JP MERZ COMPOSER
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JP MERZ COMPOSER
three frames

Listen:

​Instrumentation:

   1111/1000/1 perc/single strings
Premiered:
May 30, 2013: Lawrence Symphony Orchestra, Octavio Mas Arocas - conductor, Memorial Chapel, Appleton, WI. 

Additional performances:
April 17, 2015: Center for New Music, University of Iowa, David Gompper - conductor, Riverside Theater, Iowa City, IA
Score:
    Download Perusal Score
About:   
I was imagining this piece visually like a three framed triptych, a structure that holds it together. This structure manifests itself in the viola line which only uses three pitches E G and A. The viola line drives the other parts, which act more as colors for the triptych. This is why I choose to use some many colorful sounds in these instruments such as the horn blowing air through the instrument without producing a pitch,  scratchy sounds in the strings and a bag of coins on the bass drum creating a rattling effect. The viola pushes these colors to become more intense as the piece goes, collectively becoming faster and denser. This eventually results in the puncturing of the frames themselves. I was imagining someone taking a needle or something and poking a hole in these frames and black ooze begins trickling out. Everything becomes blurred in this ooze but the frames remain intact and the viola line continues until the end.


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