Accretional Cycle

The span of time which is bookended by my last piece for solo piano (a movement of a larger sonata, completed in 2019) and the composition of Accretional Cycle, alongside a great number of other significant developments in my musical ‘style’ or interests, has been informed by a deep investigation of “extended techniques” and explorative/unconventional modes of sound production with instruments. The piano in particular lends itself to a plethora of these techniques and approaches, yet equally carries its own additional ‘baggage:’ …what is probably best described as the ponderous considerations that plague a composer who is all too often thinking of the many great historical examples of repertoire for the instrument. With an opportunity to write for multiple pianists, I found my goal to be writing an approachable piece which somehow brought connection to these (somewhat opposing) considerations I held with an instrument that all of us found so familiar.

Building off of the above concepts, the piece takes form beginning with a reduced fragment of material, perhaps suggesting a larger phrase of ‘conventional’ melody and harmony. Out of the resonance of this motif slowly emerges various interactions with the two assistants, subtle and fleeting at first but gaining more presence with each repetition. This process recurs in several ‘cycles,’ and each modality of producing sound from the piano become more entangled and, eventually, fused with the other.

The title of the piece is given primarily in reference to how the musical material is organized, but it also is in some part a nod to the nature of the score’s presentation- handwritten, even in its final version. While this approach first asserted itself out of practicality while conceiving of the notation needed to coordinate between bench player and assistants, handwriting even the final form of the material felt to me to inform and interact with the very way in which creative decisions were framed and then made.

Accretional Cycle was written for composer/performers Patrick Flannery, Steven James, and Chloe Clark Smith, who collectively premiered the piece in November 2025. The piece was the culmination of an entire semester working together as a subset of the Peabody Institute’s Composers Ensemble, and it is only with the generous collaborative spirit of each of these three musicians that my piece came to be as it is today. My sincere gratitude and admiration for these people has continued to live on long past our work together on this piece.

Performance Time: approx. 7’30”