From Darkness We Awaken (for violin, violoncello, alto saxophone, prepared piano, vibraphone, and percussion)

Commissioned by Virago

For violin, violoncello, alto saxophone, prepared piano, vibraphone, and percussion

Score and Recordings will be available late 2021/early 2022.

I composed From Darkness We Awaken in the middle of what has proved to be the most chaotic period of time that I've ever lived through. As I write these words we are in the midst of a global pandemic that has killed millions, a fascist is attempting to consolidate power in the United States, mass protests are erupting across the country to affirm that Black Lives Matter, and a mounting climate crisis is threatening to destroy us all.

Against the backdrop of these intersecting crises, another personal upheaval occurred for me: in March 2020, my wife and I found out we were expecting our first child. Now, in October, we're less than two months away from our baby's arrival.

Of course, we couldn't be more excited. But while 2020 continues down its intensely toxic path, in our house it's been eerily quiet. We've essentially been in quarantine since March, rarely venturing out, terrified of what a Covid-19 infection could do for our growing baby. We've thrown our pent up energy into preparing our home, our hearts, and our lives for the arrival of a new human. It's a strange juxtaposition, to be simultaneously balancing so much joy with so much fear.

The one thing that has kept me relatively grounded in this unique moment has been writing this piece. I've worked quicker than usual, immersed myself in it, and put my whole self into it. As I progressed deeper into the piece, I observed it taking on more and more of a central role in my well being. I started to notice myself using this piece as a forum for processing these transformative changes. From Darkness We Awaken became a proxy for my emotional preparations for the next phase of my life — a diary documenting my personal metamorphosis. It became an avatar for an awakening of sorts: for myself, for our future baby, and hopefully for our society.

From Darkness We Awaken works to bring together several concerns that have been central to my creative practice for years — namely, the tension between composed and improvised music, and a desire to blur the lines between these two dispositions. This piece started as a series of vignettes for solo prepared piano that were structured improvisations. When I decided to transition it into a chamber piece, one of the chief concerns was to retain the open, improvisational quality of the original while utilizing the wider coloristic palate made available by the introduction of new instruments.

I'm grateful to BethAnne Kunert, Sofia Carbonara, Wesley Hornpetrie, and Meghan Rohrer of Virago for commissioning this work. Their collaborative and open attitude has given me permission to completely be myself, without a second thought.

Five Card Draw (for one or more players)

Published as a part of the Dualisms collection (below.) Five Card Draw begins on page 5.
Recording available here. Purchase the score here, or the whole collection here.

Five Card Draw, for one or more players
Video features Thom Monks (percussion) and Michael Malis (piano)

Premiered at Strange Beautiful Music XII, September 2019.

Five Card Draw uses a deck of playing cards as its score. The players work their way through the deck, alternating between fixed and improvisational roles.

I’ve used playing cards often to generate pre-compositional material for various compositions of mine, drawing rhythms, pitches, and form from their numerical and spiritual properties. But Five Card Draw is the first time that I've used cards as the score itself. Often, standard musical notation can act as a buffer between performers and the music they create. But by distancing musical notation from the performance of the piece, Five Card Draw forces the performers to more directly embody the musical processes at play. In this way, Five Card Draw puts forth a basic premise: that a musical composition can be made with anything; even a deck of cards, found in a kitchen drawer.

Rather than outlining specific notes and rhythms, the instructions for Five Card Draw outline a procedure which musicians should follow. These instructions lay out the rules for how the piece works, but leave the interpretation of those rules up to the performing musicians. The rules can be adapted and modified to fit the ensemble, which may be different from performance to performance.

The deck of cards are separated into two stacks: number cards and face cards. Rhythms are derived from number cards according to the process laid out in the score, and players of pitched instruments have the option of using those rhythms in conjunction with predetermined pitch sets.

The face cards are used to divine improvisational inspiration, using the cards' tarot analogues as creative sparks. The players work through the deck, alternating between fixed and improvisational roles.

A Little To The Side (for alto saxophone, piano, and drum set)

Purchase the score here, and the score and parts here.

Commissioned by ThreeForm. Premiered on January 21, 2020 at North Carolina School of the Arts.

"There’s a real advantage in deeply investigating and becoming skilled at something and then realizing your real interests are a little to the side of that."

- Kate Soper

Over the last few years, I -- like so many others I know -- have made some significant shifts in my creative practice. As I grow older, I've occasionally entertained the self effacing thought that perhaps these shifts betray some sort of character flaw; a flakiness or inability to stay grounded in one creative process. So when I read the above quote from composer Kate Soper in Sound American Magazine, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I felt like she was speaking to what I've sometimes perceived as my isolation; to my unease about not being squarely situated in one creative practice or another. And much to my surprise, when I shared this quote on Instagram, I found myself flooded with responses from friends, all of whom also felt a deep resonance with this sentiment.

As much as I try to be in complete control of my life, I find that there's always something imprecise about the end result. I need to remind myself that this imprecision is actually something worth celebrating, not deriding. Plans and designs can go out the window as life takes on its own form.

That was the case with A Little To The Side: I started this piece with a very limited set of musical materials, with the intention of carrying those materials throughout the piece. By and large, that happened -- but there are plenty of moments where the music veers off into unscripted territory, taking on a life of its own. In my music, I'm always wrestling with the tension between what should be pre-meditated and what should be left up to inspiration. (This, incidentally, is not too far from the tension between what must be composed and what must be improvised.) A Little To The Side has a little bit of it all.

Ultimately, the experiment of A Little To The Side was, can I write something that sounds like jazz but requires the approach of chamber music? It's a question that obsesses me, and represents something fundamental to who I am as a musician. I'm grateful for the opportunity to explore this creative terrain, and I'm grateful to ThreeForm for asking me to explore with them.

And I'm holding Kate Soper's quote as an affirmation to myself; that it's not only permissible, but actually adventageous to chase my creativity down whatever foxhole it wants to lead me. The path will be longer, but the journey will be mine alone.

Dividual (Musical Score for Original Theater Piece)

April 2019

Music for the original theater piece Dividual, written by Paul Manganello, conceived by Paul Manganello and Michael Malis

Instrumentation: keyboards, percussion, live electronics, fixed media

Premiered at the Cleveland Public Theater April 2019

More information here.

Pyrrhic Victory (for solo percussion)

Purchase the score here.

For Solo Percussion
January 2019
Commissioned by Peyton Miller
Premiered on February 13, 2020 at Varner Recital Hall, Oakland University, Auburn Hills MI.

Program notes:

A pyrrhic victory is a victory that is so hard fought that the victor loses more than they gain. I'm struck by how often many people (myself included) make the calculation that the price of a victory is worth the spoils of the victory.

This piece strives to own this tragic disposition, building impossibilities into its structure and finding solutions for seemingly reckless choices. It begins in the ether: abstract, cool, and detached. From that primordial sludge, the piece builds to a frenzy of activity, ramping up to a rate that is clearly unsustainable. It ends by slowly breaking back down into a wash of environmental ambiance. This might, indeed, be a model for the ticking clock humankind's existence on this planet. But it might be a metaphor for something much smaller too; perhaps it’s an individual maturing over time, generously allowing themselves the luxury of personal growth.

The ultimate pyrrhic victory facing our society at this moment is climate change. We’re carelessly wasteful, sacrifcing the longevity of our environment for short term convenience. We make the calculation that plastic packaging, or oil for cars, or enabling corporate greed, is more important than living in a world that could actually support our existence. At what point do we understand that the cost of these choices is the actual air we breathe?

All pyrrhic victories do not have to be in vain. To quote the revolutionary thinker Grace Lee Boggs, “these are the times to grow our souls.” If we open our ears and hearts and listen to history, we can grow and create unimaginable solutions to challenging problems. This is hard work, urgent work, and work that can’t be done by anybody but us.

I hope that this piece inspires the performer and the listener to think clearly about the costs associated with our transactional way of engaging our world. As we move forward into the second decade of the 21st century, we have the unique opportunity to make our world anew.