Vocal music

See List of Compositions for a complete list of vocal music.

Musician (1990) is a setting of the poem of the same name by Louise Bogan. It was originally written for string orchestra with celesta, and this arrangement for voice, violin and piano was made for Judy Bettina. The violinist is Curtis Macomber, god-of-the-violin. (Dagnabbit, I don't think it breathes right)



I wrote Three Encores for Judy Bettina and Jim Goldsworthy in 1991. The first one is a simple vocalise. Sorry about the silly title.



The second one, below, is a scat piece which is, in its own weird way, an homage to Milton Babbitt's Phonemena.



The third one is a vocalist that takes a long, hot bath inside the world of Berg.



For Wittgenstein (1994) is the fifth song (of five) in the cycle Nothing But the Wind, written for Susan Narucki. The poem is by Joseph Duemer and was written specially for the cycle.



Georgic (2000) was written for Jim and Judy on a poem by Phillis Levin.



Three Songs on Poems of Louise Bogan was written in 1989 for Judy Bettina.







To Be Sung on the Water, the first of the Bogan songs, was recorded by Susan Narucki on her MacDowell project.



Susan and Alan also recorded Windy Nights, from the song cycle I wrote for her, Silently a Wind Goes Over. The text is Robert Louis Stevenson.

Concerti with chamber orchestra

Cerberus (1991-92) was written for Beth Wiemann, and is a triple concerto folding in another clarinet and bass clarinet occasionally turning into a mondo soloist. This is Beff with the Empyrean Ensemble. The movements are meant to be played attacca, so get your mouse ready ...









Locking Horns (2001) was commissioned by Sequitur for Daniel Grabois. Some of the movements are played attacca (IV & V) and some are not. The soloist plays only one note in the first movement (he got to leave the recording session early). Each movement begins with the same sequence of notes, and the harmony and melody at each movement's climax is the same. Because it was something I thought of.

This is a performance of the whole piece in a single YouTube movie.


And here it is broken up by movements.

Wind ensemble

Ten of a Kind (2000) was commissioned by "The President's Own" US Marine Band. The autogenerated YouTube movies below represent the commercial recording of the piece done in May, 2001. It's in four movements, in the order presented below.









Sibling Revelry (2004) is an arrangement of four "vernacular" piano études. It is a recent release by the Marine Band, who posted the recordings on YouTube. These are the four movements in order, followed by the original piano versions.




















Cantina (2007) was commissioned by the Barlow Foundation when I won the Barlow Prize. The Marine Band recorded it in 2009 and editing finished in 2010, and the date of release, if any, is unknown. It has been posted on their website at least once.

New England Conservatory Symphonic Winds recorded a live version of three of the movements, and Naxos placed them on YouTube.