The Backwards Man (2025)
This piece responds directly to a photograph by Diane Arbus – “The Backwards Man in His Hotel Room”. Ever since first seeing the photograph, I have always wanted to write music to accompany it. Music that would be both tentative and voyeuristic, and that expresses that same sense of loneliness.
The work is one of Arbus’s early works, and in each piece, there is always a sense that she recognizes the subject and the subject recognizes her – an act of mutual seeing. This picture in particular always seemed like such a complete picture of loneliness, and the despair one feels when they are at odds with their own body. There is something poignant about the hotel room as well – the bare lightbulb, the asymmetrical furniture. The sense that the very world of the photograph is temporary and fleeting. That the man in the picture – maybe a contortionist? – is performing for themself.
Five Images (2025)
I. Patriotic Red Fading into Depressed Purple II. Aegean blue with yellow pigments
III. Pink Hexagons
IV. Quiet Lapis
V. Bathing in Milk
These five short pieces each occupy a musical world that is both unique to themself, and yet somehow connected to one other. The process of writing them was ultimately a reminder of how playfulness and profundity sit almost uncomfortably close to one another – in both music and in life.
When Trees Fall Still (2024)
This piece contains a sense of fragility as the thematic material realizes itself, and then fades once more. The structure of phrases, and the overall conception of the piece follows the Golden Ratioʼs natural sense of proportionality, as phrase lengths follow the 0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13 Fibonacci Pattern, and the overall structure follows a 21:13 ratio. Much of the piece is very soft and delicate in character.
Afterlife (2024)
This piece was originally written without program notes, because the piece is really ʻabsoluteʼ music, that reveals its own meaning quite clearly. However, since finishing it, Iʼve reflected on the process of writing it, and I have come to realize that all the sonic effects and musical characteristics that make the piece what it is, are thanks to my collaboration with Archer. This has really made the piece what it is, allowing me to write for the Trombone in a very comprehensive way. I dedicate this piece to Archer.