Recent works

• Planet Dances
  • 9 Players
  • Instrumentation: Solo Marimba, Bells, Vibraphone, Chimes, Timpani, Temple Blocks, Snare Drum, Tom-Toms (4), Bass Drum
  • Planet Dances is a piece for Solo Marimba and Percussion Octet, written mostly to keep me sane during my first college finals week ever. It is divided into five sections, each representing a dance. The dances are of no particular style, but each has its own distinct feel. The first, beginning with just the marimba, hearkens back to Baroque dance styles (where they moved one limb at a time with clockwork precision) but is laced with impressionist overtones. The second, a frenzied, whirling dervish in 11/16, is at once frantic and laid back, tense and in control. It ends in a cadenza, leading to a smooth roll section, suggesting the weightlessness of space. From there, an easy march unfolds – pushing us forward yet giving us a rest from the intensity and wildness of the second dance. Our peaceful steps are interrupted, however, by the first dance, just as celestial objects collide into one another. This interjection fades into a second, lesser cadenza and begets the fourth dance, a lively groove in 7/8. With quotes from Holst’s “Jupiter Hymn,” this dance is where the piece derives its title. The percussion section takes over at the end of this dance and #5 begins; it is a flurry of activity in 6/8, though it switches between a “2” feel and a “3” feel. It increases in intensity until it seems to implode on itself, like a dying star. And because dying stars give birth to new ones, the piece completes its circle of life and ends where it began.
• Chaos Theory
  • 3 Players
  • Instrumentation: one marimba, one vibraphone.
  • "Chaos Theory was conceived as a study of the different kinds of musical chaos. During the course of the piece, there is rhythmic chaos, metric chaos, and harmonic chaos. However, something ties the piece together, an underlying connection that pervades the swirling uncertainty and provides a bond to which we can hold onto. Even as our world dissolves into chaos, there is still a common bond that we share, pushing us forward and keeping us from falling."
• Crepe
  • 4 Players
  • Instrumentation: 2 marimbas, 2 vibraphones
  • The title comes from the first thing that popped in my head once I heard the opening melody: something out of James Bond. The chords reminded me (for whatever reason) of French crepes, and because of the ambiguous pronunciation of the word, I chose “Crepe.” Pronounced “craype,” it is the scrumptious French pancake. Pronounced “creep,” it is the spy sneaking through the air vents. It is this ambiguity that makes the piece fun to play. Cast one way, it is a celebration of succulent taste, conjuring images of Paris, Notre Dame and l’tour eiffel. But if the alternate view is taken, it is international espionage, luxury sport cars and beautiful women. The choice is yours.
• Arabia
  • 4 Players
  • Instrumentation: 2 marimbas, 2 vibraphones
  • The working title for this piece was “Ancient Caverns,” because it reminded me of H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine” when the hero enters the Morlock’s underground lair and sees them pounding the walls and screeching and doing other twisted things. But when I let my sister, who was 11 or 12 at the time, listen to it, she said it reminded her of Arabian music. I listened to it again, and agreed, thus renaming it. This quartet is based on a scale I played in Kevin Erickson’s “At the Dawn of War.” I am still having a hard time classifying it; the best I have come up with is an “A” Aeolian scale with a flat 2, a sharp 3, a flat 5 and a sharp 6. Nevertheless, this piece does evoke images of shifting sands, camels, and the occasional diamond in the rough. Its polyrhythmic 7/8 feel helps to enhance the journey across the desert, where you never know what is beyond the next dune…

 

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All music (in any form) Copyright © 2008 Kevin Joest