 WALTMANSEARLY AND CONTEMPORARY MUSIC |
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STEPHEN FEIGENBAUM (US) My music borrows a lot from the “minimalist” and “postminimalist” composers, in its diatonicism, its focus on irregular rhythm and polyrhythm, and its use of repetition or apparent repetition. My gradualist techniques depend on the essential homogeneity within sections of music. A longer passage may not contain any exact repetitions, but may consist entirely of various juxtapositions of the same material in the same texture. But in my music, unlike a lot of the earlier “minimal” music, elements of this single texture are gradually modified in a way that resembles a different kind of music, and eventually the texture is completely changed. I am especially interested in moving between diatonic sets, particularly in gradual ways that display the non-functional harmonies that exist when notes from two diatonic sets are present simultaneously. I employ gradual transitions because I enjoy their feeling of determination and I like to linger on all the intermediate steps between one type of music and another. I use techniques to achieve this not just in my harmonic changes, but also in my melodic, textural and rhythmic shifts. My harmonies are universally based in some kind of diatonicism. I think it is the only language that most people are really familiar with, and referring to it allows the subtly of how I manipulate pitches to be understood in a way that it wouldn’t be if the listener were forced to get an entirely new system in their ears, and evaluate my music relative to it. I am interested in integrating the “postminimalist” genre of contemporary art music into the realm of alternative popular music. I think there is nothing inherently inaccessible about my genre of music, and it would be valuable for both cultures to be more aware of each other. At the very least, I think my type of music deserves to have a larger paying audience than it does presently. STEPHEN FEIGENBAUM. Stephen Feigenbaum (b. 1989) is a contemporary composer of chamber, orchestral, and choral music. In 2007, his Serenade for Strings received the second-place award in the national competition for composition, Senior Division, sponsored by the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA), after receiving first-place awards in the Massachusetts and Eastern States competitions. Stephen is the winner of the 2008 Young Composer Competition sponsored by the New York Art Ensemble. He also has been interviewed and his music performed on the National Public Radio program "From the Top." In 2005, he received the ASCAP Foundation's Morton Gould Young Composer Award and was a finalist in the 2006 and 2007 competitions. His compositions have received awards and honors from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, the Davidson Institute and Pikes Peak. In 2006, his oboe quartet All Worked Up was performed at Jordan Hall as part of the New England Conservatory's Composers’ Series. During the summers, Stephen has studied with Richard Cornell and Martin Amlin at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute in Lenox, Mass., and with Stephen Coxe at the Yellow Barn Young Artists Program at Amherst College. He also has studied with Rodney Lister at the NEC Preparatory School and with Christos Koulendros. Stephen is continuing his study of music at Yale College, where he is a member of the class of 2011. www.stephenfeigenbaum.com |
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