The past few weeks have been an exciting time for me with recent recordings, upcoming premieres, and an awesome international adventure.
Continue readingMore TagReturning to the Violin
So I’ve recently started work on a violin concerto for my friend Jared Starr. I grew up playing violin, and though I never progressed passed an intermediate level, writing a concerto for the instrument feels like a kind of homecoming to me. Here’s a video of David Oistrakh playing Prokofiev’s First Violin Concerto, my favorite […]
Continue readingMore TagTwo Conflicting Views on Influence
“After all,” says Harrison Birtwistle, “we all come from somewhere: we don’t invent it for ourselves; we don’t come from the moon.”
Continue readingMore TagA Few of My Favorite Things
To all those who have bemoaned my inability to pick favorites, here you have it.
Continue readingMore TagPatting Your Head . . .
Today I wrote music . . . while listening to other music. Though a first for me, this isn’t too unusual. One of my friends routinely writes music at concerts; my teacher admitted to writing one of his best pieces will at a friend’s recital; and I’ve even heard rumors that Luciano Berio wrote his […]
Continue readingMore TagA Good Summer for Reading, part 2
As promised, in this entry I’ll finish off the survey of books I’ve read this summer. I’ve had a few good ones sneak in toward the end, and I’m excited to tell you about them. The very first book I read this summer was C.S. Lewis’s novel Till We Have Faces. The book takes place […]
Continue readingMore TagPre-composition and Football
Whenever people find out I’m a composer, they first ask, “What kind of music do you write?” for which I have yet to come up with a good answer. “Instrumental” and “classical-ish” are my usual responses. The next comment they make is often “I could never write music.” From what I can tell, many people […]
Continue readingMore TagBad Tie Day
My brothers and I all served missions, and after two years during which the tie you wear is your only outlet for expressing personality, you get a taste for ties. Naturally, then, we were curious about what was in fashion these days.
Continue readingMore TagBook of Imaginary Beings
I received word just yesterday that my proposal to write a piece for Eric Hansen, Skyler Murray, and Scott Holden—all fabulous musicians—was accepted by the Barlow Endowment, who awarded me a grant to write a 15–20 minute piece for bass, saxophone, and piano. Seeing how the endowment has given grants to a couple dozen Pulitzer […]
Continue readingMore TagA Good Summer for Reading, part 1
As the end of summer draws near, it’s struck me what a great summer it’s been for reading. Not only have I had ample opportunity to read new books, but I also found a whole bunch of winners in different genres. Today, I’ll start by reviewing the sci-fi/fantasy books I’ve read. In future posts, I’ll […]
Continue readingMore Tag