{"id":739,"date":"2014-11-11T16:29:49","date_gmt":"2014-11-11T21:29:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/szsolomon.com\/szswp\/?post_type=project&p=739"},"modified":"2016-05-28T00:08:02","modified_gmt":"2016-05-28T04:08:02","slug":"solomon-setup","status":"publish","type":"project","link":"http:\/\/szsolomon.com\/project\/solomon-setup\/","title":{"rendered":"Setup #1"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a percussionist who most often found himself inside large and complicated multi-percussion setups, I became tired of having to, in effect, learn a new instrument every time I played a new piece, constantly reinventing my technique and musical approach. Additionally, the logistical considerations of instrument setup and cartage consumed so much of my time and energy that sometimes I barely felt like a musician.<\/span>

\"setup\"<\/a>I wanted to have a relationship with an instrument in the same way a violinist or clarinetist does; I wanted to be able to practice more than one piece in a given day without having to take a half hour in between to make setup changes; I wanted to not have to make so many programming sacrifices for the sake of stage setup and instrument availability. The answer was this: a specialization, not in one instrument, but in one setup. A collection of instruments that are set up and notated in the same way for every piece and for which many pieces are written.<\/span>

Additionally, as part of my exploration of this\u00a0setup as an “instrument,” I have decided that it is necessary to include the pitches the individual instruments produce as a key characteristic of the setup. This means composers have the chance to write not just for a specific set of instruments but my specific instruments with the specific pitches they produce. This creates an opportunity for a true marriage of determinately and indeterminately pitched instruments and eliminates the reliance on novelty of sound on which so much of the percussion repertoire is based. Although future performances of these works by other performers will not necessarily use instruments with the exact pitches of my instruments, the sounds produced by those performers will not be any more indeterminate than would be in the normal case of percussion setups.\u00a0<\/span>

I hope as the repertoire for this\u00a0setup grows, performers and composers will grow with it in much the same way we develop with the repertoire of a new ensemble (like the Pierrot ensemble). So in addition to serving my own purposes, I think this project will increase the chances for the creation of a lasting repertoire which is not as reliant on the novel sounds and techniques of unusual collections of instruments, but rather is built on a new sonic, technical, compositional, and musical convention.<\/span>


View existing\u00a0works<\/a>\u00a0written for\u00a0the setup.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\nA video introduction to the setup, from the Video Companion to How To Write For Percussion<\/a>: