Robert Carl

Speaking Pianist with Fixed Media

Composer's Note:

I met Noah Creshevsky in the 1990s. We found a great sympathy of spirits, and he became one of my most important and regular composer-friends. He often came to my concerts in New York, and we shared many wonderful dinners in his Broadway apartment, with his partner, David Sachs.

Noah died in 2020 of bladder cancer. I still feel his absence strongly and miss him terribly. This work has become a way for me to explore expanding aspects of my own practice, taking his example as a model for adventure. The use of the Schubert fragment, explained below, is the closest to his actual technique of sample assemblage. But beyond that, the combination of fixed media, live performance, and improvisation is a risk that I hope honors his example.

The title draws connections to the “winter journey”, the Schubertian melancholic romance with death.