LINER NOTES

Chimeric Night

Chimeric Night explores simple, quiet gestures that resonate within an illusory sonic landscape.

Lovely Little Monster

Lovely Little Monster is full of energy, at once physically uncoordinated yet beautifully graceful. Straining to be heard, yet frustrated by attempts to articulate complex thoughts, the physical gesture is found to be the most direct

means of communication. Ultimately, peace.

Arcata (#2 and #3)

This is an improvisatory work that can take many surprising sonic twists and turns depending on the intersection of seemingly minor decisions made by Scott, Pat, and the computer. For years we thought we could predict (and therefore control) the outcomes of working with this particularly precocious bit of programming, but ultimately we have come to accept and embrace its beautifully chaotic nature. Scott makes decisions, Pat makes decisions, Kyma makes decisions. There are consequences.

Ventriloquist

Ventriloquist examines the sonic potential which follows the step-by-step construction of a device that gives voice to musical possibilities. This version is an electro-acoustic “re-imagining” of Pat’s solo clarinet piece Indigenous Ventriloquist, composed in 1995.

Omaggio a 1961

Scott is a big fan of the electroacoustic sound world of the early 1960s. The timbral and contrapuntal results of this performance environment piece are reminiscent of that period—especially some works by Luciano Berio—hence the Italian title. 

Lattice XVIIb

It’s big, it’s loud, and is just a lot of fun to perform. A free-for-all jam piece titled in honor of the many cryptic, formula-style titles for lack of anything truly meaningful to call it. It turns out that working titles, especially humorous, vapid or embarrassing ones, have a way of sticking.

Consortium

Consortium was inspired by the intersection of the ancient forms of canon and isorhythm with the more modern forms of sample looping and phase-shifting. The piece utilizes pre-recorded fragments of viol consort melodies by the English Renaissance composers William Byrd and John Jenkins (one recorded on clarinet, the other on cello, performed by cellist Jacqueline Ultan), which are combined to create several independent canons. These canons then become the foundation for a live, improvised clarinet performance that implements this same idea of looping and shifting.

haiku, interrupted

haiku, interrupted is an exploration of five restrained—yet powerful—gestures carried away by the environment they have themselves created, in the absence of other stimuli.