- 10 Musical Compositions
Composition Nr. 1 (for Trumpet)
The performer places a trumpet in a crook in the branches of an olive tree, such that the bell faces towards the city below. The trumpet is played by the wind passing through it. The performer may listen to the sound or not. The performance of the composition ends when the performer removes the trumpet from the olive tree. It does not end if someone other than the performer removes the trumpet from the olive tree.
Composition Nr. 2 (for Wooden Mask)
The performer sits or stands in front of an audience and puts on a wooden mask. After putting it on, the performer runs their hands over the mask in slow, circular motions. The sounds produced by these motions may be amplified in some way, but they don’t need to be. The performer does this for a short time, then stops, then does it for a long time. This second length of time should be longer than the performer is comfortable with. After this, the performer takes off the mask, sets it down facing the audience, and silently leaves the performance space. The performance ends when the audience also gets up and leaves.
Composition Nr. 3 (for Violin)
The performer steps behind a wall which separates them from the audience. There, the performer plays a single long or short note whenever they believe an audience member is thinking about them. When they believe no audience member is thinking about them, they remain silent. The performance ends when the performer believes they have been entirely forgotten.
Composition Nr. 4 (for Waterfall)
The performer stands beneath a waterfall. The performer drinks deeply. The performer lets the water fall across their face. The performer drinks until they are sick.
Composition Nr. 5 (for Prepared Guitar)
The performer places a guitar whose strings have been coated with pollen in the grass beneath a beehive, sometime during the day. The bees may land on the guitar and agitate the strings, or they may not. The performance ends at sunset, although the guitar does not need to be removed at this time, or at any other.
Composition Nr. 6 (for Broken Glass)
The performer drops between 10 and 25 large pieces of broken glass onto the floor from standing height. The pieces are dropped one at a time, with a pause between each, not simultaneously or in groups. The duration of this pause does not need to be uniform, and is left entirely to the performer’s discretion. The pieces of glass may be of any type and come from any source, but this source should be personally significant to the performer in some way. There should be no legible writing on the glass. After all the pieces have been dropped, the performer carefully gathers them up, and repeats the procedure. This continues until it’s no longer possible for the performer to pick up every piece of glass, either because they have shattered into fragments which are too small, or because the performer’s hands have become too slick with blood.
Composition Nr. 7 (for Snare Drum)
The performer carries a snare drum to the top of a grassy hill. The performer sets the snare drum on its side and lets it roll back down. The performer walks back down the hill, retrieves the snare drum, and then carries it up an equally tall flight of steps. The performer sets the snare drum on its side and pushes it back down. The performer continues in this way, alternating between the hill and the steps, until it becomes clear whether or not the drum will be destroyed.
Composition Nr. 8 (for Water & Two Buckets)
The performer places an empty bucket and a bucket filled with water before them on the floor of their home. The performer pours the water from one bucket into the other, then back into the first, then once again into the other, and so on, back and forth. The performer does this until there is no water left in either bucket, at which point the performance ends.
Composition Nr. 9 (for Piano)
The performer plays a sequence of chords that remind them of someone they love. Above the performance space, a bird builds a nest. The performance ends when the nest is complete.
Composition Nr. 10 (for Recording Device)
The performer places a recording device at the mouth of a cave and turns it on. Aside from wildlife, no audience should be present. The performer then enters the cave and goes as far back into it as is they are able without the aid of artificial light sources. From this place in the near-darkness, the performer vocalizes a sequence of wordless cries, the nature of which is left to the performer’s discretion. These cries are recorded, relatively clearly or faintly, with more or less acoustic distortion and reverberation, by the recording device. After the performer has completed the sequence of cries, they make their way out of the cave and stop the recording device. The performer then rewinds the recording device and listens to the recording in full. If desired, the performer may take the recording device and walk with it towards another location while the recording is replayed. When the recording finishes replaying, the performance ends.
This is a set of ten interventions in social being, presented in the form of textual “scores” for compositions to be realized via process-based performances – five utilizing conventional musical instruments, five utilizing conventionally non-musical objects as tools of sound-production. Like a closet drama, there is no expectation of these compositions actually being performed, and, in fact, most contain elements would make any attempt highly impractical, if not impossible. Rather, the purpose is to leverage the hypothetical possibility of such a performance as a tool with which to examine, complicate, and challenge presumptions about the relationship between categories such as performer, audience, and material world, both politically and poetically. Since October 7th, I've struggled a lot with how to write about what is happening in the world – as a white American, the degree to which I am distanced and insulated from the defining struggle of this moment (from, indeed, any current site of serious resistance to bourgeois imperialism) makes it difficult to believe anything I might say about it could be meaningful. My attempts to do so directly have all proven unsatisfactory, too trivial or self-involved or otherwise unworthy. This piece speaks of very little directly, only very small things, but its writing was compelled by the present situation, and it expresses an orientation towards things which I think is in some way productive for those of us living through it, which feels like “better than nothing,” at least.
