Debut Solo Percussion Album: Within the Within

I’m very excited to release my debut solo percussion album Within the Within! This album represents many of my interests in percussion and is the culmination of years of work. The album includes three world premieres by Matthew Burtner, Alexandre Lunsqui, and Cristyn Magnus. It also includes a couple of classic percussion works like Javier Alvarez‘s “Temazcal” (the American recording premiere) and Herbert Brün’s graphic score “Stalks and Trees and Drops and Clouds” (the recording premiere) with liner notes on the Brün by Allen Otte of PAS Hall of Fame Percussion Group Cincinnati. The album is named for Lunsqui’s work, “Materiali: Dentro do dentro.” Album artwork was made by the amazing Casey Farina. I’ll be doing a few masterclasses and performances at the end of October and November showcasing some of the works from the album at UNC Pembroke, Appalachian State, and Western Carolina. First time performing live in over a year!

You can find my album on any of these digital streaming services: Apple Music Spotify Amazon Bandcamp Or purchase a CD and you can read more details about each work. You can purchase a copy from Albany records or directly from me.

• Materiali: Dentro do dentro (Lunsqui) is a wonderful exploration of material textures and microsounds that require amplification. The instruments are entirely found objects of various material types such as clay, plastic, metal, water, air, rocks, and wood.
• Temazcal (Alvarez) is a staple in the percussion world and a work for maracas and electroacoustic sounds. After my doctoral research on Venezuelan maracas styles and having the opportunity to study with virtuosos like Manuel Rangel and Juan Ernesto Laya, my realization of this piece was largely inspired by my intimate journey with maracas over the past 15 years.
• Pitch vs Computer (Magnus) is a video game score controlled by the musical instrument. Magnus explores video games as a concept in order to generate meaningful interactive electronic sounds into a solo concert work. The musician is presented with the dichotomy of winning the game vs making musical decisions. It’s ultimately a battle against the instrument and the computer.
• Stalks and Trees and Drops and Clouds (Brün) was one of the very first computer-aided solos for percussion ever written. Brün uses the Calcomp pen plotter to create three graphic scores for solo percussion and this piece is one of them.
• Glisten of Places (Burtner) is a beautiful meditative work for percussion and geotagged soundscapes. Burtner recorded many field recordings of rare and unheard sounds, like inside a fire ant hill, lava flow, glaciers melting, orcas traveling at sea above and below the water simultaneously, coral reef, and more. Encoded in the percussion part are the GPS coordinates of each sound.