A Breath Between
Duration: 23"
a double concerto for flute and violin

View score pages: pg1, pg14, pg33, pg82

Listen to excerpts:

The following two samples are taken from early and late in the piece, respectively, representing a broad sample of textures and behaviors.

Two interludes employ aleatoric scoring in order to change the nature of visual/textual prompts experienced by the performers.
This example refers to Giacometti's "Man Pointing."

My work over the past decade has been primarily concerned with addressing connections between language and music, a project that is partly informed by my own history as a writer. Language can have a potent evocative dimension for both performers and listeners to music which otherwise would have limited expressive context. Because I have chosen to write music without much reference to historically embedded styles, the result is a highly personal idiom; and while certain gestures, behaviors, and other musical resources are saturated with meaning, their private nature may distance that meaning from the listener who has never heard my previous work. Language provides a medium through which I can focus the expressive world of the music around a dramatic core, one that may not be straightforward but which offers a certain avenue for engaging in the art work.

The expressive world of A Breath Between is a complex affair. I was attracted by the opportunity to construct an elaborate, albeit abstract, stage drama where two principal characters would each explore their own internal motivations simultaneously. The soloists’ activity is guided by a series of original texts which are not spoken but appear in the score as a means of providing a poetic climate in which to frame the musical material. There are two interludes – theatrical asides, if you will – where the music takes a radical departure from the narrative in order to muse on a pair of sculptures (one by Giacometti, the other by Calder). In addition, the soloists move to several locations around the hall over the course of the piece; thus introducing spatial, antiphonal, and theatrical aspects to the work.

The term breath is a guiding metaphor that is woven into the work’s structure. The soloists "breathe" in their own space: their phrases overlap but rarely begin or end together, a feature which enhances the separate nature of their arguments. This staggered phrase structure is extended to the physical space of the auditorium, such that the interval between sound and silence becomes the distance between soloists and from the stage. As the soloists undertake separate journeys their changes in position mark a change in attitude and perspective, emphasis and accent. Rather than emerging in strict contrast materials evolve subtly over the course of the composition.

The following outline denotes the overlapping, sectional structure of the work, where each new section indicates a change in the location where it is performed.

	FLUTE		VIOLIN
		Introduction [Ritornello]
	1. Separation anxiety		1.Testing the boundaries
			2. The vanguard breaks forth
		[Ritornello]
	2. Far away – alone
		[Interlude: Musing on Man Pointing by Alberto Giacometti (1947)]
			3. Pinnacle: where the radical resonates
		[Interlude 2: Musing on a mobile by Alexander Calder]
	3. A return, a reconsideration
		[Ritornello]
	4. Slightly veiled, the critic’s voice emerges
		[Ritornello]
			4. a. Disparate ventures
Coda:	5.A rant		b. Quasi-manic speculation

As I have noted, physical space – distance – is a meaningful feature in this music. Its precise meaning is open to interpretation, although it is worth describing the degree to which the space is used differently according to the soloists’ diverse personae. As the piece begins, the flute soloist is separated from the stage and the ensemble. The Flute’s music draws from the following text:

The notion, then, of abandonment and isolation becomes a preoccupation for the flute part, sometimes treated ironically, sometimes poignantly. The rather severe isolation which is eventually felt by the Flute leads to a fiercely introspective gaze; after all, ensemble connections are virtually precluded by the radical separation from the stage. This inward perspective eventually provides a linguistic foundation through which the Flute eventually can engage with the ensemble and the violin, as a critical, sometimes subversive voice.
The distance the violin soloist eventually gains from the ensemble is not as if it were cast out but rather as an attempt at providing a behavioral model for the ensemble to follow. Early in the work, the violin part addresses the following text:

Oddly, perhaps, the point of this foray is to express the value of an introspective attitude (words such as within, inward, and myopia appear repeatedly in the score). The Violin eventually finds a pedestal behind the ensemble, crystallizing a connection between ensemble and soloist where the Violin’s suggestions resonate. The rapport the Violin gains with the ensemble at this point is at the expense of the isolation the Flute experiences. When both soloists appear onstage in front of the ensemble, at the work’s Coda, they engage in what are simultaneously the most intense monologues as well as the clearest dialogue of the piece. This is not to suggest a resolution or compromise but rather to give a special status to direct engagement between these disparate personalities.

Drama in instrumental music is, I believe, best left to the listener to perceive rather than for the composer to prescribe a specific point of view to the proceedings. The Concerto tends to be the most overtly dramatic medium in instrumental music and to this end my work certainly owes some historical debt. There are many kinds of drama that I find interesting and that I believe are prompted by A Breath Between. I have suggested something of a drama of material and of characterization. There is also a drama of interpretation, where the listener has an active role in engaging in the music. For example, in this piece one’s seating position will have a strong influence on whether one views the work through the Flute, which is always on the right side of the hall, or the Violin (at left). Furthermore, if one considers the notion of simultaneous monologues there will be moments of saturation, where the rate and density of information require the listener to choose a thread in the overall tapestry. In other words, such moments are an invitation for the listener to determine how she or he will view the total work.