Sometimes (2019) is a piece for vocal ensemble and live electronics inspired by (and in tribute to) Olly Wilson’s Sometimes (1976) for tenor and tape. Olly Wilson was one of the founding members of Oberlin’s TIMARA department, and with his passing in March 2018, I wanted to ensure his compositional and educational legacy was honored at TIMARA's 50th Anniversary Kaleidosonic Music Festival. The piece incorporates bits and pieces of the original melody, accompanied by varying vocal textures, including direct harmonization, hissing/whispering, and other extended vocal techniques.  Given the original is also based on the Negro spiritual, Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child, the piece also incorporates elements of call-and-response and improvisation traditional to the Africana aesthetic. To further develop the immersive sonic world, the vocal parts are then spatialized throughout a speaker array using the spat5 Max external, to further play with the distinction between its “traditionally choral” elements and the extended techniques. 

	Attached is a recording of its premiere at the Kaleidosonic Music Festival in November 2019, performed by the Oberlin College Black Musicians’ Guild.  The 16-channel diffused file was encoded with Ambisonic UHJ formatting in order to simulate the spatialization in stereo.

Sopranos: Helena Colindres, Amber Rogers
Altos: Georgia Heers, Nicole Odreman, Adriana Vergara
Tenors: DaQuan Williams, Seyquan Mack
Bass-Baritones: Max Addae, Anthony Anderson

"Sometimes" for vocal ensemble & live electronics

Oberlin College & Conservatory '21
Computer Science & Technology in Music and Related Arts (TIMARA) 

Programmer | Vocal Arranger | Composer

Max Addae

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