Princeton Composition Portfolio
Sample 1: A Few Concerns (2021)
This album is a collection of songs and pieces which grew out of the complex emotional landscape of the years 2016-2020, as well as my ongoing search for a way of writing which combines songwriting, improvisation, and contemporary classical music. The opening track, “Hysteria,” is a sort of exploding song, culminating in a demented circus waltz and “chorus of mansplaining.” Feel free to follow along with the score here.
Please check out the rest of the album as well (you can scroll within the player), especially Coda (Track 3), a ‘12-tone pop song’ about the death of Webern (score available here), Smile (Track 5), a grungey math-rock rendition of catcalls, and Eggshells (Track 7), a sweeping ballad about learning to feel small. You can also follow along with the lyrics to all tracks here.
Performed by: Meaghan Burke, cello, vocals, guitar; Marina Kifferstein, violin, vocals, objects; Leah Asher, violin, vocals, things; Wendy Richman, viola, vocals, stuff; recorded and mixed by Bernd Klug (Brooklyn); mastered by Martin Siewert (Vienna)
Sample 2: Che si può fare? (after Barbara Strozzi)
This 2019 composition for The Rhythm Method is a slowed-down de- and re-construction of Baroque composer Barbara Strozzi’s breathtaking aria, which asks “What is to be done?”
Score and program notes can be found here.
Performed by The Rhythm Method (Leah Asher and Marina Kifferstein, violins, Wendy Richman, viola; Meaghan Burke, cello); recorded, mixed, and mastered by Bernd Klug
Sample 3: Fenster (from “Care Pieces”)
This is a trailer for the ambisonic recorded version of my piece Fenster, a sound walk which I created with the support of MATA Presents in September 2021 in Prospect Park. This project grew out of the “Care Pieces” I wrote throughout 2020 and involves various iterations (some of which I explain in the latter part of the video). The final recorded version will be accompanied by a text video which lies somewhere between closed captioning, sonic meditations, and confessional poetry.
You can view the score and original performance instructions here (note that these were revised orally for the Prospect Park iteration).
Performed by Marina Kifferstein and Leah Asher (violins); recorded and mixed by Meaghan Burke and Bernd Klug / Video by Adele Fournet and Felipe Wurst; edited by Adele Fournet
Sample 4: Kitchen Quartet (2021)
This piece, for four performers with mixing bowls and wooden spoons, will be part of “The Wandering Womb,” my large-scale music theater piece. Mixing domestic objects with Odyssey-inspired imagery, this piece explores the interior, loopy wanderings of the homebound.
Feel free to follow along with the score (and text) here.
Performed by The Rhythm Method (Meaghan Burke, Leah Asher, Marina Kifferstein, and Carrie Frey) at Target Margin Theater; audio and video recording by International Contemporary Ensemble
Additional Listening Material
Forever House, “Eaves”
This is the 2018 debut album from my avant-grunge band Forever House, with fellow composer-performer-improvisers James Moore (guitar), James Ilgenfritz (bass), and Peter Wise (drums). I co-wrote all music and lyrics on the album.
Recorded and mixed by Andrew McKenna Lee (College of St. Rose, Albany, NY); mastered by Martin Siewert (Vienna)
Siren Song
This 2018 composition for two singing violinists and cellist uses an original text inspired by Margaret Atwood’s eponymous poem and The Odyssey, and will form part of my upcoming large-scale work “The Wandering Womb.”
The score, text, and additional program notes can be found here.
Performed by: Marina Kifferstein and Leah Asher, violins/voice; Meaghan Burke, cello/voice at Roulette (2018); Audio/video recording by Roulette
Everyone sleeps alone in the funhouse
This is a music video from my second album, Creature Comforts, and one of my favorite deep cuts from my solo repertoire (performed on this album with Viennese avant-garde rock drummer Didi Kern and many Meaghans, with video by simp in Vienna’s Prater amusement park).
The full album can be heard here.