concert music

Performance materials are available for most of these pieces! If you’re interested in purchasing, please reach out via the Contact page.

 

New Work

(2022 - in progress) • concert band

Commissioned by Jonathan Law High School (Dave Pelaggi, Director of Bands). Intended premiere in April 2022.

Work Through

(2021) • clarinet, violin, cello, piano • 9’

Work Through contains a long, writhing snake of musical material. The players and the audience interact with that snake in cross-sections, gradually introducing new additive figures and “forgetting” earlier ones. The process of adding and forgetting (of “working through”) accelerates into new territory, yet feels uncannily in stasis, maintaining a burned-in image of the forgotten ideas. It’s a metaphor for memory, the slow procession of life, and the joy of the present moment.

  • Written for and recorded by Unheard-of//Ensemble for their 2021 Collaborative Composition Initiative, and featured on CCI//Sessions Vol. 3.

An exploration of machine-like, stratified textures and the lines between disarray and unity, captured within a rugged sonic palette. Written during the national COVID-19 lockdown from my family’s home in Connecticut, where I found the germ of the piece in the bowels of the house’s digestive system. Workshopped with contemporary music trio Bearthoven as part of their yearly residency at NYU. featuring Bearthoven: Karl Larson, piano Pat Swoboda, bass Matt Evans, drums

grabble & grind

(2020) • piano, upright bass, drums, fixed electronics • 7’30”

An exploration of machine-like, stratified textures and the lines between disarray and unity, captured within a rugged sonic palette. Written during the national COVID-19 lockdown from my childhood home in Connecticut, where I found the germ of the piece in the bowels of the house’s digestive system. Workshopped with contemporary music trio Bearthoven (Karl Larson, piano; Pat Swoboda, bass; Matt Evans, percussion) as part of their yearly residency at NYU.

  • Recorded remotely by Bearthoven in May 2020, with plans for a future professionally produced recording when it becomes viable.

(Covering) Me by Kyle Brenn & Amelia Murray. (2019) for alto voice & piano. This song is the third in Kyle and Amelia's collaborative series exploring memory, perception, health and medical care, following Modern Medicine (2018) and Lock Jaw (2019). (Covering) Me focuses specifically on singer Natalie Young's unique experience with a chronic pain condition acquired in her early teens. The complete song cycle is slated to be released as an EP in the coming year.  Live recording from premiere at the fall 2019 NYU First Stages concert on November 17, 2020. Natalie Young, voice Kyle Brenn, piano

(Covering) Me

(2020) • alto + piano • 4’30”

This song is the third in Kyle and Amelia's collaborative series exploring memory, perception, health and medical care, following Modern Medicine (2018) and Lock Jaw (2019). (Covering) Me focuses specifically on singer Natalie Young's unique experience with a chronic pain condition acquired in her early teens. The complete song cycle is slated to be released as an EP in the coming year. 

  • Premiered by Natalie Young & Kyle Brenn at the 2019 NYU First Stages concert.

pieced together from rehearsal recordings with some midi. flora hollifield - violin 1 yaz lancaster - violin 2 harper randolph - viola dorothy carlos - cello

Blossoming Like Crazy

(2019–2020) • string quartet + electronics • 11’45”

My grandfather took the songs he loved (mostly from the 40s and 50s) and wrote his own words to the tunes. Many of these were performed over the phone and recorded onto my home answering machine, along with spoken messages to me and my family. As the messages move forward in time, the decline in his health is evident, making singing a belabored process. The players in this piece interact temporally and dramatically with one specific song, one that I attempt to fully realize in the characteristic arranging style of mid-century ‘crooner’ music, while also exploring distorted and transformed versions of the same ideas.

  • Premiere performance at Kyle’s NYU junior composition recital on April 26, 2019 featuring: Flora Hollifield (violin), Yaz Lancaster (violin), Harper Randolph (viola), Dorothy Carlos (cello).

  • Upcoming world premiere of 2020 revised version by Ensemble Connect at Carnegie Hall: May 2022.

Recorded live at my NYU junior composition recital on April 26, 2019. Marc Hill, percussion Kyle Brenn, fixed electronics This piece was made possible by a consortium commission from 9 musicians organized by Marc Hill, including Gene Koshinski, Matt Bronson, Bryden Gollhardt, Dave Pelaggi, Dan Ingman, Cody Anderson, Emily Roane, and Jake Abel. It’s my second effort at solo electroacoustic percussion writing, and my third electroacoustic piece overall. I have ideas to expand it into a multi-movement work. Recorded by Aron Kobayashi Ritch. Photo by Amelia Murray.

Auguring

(2019) • solo multi-percussion + electronics • 6’45”

This piece was made possible by a consortium commission from 8 percussionists organized by Marc Hill, including internationally recognized percussionist and composer Gene Koshinski, as well as Matt Bronson, Bryden Gollhardt, Dave Pelaggi, Dan Ingman, Cody Anderson, and Emily Roane.

  • Premiered by Marc Hill at Kyle’s NYU junior composition recital in April 2019.

  • Other performances include: NYU Bleep Bloop (Nov. 2019), Research on Composition Conference (Univ. of North Georgia, Oct. 2020), TURN UP Multimedia Festival (May 2021).

(2019) for flute/piccolo, clarinet/bass clarinet, cello, electric guitar, piano, & percussion (drum set + found metal objects). MIDI rendering.

Lock Jaw

(2019) • 2 vocalists, fl/picc, cl/bscl, vc, pno, e.gtr, e.bs, perc, electronics • 6’30”

Second of a triptych of collaborative pieces exploring the human psyche’s relationship to the medical-industrial complex and self-care, the first being their song Modern Medicine.

  • Premiered at Pulsing & Shaking, NYU’s 2-day festival celebrating New York’s vibrant musical culture, in February 2019.

Copyright Laws Apply (2018), structured improvisation by Kyle Brenn Rohan Chander — piano Kyle Brenn — drum set Premiered at the SPHERES Collective Inaugural Chamber Concert at Scholes Street Studio on December 8, 2018. PROGRAM NOTES: Copyright Laws Apply was originally conceived as a larger-scale duo improv project between myself and keyboardist Rohan Chander. The piece presented tonight represents some early experimentation in fusing a contemporary classical sensibility with a free-jazz/hip-hop influenced idiom, while integrating outside musical and textual sources. The structured improvisation is built around a number of pieces I discovered would have entered the U.S. public domain this year, if not for the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, under which the public domain will reopen on January 1, 2019. Many of these tunes—Coltrane’s “Giant Steps,” Aretha Franklin’s “Respect,” Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land”—are instantly recognizable to most listeners, and have seen a tradition of reinterpretation since their creation. In turn, I saw the process of creating this piece and fine-tuning its performance with Rohan as an extension of this discourse on artistic ownership—how far can one go before a piece of standard repertoire is unrecognizable? Artwork by Kyle Brenn.

Copyright Laws Apply

(2018) • piano + drums • 6’30”

This structured improvisation is built around a number of pieces I discovered would have entered the U.S. public domain this year, if not for the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, under which the public domain will reopen on January 1, 2019. Many of these tunes—Coltrane’s “Giant Steps,” Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land”—are instantly recognizable to most listeners, and have seen a tradition of reinterpretation since their creation. In turn, I saw the process of creating this piece as an extension of this discourse on artistic ownership—how far can one go before a piece of standard repertoire is unrecognizable?

  • Premiered at the SPHERES Collective Inaugural Chamber Concert at Scholes Street Studio on December 8, 2018 with Rohan Chander (piano) and Kyle Brenn (drums).

InD (2018), for solo snare drum + electronics Premiered in Prague on May 10, 2018. Composed & performed by Kyle Brenn. Program Notes: This short piece is my first foray into electroacoustic composition. I wanted to focus on the specific spectral properties of the snare drum itself, and so each section of the piece centers around a different "harmonic polyrhythm" - a rhythmic pattern that matches an individual harmonic ratio of the overtone series present within the drum. I used improvisation as a jumping-off point for some of the motivic development. The piece has very little to do with Terry Riley's famous work with a similar title, but I do like writing in D. Special thanks to Michal Rataj & Aron Kobayashi Ritch for their guidance and help with mixing!

InD

(2018) • solo snare drum + electronics • 3’30”

This short piece is my first foray into electroacoustic composition. I wanted to focus on the specific spectral properties of the snare drum itself, and so each section of the piece centers around a different "harmonic polyrhythm"—a rhythmic pattern that matches an individual harmonic ratio of the overtone series present within the drum. I used improvisation as a jumping-off point for some of the motivic development. The piece has very little to do with Terry Riley's famous work with a similar title, but I do like writing in D.

Special thanks to Michal Rataj & Aron Kobayashi Ritch for their guidance and help with mixing!

  • Composed while studying abroad in Prague, and premiered there in May 2018. Performed by Kyle Brenn. 

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Two Movements for Bassoon & Piano

(2018) • 11’

Two Movements was written specifically for David Mayers during a semester abroad in Prague. The lively, scherzo-like first movement develops a few different themes, with cues taken from both contemporary classical and jazz idioms. The second movement can be seen as a further abstraction of the first, with individual rhythmic and melodic ideas developed in a more process-driven manner. This movement also showcases David's ability to play multiphonics (chords) on the bassoon.

  • Premiered in Prague in the spring of 2018 by David Mayers (bassoon) and Kyle Brenn (piano).

recken (2017, rev. 2019), for 2 percussionists. MIDI realization.

recken

(2017, rev. 2019) • percussion duo • 9’16”

  1. A backwards spelling (minus the ‘ck’ in the middle) of necker, as in a Necker cube, which changes orientation the longer you look at it

  2. A German infinitive verb meaning “to stretch”

  3. A homophone for the English word reckon, meaning “to consider”

recken was originally written for and premiered by Cisum Percussion in 2017, and was selected by Washington Squared percussion duo for their 2019 call-for-scores. 

A revised and expanded version of "Haves and Have Nots", performed at the Fall 2017 NYU Composer's Collective Concert. Featuring: Kyle Brenn (conductor), Yaz Lancaster (violin), David Mayers (bassoon), Alex Saraceno (piano), Danielle Chan (percussion) Program Notes: Haves and Have Nots started its life as a dance piece written for a collaborative workshop between NYU and the Jewish Community Center of Manhattan, based on a five-month study of Jewish text. It was originally premiered there on February 16, 2017, with choreography by Mimi Liu (a Master's student in the Tisch dance program). As the first concert work I wrote after coming to college, I believed it marked a milestone in my compositional development, so I chose to revise and expand it for this concert. Its original instrumentation was for violin, cello, piano and percussion, but difficulty finding musicians led me to use bassoon for the cello's part at the last minute. In its current form, the piece is a one-movement work with slow opening and closing material bookending a faster, more intense middle section primarily in 5/8 time. Triadic motives presented in the solo piano introduction make appearances throughout the remainder of the music, with harmonic content emphasizing chromatic mediant and half-step relationships. Despite the non-functional harmony, I made an effort to compose melodic lines that were expressive and lyrical.

Haves and Have Nots

(2017) • vln, vc (or bsn), pno, perc • 5’30”

Originally performed with choreography by Mimi Liu (NYU Tisch Dance '17), as part of the Jewish Community Center of Manhattan's collaborative workshop with NYU. Their 2017 program was entitled "The World is a Very Narrow Bridge: New Music and Choreography" and featured premieres of four pieces by New York composer/choreographer pairs based around a five-month study of Jewish text surrounding fear. Revised in fall 2017 for the semesterly NYU Composer's Collective concert. 

  • Premiere performance featuring Emily Vold (violin), Emirhan Tunca (cello), Kyle Brenn (percussion), Patrick Gallagher (piano). 

  • Composer's Collective performance featuring Yaz Lancaster (violin), David Mayers (bassoon), Danielle Chan (percussion), Alex Saraceno (piano).

Break of Day (2015), for vibraphone and string quintet. Composed by Kyle Brenn. MIDI-generated audio file. Program Notes: My mom has made a habit of scattering chunks of stale bread on a bush near her kitchen window most mornings and watching all the little birds take their breakfast. It was during one of these mornings that she heard a particularly melodious birdcall, which she recorded and sent to me. The melody was so clear and evocative that I felt compelled to write a piece surrounding it. Break of Day celebrates birds in an impressionistic way, avoiding instruments (like the flute) or musical figures that are generally associated with them. I try to evoke a wide range of images and emotions throughout, from the graceful, almost hypnotic motion of an airborne flock to the chaotic scramble for the last breadcrumb—all in the service of honoring nature’s original music makers.

Break of Day

(2015, rev. 2017) • vibraphone + string quintet • 5’30”

Based on a birdcall heard frequently outside my home in Connecticut, Break of Day celebrates birds in an impressionistic way, avoiding instruments or musical figures that are generally associated with them. I try to evoke a wide range of images and moods throughout, from the graceful, almost hypnotic motion of an airborne flock to the chaotic scramble for the last breadcrumb—all in the service of honoring nature’s original music makers. 

  • Premiered at the 2017 NYU Composer's Collective spring concert.

Solitudes (2015), for solo marimba. Composed and performed by Kyle Brenn. Recorded at Western Connecticut State University in 2015 by Lucas Borgstet.

Solitudes

(2015) • solo marimba • 7’00”

Written in the midst of the college application process, Solitudes is a reflection on the various anxieties and inner struggles I was experiencing when looking to the future. It represented for me a more detailed exploration of motivic and rhythmic development.

  • Recorded at Western Connecticut State University by Lucas Borgstet. Performed by Kyle Brenn.

Apex (2015), for wind band. Composed by Kyle Brenn. MIDI-generated audio file.

Apex

(2014) • concert band • 4’30”

MIDI mockup.

  • Premiered by the Norwalk High School Wind Symphony (Chris Rivera, director) at their 2015 spring concert, featuring Thomas Jankovic (French horn).