I’m very optimistic that this will be a great year, and so far I’ve been proven right. The Blackout Concert on Friday was a huge success, and we had some of the most enthusiastic turn-out in a while. There were many great performances and a huge variety of works were on the program – everything from abstract tape pieces to quasi-performance art works to highly diatonic love-songs accompanied by dancers, all done in the serine darkness of a church.
For the last couple months I’ve been sketching a large-scale work for mixed septet which has been going well, and once it’s finished I will write an extended entry discussing its logic and philosophy, similar to what I did for my fifth string quartet. Thus far 3 of the projected 5 movements are finished with a 4th well under way and the 5th only existing in my mind, at present.
On March 8th I’ll be presenting a new electro-acoustic composition for amplified solo viola with the Eugene Contemporary Chamber Ensemble on a double-billed concert with CPOP, which I’m very excited about. This will be the culmination of nearly a year’s worth of work; of writing, coordinating with and working with ECCE/CPOP, editing, searching for venues – all the thrilling aspects of building a multi-city collaboration concert on a major new music festival. I’ll be posting more about this as it comes closer on here as well as on my newly minted Facebook page.
After that’s finished, I’m going to start working towards a goal I’ve been thinking about for a while: releasing a CD. By the end of this year, I’m hoping to release a CD of works for solo piano and solo guitar, which will all be played by yours truly. It’ll likely be an EP of some sort; no more than 4 tracks, but never the less it will be an exciting new venture. Since I’m going to be playing them all myself chances are they’ll be on the simpler side – perhaps a short suite for piano and one or two pieces for guitar, possibly one with pre-recorded sound (“tape”) – but it should be really fun and rewarding challenge.
Jay Derderian 