Third Coast Percussion's second full-length album, "Unknown Symmetry," describes a very personal history of the Chicago-based ensemble from their founding in 2005 to today. The album includes the first recording of the percussion quartet arrangement of Arvo Pärt's iconic work, "Fratres;" beautiful, rarely-heard works by Peter Garland and Christopher Deane, and new music from Third Coast Percussion's own David Skidmore and former member of TCP, Owen Clayton Condon.

Skidmore's multi-movement work, "Common Patterns in Uncommon Time," was commissioned for the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Taliesin, Frank Lloyd Wright's home and architectural studio in rural Wisconsin.

Fratres - by Arvo Pärt

The work is commissioned by & dedicated to Bolette Roed for her debut concert March 26th, 2004. It is written for alto, voice & bass recorder & live electronics (MaxMSP). The title means "Did you see dreams" and is taken from a sonnet by Federico García Lorca called: El poeta pregunta a su amor por la  «Ciudad Encantada» de Cuenca (Sonetos del amor oscuro). Written with support from the Danish Arts Foundation. 
Both the tightly proportioned large scale form and the musical detail is built up by the ever-shortened, extended or constant. All audio in the live electronics is derived from recorder samples (played by Bolette Roed) or real-time processing.

Viste Sueños (2003)

miniature opera for voices and fixed media (four channel audio, polystyrene, plexiglas, electronic components and orange beanbags)

Music by Marco Buongiorno Nardelli

soprano: Adria Le Boeuf; spoken voice: Heather Spence; libretto: Ken Eklund, Heather Spence, Adria Le Boeuf, Peter Walter, Marco Buongiorno Nardelli ("The Band of Six")]

Technical design and electronics: Frank Cerasoli

This miniature opera was conceived at the Djerassi Resident Artists Program in July 2017 as a collaborative art installation. In it, we are asking participants to express their own ideas about the steps and progress of a creative journey into the unknown. On the array we place nodes that describe different moments of the creative process in Science and/or Art, and the audience undertakes sense-making by connecting (all or just some of) the nodes to represent their own creative process. The libretto for the miniature opera UNKNOWN, a journey is composed by the following words: TRANSFORM, ILLUMINATE, FLOURISH, SYNTHESIZE, EVOLVE, LISTEN, ENVISION, STEW, PITCH, FAIL, PRUNE, and DIG.

Unknown, a journey

Unknown, a journey (concert fixed media version)

An excerpt from "Draft" commissioned by Voix Nouvelles, Abbaye du Royaumont, for Ensemble l’Itinéraire.

Draft, for alto flute, bassoon and viola (Excerpt)

Modular work for mixed chamber ensembles, conceived as a celebration of humankind’s quest for knowledge through skepticism and critical inquiry.    Additional information about this work (including score and links to other recordings) may be found at https://josephklein.music.unt.edu/compositions/unaware_cosmos.

This realization includes eight of the nineteen modules in this cycle:
• Transient Dominion: Toshiro Chun, trumpet; Colby Norton, bass trombone; Jacob Harpster, percussion; Eva Polgar, piano.
• The Indelible Stamp of Our Lowly Origin: Jonathan Kern Anderson, Julia Milrod, Jesus Insuasty, Gabriel Sakamoto, contrabasses.
• Celestial Teapot: David Falterman, piano; Kurt Doty, percussion.
• Shadows on the Horizon: Mia Detwiler, violin I; Karina Sims, violin II; Ryan Hardcastle, viola; Kourtney Newton, violoncello.
• Unweaving a Rainbow: Veronika Vasileva, viola; Eva Polgar, piano.
• Le Contagion sacrèe: Toshiro Chun, trumpet; Heather Sucholdolski, horn; Mary Mixter, trombone; Joseph Klein, percussion.  
• Blind Watchmaker: Jorge Cruz, contrabassoon; Joseph Klein, percussion.
• The Illusion of Permanence: Mia Detwiler, violin; Kourtney Newton, violoncello.

Recording engineers: Ermir Bejo, Chaz Underriner, Seth Shafer.

An Unaware Cosmos (2012-18) — realization with eight modules

This is a stereo mix of an 8-channel work. This composition utilizes several significant aural illusions to provide the structural underpinnings. Specifically, the work incorporates both Shepard Tones (endless glissandi) and Risset Rhythms (endless accelerando/ritardando) that are featured prominently in several large sections of the work. 

Illusory Lines Stereo Mix

". . . d'un archétype métallique" (2017) 
for eight instruments and electronics

Live recording
May 1st
Columbia Composers Concert series 2017
DiMenna Center for Classical Music - NYC

Talea ensemble under the baton of Jeffrey Means. 

The piece addresses the coexistence of multiple acoustic and electronic sonic entities while it explores the relationship between instrumental and sound complexity. The framework of this project takes advantage of the technology and generates an electrified sonic world that counterbalances the acoustic complexities articulated by the ensemble. Metallic sounds, idiomatic frictions, granulated textures and chaotic microtonal clouds are some of the sonic entities interacting within a dramaturgical framework of intricate sonic interconnections and electrified acoustical masses. The generalized standpoint stems from the genesis of an electrified sonic world derived from the electronic processing of acoustic sounds that behave as the sonic extension of the instrumental ensemble in a unified way – the assembly of a “sonic twin”. The emergence of gestural interactivity pointing to an idiomatic stream of sonic behaviors captures the dramaturgical framework of the piece, highlighting a network of distinguishable sonic objects all perceived in a unified sonic fabric.

". . . d'un archétype métallique" (2017), for eight instruments and diffused electronics

This minimalist composition inspired by the landscape of far west Texas is dedicated to the 100th birthday of John Cage. The piece consists of 3 tracks: a guitar line composed by Julian Mock, and two field recordings (#1: Chamartin railway station, Madrid, Spain, and #2: rainstorm in Santiago de Compostela, Spain) added by Alyce Santoro. 

landscape: marfa, tx, john cage 100th birthday ode

Sounds generated by guitar cables touched and controlled directly by hand contact and plugged into a loop machine with some additional Korg Monotron sounds.

Marco Buongiorno Nardelli is Regents Professor at the University of North Texas, a  composer, flutist, a computational materials physicist, and a member of CEMI, The Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia, and of iARTA, the Initiative for Advanced Research in Technology and the Arts. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and of the Institute of Physics, a founding member of the AFLOW Consortium and a Parma Recordings artist. 
materialssoundmusic is a new computer-aided data-driven composition (CADDC) environment based on the sonification and remix of scientific data streams.

Unknown, a journey (concert fixed media version)

materialssoundmusic

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