viola and electronics
available as Veiled (5 minutes) and the full version (13 – 14 minutes)
commissioned by the Strathmore Music Center in Bethesda, MD
all performances on this page by Wendy Richman
Listen: Veiled (coming soon)
About:
Veiled is an excerpt I made in 2016 from a larger piece that was originally written in 2010. The original Highway Music, composed for Wendy Richman and commissioned by the Strathmore Music Center, was inspired by the experience of traveling long distances to be with loved ones. Rather than a depiction of a specific journey, Highway Music is an exploration of the various states of mind on a several hour road-trip. Even without the end goal of going to or coming from specific people, long journeys by train, car, or airplane can produce mental states that oscillate wildly between places as disparate as complete exhaustion and zen-like focus. Highway Music explores the distance between groove-based musics and more abstract textures, between the performer’s voice and viola, between 18th-century-inspired music and music that sounds more of our own time, and between clear, metallic ringing pitches and those that are more distorted (in the electronic part, all of the sounds are derived from a single set of percussion samples I recorded last summer). As a kind of mixtape to accompany a journey, I hope these elements help the listener explore and contemplate the spaces between departing and arriving.
Watch performance excerpts from the full version:
Part 1 of 3:
Part 2 of 3:
Part 3 of 3:
