Duration: 9:18

The JACK Quartet (Christopher Otto and Ari Streisfeld,
violins; John Pickford Richards, viola; Kevin McFarland, cello)

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(program notes written in 2010)

My work often deals with the ways in which technology has transformed how we hear, experience, and create music. This piece is inspired by an experience watching a YouTube video that was not buffering properly, resulting in a chopping and looping of short video segments. The material in too many arguments in line 17 is also manipulated by processes akin to granular synthesis, with an affinity for glitches and unexpected results. This piece is neither about how technology is destroying music as we know it, nor is it about how technology is the answer to all life's questions. It a collection of more mundane observations about easily overlooked (and potentially profound) ways in which technology has already altered our lives.