I wrote this piece thinking of something that should flow as a river. I didn’t want the title to be “The River,” but rather something that was more creative and easygoing. The notes were supposed to, again, flow like a river. I wanted the specific timing of the melody to be in different places as the different parts of the music go on forward. https://youtu.be/PylubSzVPDI This is Justin Park presenting his composition to The New England Conservatory of Music at the Contemporary Music Festival. Here’s the full score of the piece. Try it out for yourself!
Young Creators
Right Beneath the Clouds
This clarinet trio was inspired by two ideas. First was my perspective from my own apartment. Skyscrapers, bridges, Central Park, and construction outlined the melody of my piece, given to the clarinet. Shadows and overlaps between these structures formed the cello and piano parts for the first movement. Most of the pitches are based on the octatonic scale beginning on C. In the second movement, the inspiration comes from a very different source. “Quatuor pour la fin du temps” by the French composer Olivier Messiaen gave me the idea of unison between the voices, which served as the perfect contrast to the busy, opposing voices in the first movement. Altogether, I pictured the loud, busy life I might see if I was right below a cloud and looking down, while on the other hand, a full and unified blue sky would be seen if I just looked up. Take a listen to this piece on SoundCloud here: https://soundcloud.com/user-28081890/right-beneath-the-clouds Photograph titled “Parade of Clouds” by Asfia Jawed, published in our May 2018 issue.
Short Film: An Unusual Sunday
Editor’s Note: Abhi’s film received an award from the National PTA Reflections Program. https://youtu.be/9UuJ9IMx3lw I made this film because Sphero the robot is my hero. He is my hero because he inspired me to start coding and to become curious about advanced technologies. One of my favorite movie characters is Monsieur Hercule Poirot from Murder on the Orient Express, so in my movie Detective Monsieur Sphero is trying to enjoy a Sunday morning, but then gets called to solve a murder mystery! He is also admired and loved by the characters in my movie and that is why the ending is a bit surprising.
