Soprano Hayley Boggs and pianist Maryna Buksha perform Gary Lloyd Noland's setting of Alexander Theroux's poem "Autobiography," Op. 108. For more information on Gary Lloyd Noland, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

Here is Alexander Theroux's poem "Autobiography":

My default reflex is to disappear.
My defect reflex is to default.
My appearance is to reflect default.
My despair appearance is to defect.
My reflex is to appear to default.
My reappearance is to reflect defect.
My refault defect is to reappear.
My defect reappearance is to despair.

Music by Gary Lloyd Noland, Op. 108
Poem by Alexander Theroux

Music copyright © 2019 by Gary Lloyd Noland
Text from Collected Poems copyright © 2015 by Alexander Theroux 
Permission to set this poem has been granted by the author.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY for soprano & piano, Op. 108; poem by Alexander Theroux

Soprano Hayley Boggs and pianist Maryna Buksha perform Gary Lloyd Noland's setting of Alexander Theroux's poem "All Roys are fat," Op. 106 (2019) 

All Roys are fat but tubbiness can’t hurt
in everything that life presents of choice.
Don’t push away that wet dessert.
Doesn’t size allow a fuller voice?

Portliness by definition makes a ring.
I say eat the head off anything.

If a belt’s too short around your waist, try string.
What is comic usually can sing.

Music by Gary Lloyd Noland, Op. 106
Poem by Alexander Theroux

Music copyright © 2019 by Gary Lloyd Noland
Text from Collected Poems copyright © 2015 by Alexander Theroux 
Permission to set this poem has been granted by the author.

ALL ROYS ARE FAT for soprano & piano, Op. 106: poem by Alexander Theroux

My original composition for String Quartet which involves 4 stages of grief.
These compositions were used for a contemporary dance production by PR-Evolution Dance Company in Budapest, Hungary.
It was premiered in National Dance Theatre Budapest (Nemzeti Táncszínház)

Vivaldi? (Rage)

Anguish

Mourn

Agony

The original idea and theme for this piece was written for a trombone trio in 1980, I was never happy with the middle section so ended up re-writing it after I left University, unfortunately the final version was never heard again until I return to playing the trombone once again during the global pandemic of 2020 when I played and recorded all the parts. I later added a couple keyboard improvisations using string sounds and then combine all the elements together. I have always like the classic music from the late romantic period, although this composite recording is not suitable for use at a wedding there is passionate undercurrent running though the music.

Impromptu Wedding

DODECA

LE PIANO

MINIMALISM

Resides in Portland, Oregon. Grew up in Berkeley, CA. Born in Seattle.  PhD, Harvard. “Gary Noland is one of the great composers of the 21st century.”—JACK RUMMEL, KGNU 88.5 FM, Boulder CO, “...iconoclastic, stylistic potpourri standards of giddy humor, no holds barred soup to nuts and high spirits.”—ROBERT LEVIN, pianist, musicologist, composer, "...a fleet-fingered, ebullient performer ... bright, witty and engaging.”—CHRISTIAN CAREY, SPLENDID MAGAZINE, “...distinctive, inventive ... subversive ... You can hardly be indifferent to Noland’s music and so I would urge you to try it.” —ROGER BLACKBURN, MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL, “...set in a dizzying harmonic language that loops uncontrollably through a wide-ranging gamut of possible and impossible tonalities ... The general effect is like watching wet paintings of 19th Century musical memorabilia drip into frazzled 21st Century oblivion...” —ALLEN GIMBEL, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “Mr. Noland writes as a ‘time traveler’ in styles long abandoned by most composers as well as styles so new as to not have been imagined but by him. This he accomplishes naturally, convincingly, with originality and true passion. His command of all musical languages and his ability to traverse musical time is nothing less than remarkable. Listen!”—DONALD MARTINO, Pulitzer Prize winning composer, “...mind-bending spiraling of focus which is truly breathtaking ... spectacular...”—CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN, composer, sound poet & radio producer, “I'm amazed at your harmonic skill. Haven't seen or heard anything like it from any one else—except yours truly—certainly not from your generation. It falls somewhere between Strauss and Mahler. Especially like how you are able to slip in and out from the tonal to the atonal—or near atonal...”—GEORGE ROCHBERG, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “...court jester to the classical establishment...”—PAYTON MACDONALD, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...florid and juicy...” —RICHARD BUELL, THE BOSTON GLOBE, “...an incredible aural web ... a great ostinato of American kitsch. Sul pont never sounded so good.”—RUSSELL STEINBERG, composer, conductor of the LOS ANGELES YOUTH ORCHESTRA, “...I am bowled over by the expertise of your music: you use certain elements from the 19th century and from jazz, etc., and just at the moment when I am about to say, OK, what else is new?, you do a number of things, such as speeding up, becoming wildly dissonant, modulating to a distant continent, stopping completely and throwing some kind of total surprise ... you seem to know exactly when to do what and how much. I don’t know anybody else who can do it!” —ANDREW IMBRIE, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “... remarkable stuff...”
—MAX MORATH, American ragtime pianist, composer, actor & author, “...a loony composer from Oregon...” —MAX SHEA, WMUA 91.1FM, Amherst, MA, “Gary Noland is one of those 21st Century composers seeking to forge a new aesthetic based on older models that do not traffic in serialism or minimalism ... Zany waltzes, ragtime riffs, chorales, toccatas, and much else romp and tear through these depictions of superheroes and villains from his ‘chamber novels’; other pieces spoof serial music ... to grand operas ... and Jewish guilt.” —JACK SULLIVAN, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...Paranoid Ravel...”—ALEX DUNN, KZSU FM90.3, Stanford, CA, “...It’s a romantic romp, rhythmically robust yet melodically flirting with the nostalgia of cabaret, minus the sleazy diminution of spilled drinks and smelly ashtrays. Its elegance recalls Elgar, and the serious sides, a synthesis of those strange bedfellows Schubert and Ives. Composers hate it when their music reminds you of someone else’s, but writing within a tradition, Noland has incorporated divergent styles that, woven together, work. Cosmopolitan without snobbery, it’s intelligent, pleasurable and convincing.” —ROCKY LEPLIN, THE BERKELEY VOICE

Vic Berry has been a musician and composer since the age of 10 years old, playing the Trombone, Piano and Guitar. He studied electronic music with Tim Souster, advanced harmony and orchestration with the composer Rodger Marsh and ragtime music with visiting Professor Fulbright-Hays. At school Vic studied with Simon H. Fell who introduced him to improvisation and the Avant Garde sounds of the 20th century.  Later influenced by the bands of the Punk period, Vic taught himself to play the guitar and became involved with many 1980s bands.  Vic Berry met Steve Kenny when they worked together in a small office 2007-2010. They became friends meeting up to jam and improvise the album Elements is a compilation of work produced during their prolific period. The duo’s work matured together producing an exquisite tension between chaos and classical harmony. Steve's expressive and sometimes anarchic style is complimented by the restraint of classical harmonies and piano style finger picking that is a feature of Vic’s “Reverend Kidd” period, in which he was influenced by ragtime, rock, and blues music. Post global pandemic Vic has explored digital recording, multitracking, and using digital effects. Returning to the trombone and piano to rework material from his formative years. Recent work includes pure electronic music (Primzahlräume) well as manipulating digital recordings. Music from the late 20th Century is the predominant influence on his composition.

New tracks tagged #post romantic