Three Haiku

Presentation history:
- Premiere (with Beacon Dance): Davidson-Arabia Mountain Nature Preserve, Lithonia, GA, 9/23/06
- Graduate Recital (with Beacon Dance), Atlanta, GA, 2/2/07
- neoPhonia New Music Ensemble, Atlanta, GA, 2/13/07
first movement premiere: GSU SCI Chapter, Atlanta, GA, 4/1/06

Three Haiku originally began as a project called "Instant Music," in which I drew the names of performers out of a hat and had to write a five-minute work for their instrumentation, all within 24 hours. The original instrumentation was trumpet, non-pitched percussion, vibraphone, and guitar, which brought to my mind the image of an Asian garden. In keeping with the Asian theme, I used the poetic form of haiku to serve as an outline for the work: three larger sections, with five subsections in the first and third parts and seven subsections in the middle. The result pleased me very much, and is largely intact here as the first movement. I later contacted Beacon Dance about a collaboration, and I began writing two movements to accompany the first. During the writing of this piece, the instrumentation changed several times to the present state, where I chose instruments that had counterparts in Chinese and Japanese music. The poems that accompany the movements were written by haiku master Masaoka Shiki (1867-1902).

    "at the full moon's
    rising, the silver-plumed
    reeds tremble"

    "the moon is cool -
    "frog's croaking
    wells up"

    "coolness -
    a mountain stream splashes out
    between houses"


Score

Recording personnel: Sara Hydo, flute; Cliff Byrd, guitar; Jennifer Picard, viola; Ellery Trafford, percussion