DROWNING MUSIC (2022)

Drowning Music (2022) is a percussion piece for bowed cymbals with water buckets (originally performed by three performers). One of the most original aspects of this piece, that intensifies and expands its conceptual achievement, is the physical challenge that I make the performers take on, that is, of holding a mouthful of water in their mouths while they perform the piece. Along with this physical challenge to greater engage with the topic being investigated I turned to the physical process of drowning to structure the piece. These stages are: surprise, panic, unconsciousness, involuntary spasm and cerebral hypoxia/ death. 

While dealing with such morbid content I had to remain respectful of it and not allow the belittling of such a tragic event as someone’s drowning. However, these stages provided the textural, timbral and length of the piece with the performance instructions capturing each stage sonically; each stage of the composition lasts the length of time of each stage in the process of drowning.