Decoupler

Written for Cameron Chase

Instrumentation - String instrument

Duration - 6:00

This piece is notated in such a way that it can be played by either violin, viola, cello, or bass (though it probably works best for violin and the last one might be particularly difficult). I wrote this for Cameron Chase to play on the violin (see right). 

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Isn’t the concept of pitch in string music kind of weird? There aren’t any frets! Vocal chords are strings too, but we think of speech as sliding up and down through a frequency spectrum rather than cycling through a collection of pitch choices. Strings can produce beautiful melodies, but traditionally expressive melodic content is actually constantly correlated with pitch indiscretion — gooey shifts, portamento, wide vibrato. Maybe removing the discrete identity of the parameter altogether makes room for maximum expression, or at least greater expression in other parametric worlds like rhythm, texture, or whatever is made possible by the mechanical potential of the way the instrument is designed: a blind man developing a wicked ear.

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Or maybe not! This isn’t a completely new approach anyway, but at least it’s fun.

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(This piece calls for improv from 5:13 to 5:34 in the video—Cameron goes so hard here that I needed to mention it)

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