for Fl., Ob., Cl., Bsn., Hn., Tpt., Tbn., Tba., Pno., Perc., Vln. I., Vln. II., Vla., Vc., and Cb.

The Dissociative Chamber Symphony was inspired by a walk I had along a busy road. The cars were racing past me with their own music blaring and I was lost in my slow and directionless thoughts. It was strange to me, the disconnection between my mind and the world around me. How could so little space allow for such different idealistic pacings? Even within my train of thought, the ideas  could be slow but jump between so many different focuses. I could also be fixated and never be able to leave an idea. And while my thoughts were broken, incongruous, and senseless, the world around me still flowed and, at least in a physical sense, had to make sense.

These inspirations come through with the blatant genre overlapping I put into the piece. Throughout the piece, there are hiphop beats over contemporary classical counterpoint; there is a Classical-era song juxtaposed with a postminimalist theme; and there are heavy metal inspirations with soundtrack motifs.

History

This piece was finished on September 15th, 2018 and premiered November 15th, 2018 by the Tartan Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Shane M. Gillen and was dedicated to him.