New Songs

December 10th, 2009 | By Tyler Banas | Section: Article

Students enrolled in Music 215: Introduction to Composition, spent months writing short scores for whatever blend of instruments they liked, and will be hosting a classical concert this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in Sebring-Lewis Hall. The show will consist of about 13 short scores composed by the students under the guidance of Professor Christopher Gainey, Music.
The show is the product of an open-ended assignment. “There are no real guidelines in terms of form. It’s really free and open to whatever you want to do. There’s a lot of different styles being orchestrated,” Charlie Kessner ’12 said. “The professor is really open to all styles of music.
The nature of the assignment gave students profound latitude, which paid off in a number of ways. “The students’ scores have become very individualized over the course of the semester,” Gainey said.
Each piece will have a unique sound, reflective of its composer—some of the compositions depend on highly unusual components. “One student is using weedwacker cord wrapped around a piano string, so you can bow it, and is combining this with flute, piano, cello and some other instruments,” Mikey Maiorana ’12 a student in the class, said.
Even so, there are also many string ensembles and other traditional instruments, so the concert should appeal to most audiences. “The scores the students are creating are not too ‘out there’ for new music,” Jamie Alper ’10, another student in the class, said.
The project was assigned on the first day of class this semester, and the students have worked hard at composing, finding musicians and rehearsing their scores.
“To me it’s important to write a good piece of music that’s not only musically accurate and interesting to me, but also effective in that a listener who is uneducated in music theory can listen to it and enjoy,” Kessner said.
Whether your musical taste falls into the violin or the weedwacker camp, Saturday’s show promises to inform and most of all to entertain.