UC San Diego

The following Master's Thesis represents the culmination of two years' work in the UCSD department of music. The three pieces, Bicusp[i think you've got]id, Sequitur, non?, and Solo for horn, appear in order of completion, the first two having been composed for juries, the last for a fellow student's recital. My efforts in composition during the program have focused on the exploration of chaotic states, energy transfer, transformative trajectories, and non-traditional sound worlds. One can see evidence of these categories in the included submissions, along with further description in their respective explanatory notes. I have found the tuba of particular interest, working with friend and colleague Jonathan Piper. Both Bicusp and Sequitur explore the instrument in unusual contexts, relying on unusual sounds. We have documented these and other less-known capacities in the form of a performance catalog, which we will look to publish in the coming year