Keyboard Percussion
Note from the Composer: Greetings mallet players! As a percussionist of almost 20 years myself, I am always happy to hear from other percussionists who are passionate about music by living composers. I’d love to write more for these instruments in the near future, so if you’re looking for something truly new let’s chat soon!
Mixed Percussion List | Return to The Library | Commission Information
Unaccompanied Solo Works
New Music Cookbook: French Onion Chicken Pasta for solo marimba (2022)
This work has not yet been recorded—the link above is a MIDI rendering. You can read more about this work at the blog post linked here.
Duration: 3’15”
Commissioner: Robert Clayson (Website | YouTube)
Range: A2-F4 (optional Ab’s)
Commissioned as part of the New Music Cookbook project by Robert Clayson, French Onion Chicken Pasta is meant to follow gestures of each stage of cooking the dish.
Opening with sprinkling seasonings and moving to the boiling of noodles, the rest of the work plays with different combinations of rolls and recurring motives—ultimately bringing the two elements together into a single “dish” at the end!
Pricing
Digital: $8
PDF includes a marimba score formatted for page turns.
All proceeds from works in the New Music Cookbook project are donated to a local food bank (if one is not specified by purchaser, funds are sent to Oregon Food Bank).
Azidoazide for solo marimba (2017)
Duration: 3’00”
Commissioner: Robert Clayson (Website | YouTube)
Range: C2-C7
Azidoazide is a chemical compound that has proven rather difficult to study, due to the large number of high-energy nitrogen bonds - which makes the compound extremely explosive. Small changes of any kind—temperature, pressure, radiation, physical contact, and, in some cases, nothing at all—cause the chemical to violently and unexpectedly erupt. Entire labs have been destroyed! Upon reading more about the compound, I was immediately inspired to create a piece about this allusive, mysterious, and temperamental chemical. Beginning with an explosive and violent series of chords and runs, Azidoazide the composition seeks to match the unpredictable and volatile nature of its namesake. Quiet textures still burble and pop, threatening to send the player to a different end of the instrument at a moment's notice. The result is a uniquely energetic and rhythmic work whose virtuosic writing provides a fun and challenging project for any marimba player!
Pricing
Digital: $12
PDF includes a landscape marimba score (4-page spreads required for those who do not perform from memory).
Accompanied Solo Works
None yet! Be the first to commission one, and receive 15% your total commission fee!
Duos with Keyboard Percussion
ROOTED for alto saxophone and marimba (2021)
Duration: 6’15”
Commissioner: Sarah Hetrick (Website | YouTube) and Paul Millette (Website | YouTube)
Range: C2-Bb6
Commissioned by saxophonist Sarah Hetrick and percussionist Paul Millette, ROOTED is inspired by the various uses of roots in the works of Frida Kahlo. Roots were used in Kahlo’s paintings for a wide array of meanings—to depict feelings of being trapped or in pain (particularly in works dealing with her hospitalizations), to show feeling more grounded and growing outward, and even to portray connections to her cultural history. The piece opens with shuddering breaths from the saxophonist and cold, mechanical tones in the marimba before blossoming outward into tangled, flowing lines with whimsical outbursts. Pervasive rhythms, expressive solo moments, playful hocketing, and powerful tutti arrivals work to create a dynamic and virtuosic showcase piece while paying homage to one of the 20th century’s greatest artistic voices.
Pricing
Digital: $20
PDF includes a full score (transposed and/or in C) and separate parts for each performer, formatted for page turns.
You and Me, Filigree for trumpet in C and marimba (2020)
This work has not yet been recorded - the above is a MIDI rendering of the work.
Duration: 3’30”
Commissioner: Andrew Boylan, for Camas and Courtney Stredder
Range: C2-Bb6
Commissioned for sister musicians Camas and Courtney as part of the Project 12 commissions, You and Me, Filigree attempts to capture both the independent spirit of each voice while still providing moments of true interplay. Starting in a darker, more melancholic tone, the piece eventually brightens playfully as the voices start to mimic one another more closely. Both instruments are given the opportunity to play both foreground and background roles as the piece presses into a final drive of energy, ending with a flourish.
Pricing
Digital: $15
PDF includes a full performance score, as well as optional solo parts for each performer, formatted for page turns.
Commissions from Quarantine: 14. Romantic, Contemporary, Dark for piano and vibraphone (2020)
Duration: 3’30”
Commissioner: Jade Hails (YouTube) and Letizia Pent (YouTube)
This short work for vibraphone and piano was inspired in part by the novel Giants in the Earth and the film Days of Heaven, which both feature a giant, destructive swarm of locusts. The piano starts with a menacing march as the vibraphone swells and decays. The piano and vibraphone dialogue back and forth, building exponentially until a tutti outburst creeps, crawls, and zooms downward. This interplay continues throughout the work with only momentary reprieves—resulting in a dynamic, truly balanced duo sure to leave a chill down the spine of your listener!
Trios and Quartets
STUMPED for vibraphone, 3 cymbals, and snare drum + electronics (2021)
Duration: 6’00”
Commissioner: Mitchell Beck, for his students (Website | YouTube)
Commissioned by Mitchell Beck for the percussion students of Boise State University, STUMPED was inspired by dendroclimatology (studying a regions climate using cross-sections of trees in the area). Starting with lush, resonant textures and freely moving parts, the music begins to dry out, ultimately bursting into flames—leaving the soundscape brittle and sparse, but ultimately ending with a small glimmer of what once was.
Pricing
Digital: $25
PDF includes a full score, a download link for the electronics, and individual parts for each player, formatted for page turns.
Cliff Notes for vibraphone, viola, cello, and double bass (2020)
Duration: 5’45”
Commissioner: Grand Circle New Music Ensemble (Website | YouTube)
Commissioned as part of the Project 12 commissioning series, Cliff Notes was inspired by the Red Cliffs near St. George, Utah where the Grand Circle New Music Ensemble is based. The piece works to capture the rugged beauty, towering scale, and arid climate of the cliffs—fiddle-inspired gestures in the viola, thin, soaring melodies in the cello, and groove-based ostinatos from the double bass permeate the work as the vibraphone lends both percussive impact and hypnotic textures throughout. The result is a dynamic work that makes the perfect ending piece for any recital!
Pricing
Digital: $25
PDF includes a full score and individual parts for each player, formatted for page turns.
Prairie Rain for two harps and two marimbas (2011)
Recording from premiere performance by Leif Larson, Christopher Smith, Lisbet Finseth, and Emily Wonder
Duration: 4’30”
Range: G3-G5 and A2-A5
This entrancing work was inspired by the opening of Ole Rølvaag’s novel, Giants in the Earth, in which the protagonists make their way through the vast American prairie for the first time. The work mirrors the breath-taking openness of the prairie and the subtle dread felt by the pioneers, with small outbursts of cascading musical gestures.
‘Tish-ah!’ said the grass. . . .‘T’ish-ah! Tish-ah!’ . . . Never had it said anything else—never would it say anything else.
—Giants in the Earth, page 1
Pricing
Digital: $15
PDF includes a full score, and solo parts for each performer, formatted for page turns.
Chamber Ensemble Works
Wild Orbits for two euphoniums, tuba, and marimba + electronics
Duration: 5’15”
Commissioner: Allen Parrish (Website)
Commissioned by Allen Parrish as part of the Project 12 series and for a recital of works reflecting on natural disasters, Wild Orbits follows the struggle between the natural and man-made worlds. Changes in both nature and in our responses to these changes cause us to orbit one another instead of allowing us to find true coexistence or balance—and as our responses to each other become more extreme, these orbits begin to spiral dangerously out of control. All of the samples heard in the electronics are field recordings of the natural world (birds, thunder, wind, ocean waves, rocks, etc.) that have been manipulated to varying degrees—while the unusual instrumentation creates unique opportunities for both overwhelming power as well as delicate, nuanced textures.
Pricing
Digital: $15
PDF includes a full score, a detailed cue sheet for the electronics, and solo parts for each performer, formatted for page turns. Purchase also includes a download link for the electronics.
Something to Prove for xylophone, two vibraphones, and three marimbas (2010)
Duration: 4’30”
Premiered as part of the Tanglewood Music Festival, Something to Prove is a ferocious work for mallet sextet. Beginning somewhat innocuously with soft, mysterious chord exchanges in the vibraphones, the full ensemble soon catapults the work into an explosive array of counterpoint and color—scattered with solo and group features throughout. The piece recalls its opening, culminating in a chorale-like passage with only the marimbas. This small moment of introspection grows dramatically to reprise the flurry of notes from before, ending with a dramatic series of solos, modulations, and a final punctuating gesture.
Pricing
Digital: $15
PDF includes a full score and solo parts for each performer, formatted for page turns.
Looking for more?
You may also find more works for keyboard instruments in the Large Mixed Ensemble section of The Library—or reach out to me directly! If I don’t have what you’re looking for, I’m always happy to recommend other living composers who might have just the thing!
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