Crosswinds

Crosswinds represents a melding of the traditional woodwind sound of the clarinet with digital live electronic techniques, and the piece explores the potential for this relationship in three parts. From a sustained breath and a single sustained note at the beginning of the piece, the computer derives all the subsequent elements it will play. The stage performer then leads the digital elements, playing a virtuosic and haunting theme which mentors and is augmented by the electronics. Even as the relationship between the live performer and the digital components is established patiently throughout, the listener is invited to consider the interplay between them. Crosswinds is, in many ways, an experience of the history of our music through the relationship between traditional clarinet and modern digital techniques: the common elements they share, the singularity of their own particular strengths, and the beauty that can be experienced when they collaborate.