Flat Circle – John Kosch
Flat Circle is a musing on the adage, “Time is a flat circle.” The piece loosely depicts different states of consciousness that often accompany existential thought, from mindfulness to madness and everything in between. Some sections are meditative, and others are disorienting, dissociative, and even dreadful. My hope is that we identify the beauty in all of it.
This piece is designed for young percussionists who are just beginning to learn 4-mallet technique. The majority of the piece involves double vertical strokes on comfortable intervals (4ths and 5ths). There is 1 repeated single stroke permutation that is present in all 4 parts. Finally, the entire piece requires just 1 shared marimba. Although 2 of the performers must play the marimba backwards, they play almost exclusively on the upper manual (the “black notes”), limiting the number of possible pitches.
John Kosch has received several honors for his compositions, including: The Herb Alpert Young Jazz Composer Award, a Student Downbeat Award, first place in the NAfME Young Composers Competition, a merit award from the Tribeca New Music Young Composer Competition, and an honorable mention from Austin Classical Guitar. He is a three-time semifinalist for the American Prize, and his works have been selected for performances at regional and national Society of Composers conferences, as well as the Brevard Music Festival, Charlotte New Music Festival, and the Cortona Sessions for New Music. He currently teaches applied composition at Concordia University.
The Time Spent Wandering – Cole Asche
Written in Fall 2022, this piece holds a special place in a special time for me. It tells of the feelings that you get when you are a college student, teenager, young adult trying to figure out what you're meant to do, when you get back home from school and sit on your bed wondering, "What in the world am I doing?" In this state of mind, I would notice things, little events or situations that seemed perfect. Those perfect things would bother me but also kept me comfortable. The piece starts out with a triumphant entrance, representing these perfect things, and the rest resembles the thoughts of my mind in a time like this.
Cole Asche is a 3rd-year student at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln. Along with a major in Actuarial Science, he studies music composition with Dr. Greg Simon and Percussion with Dr. Matt Rush. His past teachers include Michael Klee out of Columbus, NE, and Dr. Dave Hall at UNT. Cole has experience in groups such as the Cornhusker Marching Band, the UNL Percussion, Orchestra, and Symphonic Band ensembles, the UNL Composition Studio, Crossroads Indoor Percussion, Jersey Surf DBC, and the Cavaliers DBC. He is a percussion instructor at Waverly High School and teaches the drumline at Lincoln Christian School. In the future, he hopes to write music for marching band and percussion ensembles.
If I Can Stop One Heart Beating – Bryce Hayes
Content Warning: potentially disturbing material.
A project that started as an experiment with voice manipulation expanded into a deeper exploration and mediation into the personal mental health experiences of the composer.
Bryce Hayes is a sophomore composer at UNL. Originally from Oregon, he is here studying music composition, with a strong interest in music for other art mediums, such as movies, video games, and even live theatre.
The Horse You Rode in On – M. Joseph Willette
Having lived most of my life in fairly conservative parts of the country as a loud, proud, openly queer person, something that I have heard a lot is that I’m “too much.” I’m too flamboyant, too queer, too colorful, I dress too strangely. Because of this, I’ve often been the subject of discrimination, harassment, and even assault. This piece is an expression of frustration at these comments, and the frustration many queer people feel because we don’t fit into the boxes that many people want us to. This piece is a screaming song, aimed towards those who find us to be “too much”.
... and the horse you rode in on.
M Joseph Willette (b. 1997) is a composer and educator currently residing in the bustling city of Lincoln, Nebraska. Often drawing inspiration from their own experiences as a queer individual, Joey (they/them) utilizes delicate timbres and rich sonorities to capture the idyllic intimacies and onerous tribulations of the human experience.