non-poem 4 was commissioned by clarinetist Mark Dover in 2017. During that time, I was living in uptown Manhattan, and regularly holding discussions with the dead. I had gotten into what I later learned to be a form of psychotherapy, that of giving voice to the multiplicity within us in the form of characters; it just so happened I picked dead idols. (Consequently, this freed me from the worry that I was simply talking to people I’d never met…) The composition of the work was interwoven with a very intense sit-down with Leonard Bernstein. I love Mark Dover’s playing more than most musicians I have met, and I respect his musicianship more than any musician I have met. The piece began as a simple salute to his musical personality. Living a few floors below the room where Gershwin previewed his Rhapsody at the piano for friends, I was indeed haunted by the ghosts of old New York. I share this only to give voice to a very special time in my life, rather than to help illuminate something ‘about’ the music or its character. It is my continual hope that the music will stand on its own and need no stylistic comparison for it to exist.
Beyond writing a piece I was happy with – and one that had me trading dirty jokes with an ex-assistant conductor of the philharmonic – a greater event happened as a result: working with Jeremy Ajani Jordan. We had met briefly at a few parties but had yet to make music with one another. Mark and Jeremy gave a tremendous gift to me in taking the music so seriously and giving it life; something every composer can only humbly hope for.
non-poems are a series of chamber works that I have written that have no narrative element. They strive to be music and music alone. The works have encompassed – as of this writing there are eight of them – a variety of ensembles from duos to sixteen-piece bands, and a mixture of concert and improvised music. non-poem 4 engages the performer in both realms of exact and improvised music. The work represents a turning point in my creative life, where I began to confront the need to synthesize the musical lives I led.
The summer following the first few performances of the work, Jeremy told me about a series of concerts he was giving with violinist Kristin Lee. Of fortuitous interest, the concerts were to present music of the ‘American Journey’, featuring the voices of many of the apparitions I communed with in my uptown apartment. They – Jeremy and Kristin, the abundantly alive – asked if I would be interested in reimagining the work for solo violin and piano. I jumped at the chance. 4.1 or v2 is an extension of the work that I never could have imagined when I first began writing it. There is nothing in the way of more content, but a re-sculpting of the solo part to speak to the nature of the violin brought out a completely different energy that still surprises me. This is one of the great joys of composition: acknowledging and reveling in the complete lack of ownership, understanding, and authority of a work initially scribbled with one’s own hand. And as I bowed to the gift given me by Mark and Jeremy, I must again express my deepest thanks to the precision, skill, and love – the revelation of the mysterious thing we call ‘meaning’ in music – that Kristin and Jeremy bring to non-poem 4.