its philosophical impetus arises from emergence theory, the actual process of Ecnegreme is one of emergence in reverse (hence the title). As the piece progresses, each of its initial five tone sets (which all share the same intervallic contour) will gradually be consumed and eventually converge on the fundamental of the initial tone set - C. This process takers place within a form dictated by principles of fractal geometry, namely self-similar patterns at different degrees of scale (represented here by tempo changes). The content of each tone set (as well as the rhythms employed) are dictated by the overtone series, with no three of the five tones found within each set combining to form a complete triad. As a result, vestiges of non-functional tonality are heard initially, but become obscured as the variety of tones used diminishes.

Kris Magnuson Music

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