Time Games (2025)

for Wind Quintet*

I. Addition and Subtraction
II. Subdivision
III. Repetition (Elegy)

It is not difficult, when looking through my music, to notice that rhythmic play and changing pulses are a common thread in my compositional technique.  From an early stage in my training, I have been fascinated and enthralled by the music of composers like Stravinsky, Bernstein, and Copland, whose bodies of work are ripe with complex rhythms, odd meters, and combinations of long and short pulses.  Time Games, as the title might suggest, is an exploration of these different aspects of rhythm and pulse, and some of the ways in which they can be manipulated.  Each movement focuses on a single “trick,” which plays out throughout the work: adding values to certain beats to lengthen or shorten them, creating a playful interaction between long and short pulses; layering different subdivisions of a single beat on top of each other to create a chaotic, polyrhythmic scherzo; or meditating on a simple, repeated pattern, over which hangs a placid lullaby.

*Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Horn, Bassoon