Keyboard

This piece for solo organ was commissioned by Tammy-Jo Mortensen to be performed on the Davis Concert Organ at Winspear Centre in Edmonton. It is an example of two of things that continue to excite me as a composer. The first is rhythm and the second texture.

The piece is in three sections with the rhythmic material occupying the outer parts:

• The piece begins with a compositional technique called “fill in the blank.” This is realized by taking a melodic line and only playing a couple of notes and then as you repeat, you add more and more notes until the line is complete. This creates the illusion that the music is speeding. After all the blanks have been filled in we get the primary material of the piece. This material has a lot of rhythmic energy and when it’s repeated with the pedals added the “groove” becomes even stronger. This section reminds you of something you might hear played by a '70s progressive rock band.
• The middle section has a more suspended feeling as the soloist plays two busy triplet figures on the keys and a melodic line in the pedals.
• That material leads back into a recap.

Cancion was written for Sylvia Shadick-Taylor and commissioned through the CBC. At the time I started this piece I had been studying the piano music of Claude Debussy. His ability to create many different layers while still being completely pianistic always impressed me and that’s the type of texture I was striving for.

The introduction is a series of cluster chords that lead into section I which is driven by a 7/8 ostinato. Above that I weave a long melody derived from the phrygian mode. This scale is often associated with Spanish music and is why I called the piece Cancion, which is Spanish for song. The middle section is a slow chorale focusing more on harmony followed by a short recap of the material from section I.

Score sample