Marnen.org

Composition

I've been composing as long as I've been playing music; I received First Prize in the Aaron Copland Competition for Young Composers in 1988. I particularly enjoy writing songs and chamber music. My compositions tend to be rather eclectic, often combining classical forms with popular-influenced materials; many of my more recent works reflect my interest in early music.

My composition teachers have included Myron Fink, Carla Kihlstedt, Hankus Netsky, Anthony Newman, Malcolm Peyton, and Andrew W. Thomas, among others. In festival settings, I've also worked with Stephen Albert, Eric Ewazen, Amy Beth Kirsten, Tania León, Jeff Scott, Sarah Kirkland Snider, and Dmitri Tymoczko.

Below is a list of my recent works, with scores and links to recordings when available.

Note that all my sheet music is available for free download; if you want to perform it, just make sure to send me a program so I can properly report the performance to ASCAP and receive applicable royalties. Better yet, contact me in advance—I always enjoy hearing my work performed, and of course I'd be happy to answer any questions about it!

Mueller Report project

I am in the process of setting the Mueller Report (or as much of it as I can manage) to music, in order to give people (including myself!) an incentive to read and/or listen to the report. I release each installment as I complete it, so go listen at my Bandcamp page, or use the embedded player here!

Note that while these recordings are electronically produced, the work is written to be suitable for live performance (scored for narrator, flute, oboe, and strings). I'll make scores available here soon, but if you're interested in performing the piece before that, let me know and we'll make it happen!

Other works

Title Notes Sheet music Recording
Advent 2020 December 4
for soprano and piano

My friend Claudia Chapman is a writer and illustrator, and each year she challenges herself to write or draw something on each day of Advent. On 4 December 2020, she wrote a poem reflecting on the coronavirus pandemic, and it seemed to cry out to be set to music.

I wrote this setting as a message of comfort and hope as we left a difficult year behind; Katie O’Reilly, for whom I also composed the Nine Haiku of Ryōkan, learned it in record time and recorded it with me (modulo social isolation).

 score
Fantasia on Greensleeves
for flute, violin, and viola 		This is a short work that I wrote as a surprise for two friends of mine. It was written to be easy enough for them to sight-read, but it's not as simple as that fact might suggest. The piece uses two versions of Greensleeves: the familiar modern version (in the outer sections) and a 17th-century version (in the middle section).
Fantasy-Ricercar
for woodwind quintet

Written for the excellent Adelante Winds of San Antonio, Texas, and performed at the 2016 Imani Winds Chamber Music Festival, this is a fugal work of about 8 minutes, displaying the varied colors of the woodwind quintet.

 score and parts
Introduction and Passacaglia
for alto flute and guitar

This is a brief work exploring the harmonic language encouraged by the the tuning of the guitar, as well as the passacaglia form. My approach to the passacaglia form is inspired not only by classic passacaglias such as the famous one of J.S. Bach for organ, but also by modern treatments such as those of Ernő Dohnányi and even Ronald Stevenson.

I composed this work for the 2018 highSCORE Festival in Pavia, Italy, where it was performed by unassisted fold.

 score and parts
Isabella Regina, upon her Accession
for SATB quartet or chorus

This is an anthem in the Anglo-Italian Renaissance madrigal tradition, written for Queen Isabella of the East Kingdom of the SCA. The text is a sonnet by Ana Areces (known in the SCA as Ana Ravaya de Guzmán) which was read at Queen Isabella's coronation. This piece tied for first place in the musical composition category in the Northern Lights A&S Pentathlon in 2004.

full score

MIDI file (not great quality; the middle section is half the speed it should be)
Nine Haiku of Ryōkan
for soprano and piano

I wrote this piece for the amazing Katie O’Reilly and myself to perform on a recital that also included Samuel Barber’s famous Hermit Songs. Barber used texts by medieval Irish hermits, so my texts here were poetry from another hermit in another part of the world: the 18th-century Japanese monk Ryōkan Taigu (良寛大愚, 1758–1831). The music derives some pitch set concepts from traditional Japanese music, though they’re often used in nontraditional ways.

 score and texts
Somerset Wassail
for treble voices (SSAA) and piano

I wrote this piece for the Somers (New York) Women’s Chorale when I was serving as their pianist. It’s an arrangement of a familiar English folk song, perhaps a little quirky but still accessible for nonprofessional singers.

 score
Suite for Flute and Baritone Saxophone

I composed this piece in 2017 for the NorthStar Duo (fellow Bostonians!) to perform at the Imani Winds Chamber Music Festival. Getting the flute and baritone saxophone to blend well turned out to be quite a compositional challenge, since the two instruments have such different characters and dynamic ranges; however, the result was very much worth it!

The titles of the movements are as follows:

  1. Intrada
  2. Berceuse
  3. Minuet
  4. Tarantella
 score and MIDI files
Three Études
for piano

When my teacher Ran Blake asked me to write a solo piano piece that I'd consider typical of my style, the first of these three études was the result. The other two were written as companion pieces. These are fun character pieces for piano, flashy and interesting but not too difficult to play. I greatly enjoy performing them, and I hope others will too!

 score
A Waltz for Aunt Line
for piano

This is something of a character sketch, inspired by Aunt Line from Claude Chabrol's film The Flower of Evil (La Fleur du mal). She's a complex character with a lot to hide in her past, yet she's extremely sympathetic.

 score
The Young Art Student (in memory of Pete Seeger)
for tenor, viola, and contrabass 		Written in memory of Pete Seeger, this is a setting of an anonymous poem that he read in a radio interview. My intent is for the violist to also sing, but the piece can just as well be performed with a separate singer. full score