An evocation of the deeply human experience of “dread.”
Not Today
A brief, jaunty work for bass clarinet trio, composed for and premiered by the Not Today bass clarinet trio at the 2015 European Clarinet Association conference in Ghent, Belgium.
This Homeless Way
This Homeless Way is inspired by three poems by Jacob Folger, a formerly homeless person who now runs an organization called “Friend to the Homeless” (www.friendtothehomeless.org), whose purpose is “to educate on Homelessness and help people to discover simple things they can do to ease the lives of Homeless People.” All proceeds from sheet music […]
Fantasy on Five: E-FLAT and Bass Clarinet Version Piano Reduction
(recording is of saxophone version) Fantasy on Five is a double concerto of sorts, originally for solo soprano and baritone saxophones with wind ensemble. This Eb and Bass Clarinet version is a direct adaptation, with no changes to the solo parts beyond the different transpositions. The piece plays with the idea of “five-ness” in several […]
Fantasy on Five: E-FLAT and Bass Clarinet Version
(recording is of saxophone version) Fantasy on Five is a double concerto of sorts, originally for solo soprano and baritone saxophones with wind ensemble. This Eb and Bass Clarinet version is a direct adaptation, with no changes to the solo parts beyond the different transpositions. The piece plays with the idea of “five-ness” in several […]
Four of a Kind
A gentle, (mostly) meditative work, exploring the timbral beauty of four bass clarinets moving in parallel motion.
Bass Clarinet Concerto: Wind Band version
(recording is of the orchestra version) This Bass Clarinet Concerto is virtuosic, but not necessarily in a typical concerto sort of a way. Rather than lots of flashy runs and fast passagework, it features a virtuosically wide range of colors and approaches to the instrument, from aggressive grooving to lyrical soaring to altissimo wailing. Like […]
Trio for violin, bass clarinet, and piano
(recording is of Piano Trio version) This is an arrangement of my Piano Trio, with bass clarinet in place of cello. It is an epic four movement work combining austere minimalism with emotional romanticism and dramatic narrative. Movement 1: A slow, ponderous opening gives way to feverishly undulating figures in the piano under sighing melodies […]
Bass Clarinet Concerto: clarinet choir version
This Bass Clarinet Concerto is virtuosic, but not necessarily in a typical concerto sort of a way. Rather than lots of flashy runs and fast passagework, it features a virtuosically wide range of colors and approaches to the instrument, from aggressive grooving to lyrical soaring to altissimo wailing. Like many performer-composers before me, I sought […]
Bass Clarinet Concerto: Piano Reduction
(recording is of orchestral version) This Bass Clarinet Concerto is virtuosic, but not necessarily in a typical concerto sort of a way. Rather than lots of flashy runs and fast passagework, it features a virtuosically wide range of colors and approaches to the instrument, from aggressive grooving to lyrical soaring to altissimo wailing. Like many […]
Bass Clarinet Concerto
This Bass Clarinet Concerto is virtuosic, but not necessarily in a typical concerto sort of a way. Rather than lots of flashy runs and fast passagework, it features a virtuosically wide range of colors and approaches to the instrument, from aggressive grooving to lyrical soaring to altissimo wailing. Like many performer-composers before me, I sought […]
Skip to my Hocket
A fun little minute-long duo, composed as a Kickstarter reward for Larry Brown.
Bass Clarinet Double Concerto: Piano Reduction Version
My basic idea for the Bass Clarinet Double Concerto was of Weber’s clarinet concertos meeting heavy metal. I am intimately familiar with both genres, through extensively practicing the Weber concertos in high school, and performing heavy metal bass clarinet tunes as a member of the Edmund Welles bass clarinet quartet. When it came to writing […]
Bass Clarinet Double Concerto: Chamber Ensemble Version
My basic idea for the Bass Clarinet Double Concerto was of Weber’s clarinet concertos meeting heavy metal. I am intimately familiar with both genres, through extensively practicing the Weber concertos in high school, and performing heavy metal bass clarinet tunes as a member of the Edmund Welles bass clarinet quartet. When it came to writing […]
Bass Clarinet Double Concerto: Wind Band Version
My basic idea for the Bass Clarinet Double Concerto was of Weber’s clarinet concertos meeting heavy metal. I am intimately familiar with both genres, through extensively practicing the Weber concertos in high school, and performing heavy metal bass clarinet tunes as a member of the Edmund Welles bass clarinet quartet. When it came to writing […]
Bass Clarinet Double Concerto: Chamber Orchestra Version
My basic idea for the Bass Clarinet Double Concerto was of Weber’s clarinet concertos meeting heavy metal. I am intimately familiar with both genres, through extensively practicing the Weber concertos in high school, and performing heavy metal bass clarinet tunes as a member of the Edmund Welles bass clarinet quartet. When it came to writing […]
Quartet for Four Clarinets
I wrote Quartet for Four Clarinets for my undergraduate senior thesis. In it, I wanted to achieve a synthesis of many of the fundamental skills I had been working on as a student. As my compositional thinking tends to be very harmony-based, I especially wanted to try to develop my contrapuntal chops. I studied a […]
Groove
Groove is the result of feeling stuck, frustrated, irritated and annoyed. In the fall of 2001 I was hard at work on an Epic, Serious, Important solo piano piece, when I hit a wall and simply could not get anywhere with it. Then one night I went to a classical chamber music concert by San […]
KlezDuo
KlezDuo was my attempt to bring together two musical worlds that are very important to me as a performer, but that are normally kept separate: klezmer music, and my bass clarinet duo, Sqwonk. It was great fun to combine these elements together into this raucous and joyous piece. SHEET MUSIC FOR THIS PIECE CAN BE […]
…and the Beast…
…and the Beast… began its life as an exercise in tuning perfect fifths that grew and morphed into a depiction of a day in the life of the common beast. Each movement depicts a different action of the Beast — waking up, creeping, dancing (or trying to), attacking, and finally going to sleep. SHEET MUSIC […]