SPLICE Institute 2024 Participant Concert 2 Program
Saturday June 29, 2024
10:30am EDT
Dalton Recital Hall, Western Michigan University
Livestream simulcast on SPLICE YouTube (unique link)
Yeonsuk Jung : (p)los-i've (2024)
Rebecca Larkin, flute
Huan Sun : Inscrutable (2024)
Tyler Harper, bassoon
Ethan Cohn : WHALE (feat. MagicBow3) (2024)
Ethan Cohn , bass
Carlos Zárate : to collapse (2024)
Hugh Ash, trumpet
Micah Pick : Offworld Horizons (2024)
Jack Thorpe, saxophone
Chloe Liu : Where Is Medea (2024)
Olivia Cirisan, percussion
Notes
Yeonsuk Jung : (p)los-i've
(p)los-i've is a deep dive into the explosive sounds that can be created through the flute. exploring its capacity for sharp, punchy expressions. Inspired by the plosive sounds in speech – those crisp, impactful consonants like "p," "t," and "k" – this piece examines how similar effects can be created using the flute.
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Huan Sun : Inscrutable
Inspired by David Spriggs’s Gravity series installation, Inscrutable delves into the complex interplay between elemental constituents and holistic patterns. Spriggs’s artwork, rooted in Gestalt theory, emphasizes the perception of entire patterns and configurations, which parallels the concept of atomism where intricate ideas emerge from basic components.
The Gravity series captivates viewers with its central axis of rotation, drawing them into a cohesive visual experience shaped by the interplay and overlap of painted transparent layers. This sense of depth, form, and movement serves as the artistic foundation for Inscrutable.
Drawing from Spriggs’s thematic elements and Gestalt principles, this composition explores the dynamic relationship between the bassoon and electronic elements. The bassoon, renowned for its versatility and expressiveness, intertwines with electronic sounds to create a rich, textured sonic landscape. Through this fusion, Inscrutable aims to evoke a sense of mystery and profundity, embodying an enigmatic quality that reflects the complexity and depth of both the visual and auditory elements that inspired its creation.
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Ethan Cohn : WHALE (feat. MagicBow3)
Whales communicate with each other in ways that we cannot possibly comprehend. I imagine that to even begin to understand the meaning behind their beautiful songs, we must attempt the impossible task of living the life of a whale. When I began developing my piece, WHALE, I was inspired by this idea of an unintelligible language that is particular to the one speaking it. As a bass player, I find that the movement of my bow is typically a byproduct of the sound I wish to create, with the majority of motion existing in service of that sound. In developing my own language system as a solo electroacoustic improviser, I wanted to extend the expressiveness of the motion of the bow off of the instrument. I developed the MagicBow3 for this purpose. Using data from the bow's motion through space, the MagicBow3 digitally processes the sound of the bass in real time. I aim to create a language system that is particular to my experience playing the bass, one that draws parallels between the large, majestic beings of bass and whale.
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Carlos Zárate : to collapse
to collapse is a piece about my relationship with breathing at a specific moment in time. The idea of collapsing is explored as a temporal metaphor but the piece also seeks to explore how strain affects breathing and its sonic characteristics.
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Micah Pick : Offworld Horizons
Offworld horizons is an exploration of human adaptability. It has been famously said that fantasy stories exist, not to teach us that dragons exist, but that they can be defeated. In the same way, stories of space exploration teach us about humanity's great ability to adapt to new surroundings and circumstances. This piece can be a literal programmatic piece about epic space exploration, but it can also serve as a metaphor for the ways that we all learn how to adapt to new paradigms, situations, and locations. By using a 12 tone scale that is altered from the typical chromatic scale by specific quarter tones the piece creates an “alien” listening environment that becomes more and more familiar to the performer and the audience as the piece progresses. By the end of the piece the alien landscape should feel like home.
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Chloe Liu : Where Is Medea
Medea, a character from Greek mythology, lived a life marked by profound tragedy. She abandoned her family and country to be with her lover, Jason, only to later kill her own children as an act of revenge following Jason’s betrayal. Medea's story has always been highly controversial and considered immoral. However, in Euripides’ play, her tale becomes multifaceted, evoking a sense of sympathy for Medea despite her horrific actions. Through her own words, Euripides presents Medea not simply as a villain but as a deeply wounded woman whose love for her husband was so intense that it drove her to madness and cruelty. This duality raises profound questions about morality and human nature.
I often find myself drawn to Greek tragedies, and Euripides’ “Medea” exemplifies why. Greek tragedies usually served as a powerful medium to explore the most extreme and challenging questions about the social life. Although the story of Medea may not seem directly relevant to us, Euripides’ approach to controversial and extreme subjects continues to inspire us to ask similar questions about our own issues in modern society.
I would like to thank my friend Lucas Bennett for helping me revise the script for this composition.
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Bios
Hugh Ash has taken his trumpet around the globe, performing everything from new music to standard classical repertoire, jazz, rock, and commercial music. Based in Brooklyn, Hugh is an active free-lancer and educator as well as a Teaching Assistant at Rutgers University and a faculty member at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music. He regularly performs new music, both solo and chamber, with Ensemble Mise-En and The Curiosity Cabinet, and spent the majority of 2019 subbing on the Off-Broadway hit Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish. A lover of contemporary classical music, Hugh actively champions work by living composers. He has performed premieres by Philippe Manoury, Larry Sitsky, David Maslanka, Viet Cuong, Angelica Negron, Whitney George, Nicolas Nelson, Amir Shpilman, Jay Vilnai, and Harry Stafylakis. He has performed at the New Music Gathering, the Hartford Women’s Composers Festival, MoMA’s PopRally series, and as part of the Art in Odd Places Festival.
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Olivia Cirisan is a percussionist, singer/songwriter, composer and producer based in Ann Arbor, MI. Olivia particularly has a passion for contemporary, chamber, electroacoustic and electronic music, and performs locally in the Ann Arbor / Ypsilanti area with various groups including her percussion/electronic music duo VIRID, her new music sextet FLYDLPHN, and her percussion trio Brain Pocket. In addition to being a performer and co-director of various ensembles, she is a co-producer of the concert series VIRID and Friends based in Ann Arbor. Olivia strives to continue exploring and experimenting while also staying connected to her classical percussion training and her upbringing surrounded by songwriting and popular music. Currently, Olivia is pursuing an MM in Percussion Performance at the University of Michigan, where she also received her BM in 2023.
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Ethan Cohn is a bass player, composer, improvisor, and educator born, raised, and currently based in New York City. Known for his love of musical cross-pollination, his work reflects his sponge-like capacity to absorb and integrate his many interests into one unified voice. Ethan has performed with groups from all over the musical map, carving a distinct voice for himself through his clear sound, strong groove, and consistently melodic approach to playing the bass. He is interested in the potential of electronics as both a compositional tool and an interface for live performers and improvisors. Ethan is an alumnus of McGill University, The New School, and Focusyear Basel.
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Tyler Harper
Growing up in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, I come from a working class family, far from the world of art and culture. My mind was occupied in curiosity, spending my time learning about space and invested in a track to academia. Space has always provided me with a sense of awe and wonder at the scale and diversity of our universe. Quasars, super massive black holes, millions of billions of stars larger than I can even perceive. The massive nature of our universe and the bodies within it provides me with the closest proximity to apotheosis I can imagine. This drive to find out the nature of the gods propels my creative mind today, pushing me towards a sound that pays homage to the scale of the gods.
My artistic approach employs multimedia and multimodal expression to deepen appreciation for the world's beauty and grandeur. Electroacoustic processing of bassoon and other winds, reactive video, and dynamic performances themed around nature, space, and the built environment constitute my practice. Termed ""landscape music,"" my work explores metaphorical connections between sight and sound, aiming to evoke wonder and curiosity about the mechanisms shaping our world.
In the past year, my focus shifted towards a more accessible and relevant presentation style for classical and electroacoustic performances. I seek to update the traditional concert format, which often alienates audiences with its stringent rules. As the 2024 Artist-in-Residence at the Reef DTLA Galleries, I experiment with unconventional venues and multimedia technologies to bring our artistic presentations into the 21st century. My goal is to break down barriers and make the experience inclusive, especially for those who, like me, come from non-traditional backgrounds.
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Originally from Korea, Yeonsuk Jung is a Korean composer whose works delve into the intersection of urban design, composition, and technology. Yeonsuk's compositions explore the potential of collaborative music-making, integrating unique aspects of relationships into the music without drawing boundaries. Yeonsuk holds Bachelor of Music degrees in Composition and Music Theory from the University of North Texas. He is currently pursuing a Master of Music degree at Bowling Green State University.
His music has gained international recognition through participation in prestigious music festivals and winning several awards, including the 30x30x30 Soli Chamber Ensemble Call for Score (Winner, 2024), The Clements Prize for Composers (Finalist, 2023), and the 2023-24 Klingler Electro Acoustic Residency Competition (Winner, 2023). His compositions have been performed globally, notably at the Conway Hall Sunday Concert Series (London, UK), the International Young Composers' Academy at Ticino (Switzerland, 2022), and ICEBERG New Music Institute (Vienna, 2022). Yeonsuk has collaborated with numerous ensembles and performers, including Trio Immersio, Trio Fidelio, BGSU Graduate Saxophone Quartet, Duo Duoro, Les Percussion De Strasbourg, and Camerata San Antonio.
Beyond his traditional compositions, Yeonsuk explores diverse musical outlets through his alter ego, Squab Dad, where he delves into various intersections of music, from dance to internet meme culture.
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Rebecca Larkin is a musical storyteller. Inspired by soundtracks and concert music, Rebecca writes visual music for the stage and screen. She has received recognition as an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards finalist and a Game Audio Network Guild (GANG) scholar. Constantly seeking opportunities to create new cross-disciplinary work, her most recent project, “Duet for Flute and Video Game,” explores the expressive potential of play and debuted at GameSoundCon ‘23.
As a flutist, Rebecca is an active performer of new music. She has been a featured soloist with Vermont’s North Country Electronic Music Festival and the Oregon Bach Festival Composers Symposium. She also partners with percussionist Chieh Huang to form the duo Brazen Sky. Rebecca studied at the University of Oregon and Ohio Wesleyan University, earning an M.M. in Music Composition and a B.M. in Flute Performance, respectively. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. at UC Irvine in Integrated Composition, Improvisation, and Technology (ICIT).
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Chloe Liuyan Liu is a composer who earned her Master of Music in Music Composition from Indiana University in May 2023, following her Bachelor of Music in Composition at Wheaton College in 2021. Liu has studied composition under mentors such as Shawn Okpebeholo, Xavier Beteta, David Dzubay, Annie Gosfield, and Han Lash. She also pursued a minor in computer music under the direction of John Gibson and Chi Wang. During her time at Indiana University, she focused on interactive music with data-driven instruments for her computer music compositions. Outside of academia, she composes Chinese pop music and soundtracks for short films and games.
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Micah Pick is a composer, producer, and performer living in Central VA where he works as a collaborative pianist, music director, and music educator. He has released music on Audiobulb Records, Flag Day Records, and Exopac Recordings. His music has been performed at the Jacksonville Electro-acoustic Festival 2023 and was featured at the New York City Electo-Acoustic Festival 2024. He has an MFA in Music Composition from the Vermont College of the Fine Arts. When not writing, performing, or teaching music he can be found exploring the mountains and rivers of Virginia’s Blue Ridge with his daughters.
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Huan Sun is a Chinese contemporary music composer, drawing inspirations from installations and fine arts to explore the boundaries of diverse cultures. Her accolades include being a finalist for the 2024 SEAMUS/ASCAP Award and winning the Breaking Barriers Call for Orchestra Scores Competition. Additionally, she was recognized as a finalist in BMP's "Next Generation" program and won the first prize in "The 9th Yanhuang Composition Competition."
Huan Sun's work has been showcased at renowned festivals such as the SEAMUS National Conference, and IRCAM’s CIEE Summer Contemporary Music Creation + Critique Program. She has received commissions from esteemed institutions including Zhejiang Conservatory of Music, the Atlantic Music Festival. Huan Sun holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, a Master of Music degree from the Mannes School of Music, and is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in composition at Indiana University Bloomington.
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Atlanta-based saxophonist Jack Thorpe currently serves as the Artist Affiliate of saxophone at Georgia State University and the adjunct instructor of saxophone at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. As a concerto soloist, he has performed with the Georgia State University Symphonic Wind Ensemble, the Stephen F. Austin State University Symphonic Orchestra, and the University of Illinois Symphony Orchestra. Through his work as the alto player in the Versa Quartet, Thorpe won first place in the 2020 North American Saxophone Alliance’s Quartet Competition, and in 2017, he co-founded the Snow Pond Saxophone Quartet, a chamber ensemble formed to represent the Frederick L. Hemke Saxophone Institute at the Snow Pond Center for the Arts to international audiences. The quartet performed throughout Japan in 2017 alongside soloist Masato Kumoi and toured the southeastern United States in 2019.
In March of 2022, he was named the winner of the University of Illinois's Presser Graduate Award. With funding from this award, he commissioned six composers who belong to traditionally under-represented communities in classical music to write solo and electroacoustic works for saxophone. In June of 2023, Thorpe recorded these works and released them as his debut album Illusory Dreams on October 6, 2023. As a performer of contemporary music, Thorpe has given world premieres of over 25 works. Recently, Thorpe's saxophone duo, Vex, has premiered new works by Emily Koh, Yaz Lancaster, and Anthony R. Green.
Thorpe holds a D.M.A in saxophone performance and literature form the University of Illinois, an M.M. in saxophone performance from Stephen F. Austin State University, and a B.M. in saxophone performance from Georgia State University where he was the recipient of the Presser Undergraduate Scholar Award. His teachers include Debra Richtmeyer, Jan Berry Baker, and Nathan Nabb with additional study under Frederick L. Hemke.
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Carlos Zárate is a composer of acoustic and electroacoustic music. He was born and raised in Mexico City and is interested in live electronics, audiovisual art, and exploring different ways in which other artistic expressions can foster musical ideas.
Carlos is currently pursuing a PhD in Composition and Music Technology at Northwestern University, under the guidance of Alex Mincek, Hans Thomalla, and Jay Alan Yim. He holds a MM in Interdisciplinary Digital Media Composition from Arizona State University, where he studied as a Fulbright fellow with Fernanda Aoki Navarro and Gabriel Bolaños. Carlos got a Bachelor's Degree in Composition and Music Theory at Centro de Investigación y Estudios de la Música (CIEM).
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