It's going to fly, right?

Springfield

Building the Ship / Joey's Theme

Memories

Cardboard Rocket

The concept of String Quartet No. 1 was mainly to develop a motive (the “dotted eighth- sixteenth” idea) over the length of the piece in various contexts and forms. While I usually have a story or message to convey when I compose, for this piece, my goal was simply (or as I learned, not so simply) to write an effective string quartet. 

However, I think it would be a mistake to take the work simply as a means to extend a motive, as I still tried to put emotion into the music on the page. The feeling of the piece will sometimes shift from bold and confident to more focused and determined; it moves from a rush of excitement to the weight of anguish and turmoil, but concludes in a triumphant ending. For me, it is thrilling that the open ended purpose behind the piece leaves the audience free to put their own meaning into the music, and I encourage the listener to relate what they hear to their own narrative.

String Quartet No. 1

Relentless Night for Solo Clarinet is a piece written mainly to explore the development of motives. While learning about Dmitri Shostakovich in class, I started to wonder what my initials would sound like as music. This is where the opening motive comes from: the concert C to A are a transposed version of my initials, "S" (Eb) and "C." The minor third appears all over the place in the piece.
 
Another idea I wanted to explore was the conflict between two ideas - one flowing, lyrical and at times dissonant, and the other pointed, repetitive, and relentless. A good amount of inspiration is drawn from the jazz of the Gershwin era, which lies in stark contrast to the other part of the piece: empty, hollow and roaming sounds. The result is a clash of the two forces, who battle it out head to head in a rhythmic, quite literally toe tapping duel.
 
A special thank you to Joseph Morris of the Pacific Symphony for a wonderful performance, and to Sierra Allen for workshopping the piece to make it what it is today.

Relentless Night for Solo Clarinet

Shawn Mativetsky; tabla
John Ferrari, Jesse Gerbasi, Peter Jarvis, Ken Piascik; percussion

Composed as part of Shastra's Composing with Indian Rhythm Workshop Summer 2018, "Concerto for Tabla and Percussion Quartet" combines both elements of traditional North Indian tabla with a western percussion quartet.

Photo by Rudi Seitz

Concerto For Tabla And Percussion

Shane Scott Cook is a composer, percussionist, vocalist and conductor for concert and film music. He is currently pursuing his Masters of Music in Composition at the University of Texas at Austin.