Sam Alvarez - a kind of forgetting (2024, for four alto saxophones)

"a kind of forgetting" (2024) by Sam Alvarez
(reach out to: [e-mail] for score inquires)
Performed by Masso Quartet:
Isaac Boone, Ila Gupta, Sam Alvarez, and Kurt Cox (alto saxophones)
Recorded on June 5th, 2024, in Alice Millar Chapel at Northwestern University.
Program note:
"a kind of forgetting" is music about erosion. I’ve always been someone who clings to things-memories, feelings, relationships, experiences, whatever else-I've just never been able to let go easily. I think I harbor a fear of things crumbling, of time and its erosion ruining whatever seems good. There’s a thought though, an uninsightful idea I sometimes try to convince myself of, that erosion forms as much as it tears down, that things fall together as easily as they fall apart. "a kind of forgetting" is a sort of wish, a hope for remembering that erosion builds too. The music spills from one five note gesture and is built around twelve consonant multiphonics, and the harmony that layering them can produce. The piece started with the first two lines of a poem I’ve never been able to finish, and was commissioned by (and is dedicated to) my favorite people: Ila Gupta, Isaac Boone, and Kurt Cox (Masso Quartet).
"The logs are a kind of forgetting,
the wood grain and their erosion:"
Audio and Video Production: Sam Alvarez
Audio Technician: Natalia Warthen

[@jacob.feldman]

🔥🔥🔥 so good