ABOUT

A composer of
generative musical
processes. An improvisor
expanding the vocabulary
of clarinet technique.

Organizer of High Zero
and the Red Room Series.
Founder of After Now.
Performer in Mobtown Modern.

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CALENDAR

2010 March 30
Presentation for
Dorkbots about
electroacoustic music with
extended reed playing,
modular software design,
and synthesis of composition
and improvisation

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A formidable intellect balanced
by an almost carefree spirit...

-- Christopher Theofanidis

An important injection of vitality into the
lineage of post-serialist 'new music'...

-- John Berndt

Cool.
-- Tim Smith, Baltimore Sun
MP3S

Dime Novel
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Dime Novel (2004)
for violin and piano

Performances:
2005 April 28: Aurelie Banziger-Dinerchtein, violin; John Chernoff, piano
2004 October 20: Aurelie Banziger-Dinerchtein, violin; John Chernoff, piano

Awarded third prize at the Prix d'ete XI.

With only two performers and three minutes to tell its story, Dime Novel manages to takes the listener on a long journey. The work features mathematically precise but organic sounding transitions from one musical location to another plus harmonic and melodic elements that are at times indistinguishable. Rhythmically alive and witty, Dime Novel is quite accessible.


Pametric
Transmutations

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Parametric
Transmutations
(2004)

for orchestra

Performances: 2004 Orchestra Reading by the Peabody Symphony Orchestra
Awarded Honorable Mentions in the Macht Competition

Parametric Transmutations is a monument to Burt's dedication to detail. Carefully crafted from each individual note, harmony, and rhythm to the large morphing shape. The recording was pieced together by the composer from a recording session led by Erin Freeman (http://www.erinrfreeman.com/) leading the Peabody Symphony Orchestra and a group of eight brave chamber performers. If you like what you hear, your orchestra could give the premier of this intelligently sensuous work.


Fountain Resonances
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Fountain Resonances(2005)
for alto sax, electronics and strings

Performances: 2005 March 30, alto saxophone
(electronics only version)
2005 April 15: C.R. Kasprzyk (electronics only)
2005 April 27: C.R. Kasprzyk; strings of the Peabody Institute
2005 May 7: C.R. Kasprzyk; strings of the Peabody Institute
2006 February 24: Brian Sacawa; SPARK Festival

This massive work asks the saxophonist to commit to playing on his back and blowing water into his mouthpiece. It was the marriage of Burt's exposure to Baltimore's experimental performers and to his own intense commitment to large forms and timbral exploration. This is perhaps the first classical work to employ the bubbling sounds of forcing fluid through a single reed instrument.


Unwound
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Unwound (2007/2009)
For any number and type of players

Alternative version exists for alto saxophone, piano, and double bass

Performances: 2009 October 17: Cameron Raeke and Liz Meredith, violas; Caleb Jones and Rachel Gawell, violoncellos
2007 November 17: Rose Hammer, alto saxophone; Ann Teresa Kang, piano; Michael Formanek, double bass

Unwound features the decelerating form shared by other pieces during this time period. The parts to this piece are asynchronous, specifying that each performer is to loop their short musical segment many times, starting with a fast speed and slowing with each successive repetition. Their are of course some prescribed disruptions along the way that give the performers some freedom to develop the preexisting material or stray into new territory.


Incandescent
Silhouette

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Incandescent
Silhouette
(2009)

for alto saxophone

Performances: 2009 May 9: Rose Burt, alto saxophone

This piece, written for his wife, is part of a larger series of short new works for saxophone focusing on controlled registral placement of pitches and the large leaps required to perform such music. Incandescent Silhouette in particular deals with quiet echoes displaced an octave from their more energetically melodic originating phrases.


Cog
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Cog (2004)
for baritone sax, piano, and double bass

Performances: 2007 November 17:
Rose Hammer, baritone saxophone; Ann Teresa Kang, piano; Michael Formanek, double bass

Cog provides the fragmented shards of a repeating melody without ever providing the melody. Each of the three performers express their own skipping window into the underlying melodic frame.


Refrain of Athanasius
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Refrain of Athanasius (2009)


Performances: 2009 October 17:
Cameron Raeke and Liz Meredith, violas; Caleb Jones and Rachel Gawell, violoncellos

Without specific notation for what to play or when to play it, Burt's instructions for Refrain of Athanasius still provide for a unified sound and a long term linear changing form.



clarinet performance
experimental performance
leading music ensembles
gallery installations
custome
software design