Left Gosh - Brass Quintet and Electronics

Duration: 8:30

Written: Spring 2020

Digital Premiere: Feb. 2021

Formal Premiere: subtle cheetah brass, Oct 24, 2021, Opera America, New York

Program Note:

"Left Gosh," written February - April 2020, draws programmatic inspiration from the politicization and weaponization of religion, human freedom, and the preventable death of thousands due to the handling of Covid-19 in New York City and the United States. Another working title was "Gosh Left Gauche," a play on "God left the left,” an acknowledgement of the American Left vs. the Actual Left, and a nod to the second mainstream media erasure of a true-left candidate's presidential campaign. 

The source material for the electronics came from a February walk in Brooklyn Heights, a sound-bath service in Sunset Park, and a trip to see my grandfather that month who had suffered a terrible health spell. (That trip ended up being the last time I saw my grandfather, who passed away due to Covid-19 in December 2020).

As New York began to shut down that second week of March, all of us were eyeing an incoming recession, wailing in support of healthcare workers at 7pm, and communicating only by way of our screens. This piece had inherently changed form and purpose at a fundamental stage in writing; initially inspired by varied soundscapes that were objectively innocent in nature, these recordings became a log of now-life-threatening routines and travel patterns.

The consequences of for-profit industry, late-stage capitalism, and government-sanctioned violence were on full display in our handling of the pandemic and its intersections. This country's need for a pathway out of its own condition was profoundly clear to many in New York City in March and April, and this piece hopefully reflects the compounded feelings and experiences of that time.