At the Hawk’s Well

June 17, 2024

The cast of At the Hawk’s Well. L-R: Phoebe Chee, Alex Jerinic, Marissa Maislen, Nicolas Vasquez-Gerst, Igor Vieira. (Photo: Steve Fisch.)

I completed a first version of this opera back in April 2021. This spring, I revised it for a performance by Bay Area Arts Alliance. It was performed on June 15 and 16, 2024, at the San Francisco Community Music Center, directed by Megan Cullen and with Alex Katsman as music director.

Here’s the full performance from June 16, 2024, on YouTube. The opera is about 50 minutes long, and it’s followed by a discussion with the cast.

  • Old Man (baritone) – Igor Vieira
  • Young Man (tenor) – Nicolas Vasquez-Gerst
  • First Musician (mezzo-soprano) – Alix Jerinic
  • Second Musician (soprano) – Phoebe Chee
  • Guardian of the Well (dancer) – Marissa Maislen

Ensemble:

  • Piano – Alex Katsman
  • Violin – Manny Vousé
  • Viola – Armando Atando
  • Cello – Octavio Mujica
  • Bass – Carlos Valdez
  • Soprano saxophone – Robin Lacey

Full score (PDF). Parts available on request.

Libretto (PDF), lightly adapted from the play by W.B. Yeats.

Program (PDF), including synopsis, commentary, and performer bios.

Interview on the Community Music Center site.


Lumping and Splitting

November 6, 2023

Overture for chamber orchestra. Performed Saturday, Nov. 4, by the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra, John Kendall Bailey conducting.

Score (PDF)

Live recording (MP3)


Lament for Art O’Leary

September 3, 2023

Monologue for soprano, with cello and piano.

In 1773, in County Cork, Ireland, Art Ó Laoghaire (Art O’Leary) was murdered by an English landowner. His widow, Eibhlín Dubh Ní Chonaill (Eileen O’Connell), delivered an extraordinary elegy in Irish at his wake. It entered the oral tradition as the Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoghaire (Lament for Art O’Leary), and was first written down in the 19th century. It has been translated into English several times (notably in Doireann Ní Ghríofa’s book A Ghost in the Throat). I’ve chosen a series of excerpts, roughly an eighth of the poem, from the translation by Vona Groarke. The speaker addresses us across the centuries with a startling immediacy, full of love and loss.

Video of performance by Megan Cullen, soprano, with John Kiunke, piano and Tim Stanley, cello. Performed as part of the Operation Opera workshop, California State University, Sacramento, June 2023.

Text (PDF)

Score (PDF)


Dancing

July 13, 2023

A scherzo for string quartet, originally intended as part of a multi-movement work. Runs about 5 minutes.

Score (PDF)

Synthesized audio (MP3)

Parts available on request.


Emergency Guidelines

May 16, 2023

Setting of the poem “Emergency Guidelines”, by Martha McCollough. For soprano and ten instruments (woodwind quintet + string quintet). Duration ca. 4:00.

Score (PDF).

Performance (video, audio only), by Megan Cullen, soprano, with John Kendall Bailey conducting the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra, May 13, 2023.


Kira’s Confession

April 9, 2022

Aria for mezzo-soprano, composed for Really Spicy Opera‘s Aria Institute. Libretto by Sandra Flores-Strand.

Score (PDF)

Performance (YouTube) — Lisa Neher, mezzo, with Jodi Goble, piano.

The prompt was this brief scene in Deep Space Nine — see Wikipedia for more.


À quoi bon dire

January 8, 2022

Setting of the poem by Charlotte Mew, for mezzo-soprano (or other voice) and piano. A bit in the vein of a jazz standard.

Score (PDF)

Performance (MP3) by Zahra Rothschild, mezzo, and me at the piano.


Tu scendi dalle stelle

December 7, 2021

A Neapolitan Christmas carol. The tune is a bit different from the well-known version — I believe the source is The International Book of Christmas Carols (Prentice Hall, 1963). For choir SATB and piano.

Score (PDF).

Recording, by the San Francisco Bach Choir. (Magen Solomon, director — Steven Bailey, pianist.)


Crimson and white

November 7, 2021

Duet for violin and piano, composed November 2021.

Score (PDF)
Violin part (PDF)
Synthesized demo of violin part (MP3)


Maximus, to himself

September 8, 2021

Solo piece for trombone, written for Brent Mead in the Great Plains Composers’ Workshop.

Audio, as a score-follower video

Score PDF