One of my biggest musical and philosophical inspirations, saxophonist and composer Wayne Shorter, once said that “[c]omposition is just improvisation slowed down, and improvisation is just composition sped up.” My work, Quartets*, a collection of pieces for four saxophones, puts this idea into practice. Indeed, nearly every piece in this EP is made up of four fully-improvised individual parts, each performed by me and layered on top of one another (this is the explanation behind the asterisk in the EP title). Each part interacts with the others, in an attempt to create a loose sense of counterpoint and musical conversation. This project represents the latest development in my exploration of the intersections between jazz and classical music, as well as part of my greater effort to integrate my saxophone playing into my compositional voice. In creating these saxophone pieces, I have drawn inspiration from not just my favorite jazz and concert music artists – Wayne Shorter, Palestrina, György Ligeti, and Caroline Shaw, to name a few  – but also some of my favorite non-concert music artists and groups: Radiohead, Bon Iver, Floating Points, Son Lux – the list goes on. Due to these disparate sources of inspiration, I believe, as a whole, Quartets* is a version of concert music made for all ears to enjoy that does not compromise artistic value.

Technically, each piece (with the exception of “Lapis Lazuli (in Ab)” Parts 1 and 3), utilizes the same loose tonal framework: two parts improvise using only the root, third, and fifth notes of the scale which corresponds to the piece’s key (IE, the tonic chord), and two use the second, fourth, sixth, and seventh notes (the upper structure, or chord extensions). In the case of “Ether (Whole-Tone Scale)” which is based on one of the two whole-tone scales, two parts play one of the associated augmented chords, with the others playing the other. Rhythmically, a similar loose framework takes place: two parts (one from each tonal framework) perform shorter, more stab-like attacks, while the other two hold out longer tones. I emphasize looseness in these templates; each part is encouraged to take musical liberties should the necessity for such arise. This use of facilitated, yet still natural improvisation, in tandem with the lack of an overall tempo and rhythmic division, causes each part to intersect organically, creating particles of consonance and dissonance which coalesce to form sonic atmospheres, and exploring as many permutations and combinations of notes within a given key as possible.

I chose to create the aforementioned “atmosphere” musical templates for Quartets* as such because the resultant improvised product sounds like both a warm embrace and also a moment of tranquility. I have loved the meditative sound intervals that ninths, seconds, sixths, and thirteenths produce, in addition to the familiar sounds of major and minor chords, so to combine them in such a “controlled-chaos” way seemed to me a surefire way to replicate those musical atmospheres. This became the inspiration for three of the four improvised quartets (“Lotus Flower (in F),” “Remembrance (in f#),” and “Lapis Lazuli (in Ab).” I chose these keys because they each occupy spaces far away from one another on the circle of fifths, and thus produce atmospheres with different emotional qualities. The fourth improvised quartet, “Ether (Whole-Tone Scale),” comes not from this place of a warm, meditative embrace, but rather one of ambivalence, and awkward floating; each note in the whole-tone scale is spaced equally from one another, giving the listener an odd feeling of uncomfortable equilibrium. I lean into this by going outside of the traditional range of saxophone sounds: false fingerings, microtones, and other extended techniques, all characterize this piece. As alluded to above, “Lapis Lazuli (in Ab)” Parts 1 and 3 do not follow the aforementioned templates, but rather utilize sampling of small pre-composed musical cells, with and without free improvisation, such being another compositional interest of mine. 

Quartets* was recorded and produced in my home studio in January, February, and March 2022 with editorial input from Noah Kaplan, was mixed by Peter Karl in April 2022, was mastered by Lucas Saur in July 2022, and was released on all platforms on July 15, 2022. The EP cover was designed by Kimberly Wee in March 2022. Quartets* was completed with financial assistance from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University’s Dean’s Award for Graduating Seniors.