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WORKS


ALL   OPERA+THEATRE   CHAMBER   SOLO   LARGE-ENSEMBLE   CHORAL/VOCAL

Interiority:

2018/2025The interiority series are solo pieces written in collaboration with the performers. These pieces both probe the “interior” lives of the performers as well as amplifying the interior mechanisms of the instrument.

1. Co-struct with Michael Mansourati

2018 | tuba, live electronics
8:00
Two bodies on stage, each with their own needs. How can we constuct something together?

Premiered by: Bakarlari

2. hands, feet; a Body with Alex Tibbits 

2021 | harp, live electronics
6:00
When we’re necessarily separated from each other, how do we come back together? How do we reconnect with ourselves?

Presented by: Codes D'accès

3. Joinery with India Gailey

2023 | cello, live electronics
7:45
“Is it good being Joinery? Did it hurt?” 
What is the cost of change in our lives?

Presented by: India Gailey and People|Places|Record



4. Weirdtok_2020 with Hillary Jean Young
2020/2024 | voice, live electronics, TikTok videos
17:00
What happens when are lives are mediated through social media snippets? Where does the persona end and the person begin?

Presented by: Din of Shadows

Video by Bakarlari, Photo by Domenic Clark

Means of Production
for any amplified string chamber group

2024
10:00
string ensembleCaressing, touching, exploring the depths, the labour involved in the production of a sound.

1. Before Touch
2. Caress
3. Tactiles
4. Horse Latitudes
5. Bathymetry
6. Positionality
7. After Touch

Premiere TBA - Spring 2025

Shevirah
vessels for ensemble

2023
4:30
any number of singers and/or instrumentalists“If you believe it is possible to break, believe it is possible to fix”
- Likutei Moharan, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov

The title, meaning "shattering/brokenness", refers to the myth of the "shattering of the vessels" where, according to the Mishnah, god's light was stored in clay jars that fell from heaven and scattered into every being and object in the world. See Leonard Cohen "there is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in". 

The action of the piece is to look at these fractured, incomplete and sometimes contradictory fragments and figure your way around them, creating a whole piece, and working together with your friends (haverai). The hope, is that if we can come together, in microcosm on stage, to make whole this small piece, we can do similarly in the whole broken world.

Presented by: the Art Song Collaborative Project


video by Joseph Glaser


l a t e n t
for five conferenced players

2021
15:00
alto saxophone, harp, percussion, guitar, 'cellol a t e n t plays with the ways video-conferencing aims to simulate real-time communication but fails to deliver on it. Written to be presented during the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic, the ensemble is required to rehearse over Zoom. The piece leans into the inevitable input latency between ensemble members when they are playing over the internet. Throughout the piece, members are constantly trying to play together but coming apart at every turn.

Presented by: Codes D'accès

Video 


video by Joseph Glaser,
artwork by Astoria Felix


HYDRA
five reactions to a soundscape

2021
10:00
alto saxophone, harp, percussion, guitar, 'cello, fixed electronicsHYDRA is a companion piece to ARGOS using the same score but recontextualizing it’s performance through DIY videos of the five performers in their own neighbourhoods.

In the pandemic world, we experienced so much of our lives through our windows and through screens. For many, daily walks around the neighbourhood were the only times they saw people outside their family. By substituting the live human interplay of ARGOS with the recorded, telescopic view of the HYDRA video, the piece probes what is lost when we are no longer gathering.

Presented by: Codes D'accès

Video


video by Joseph Glaser,
artwork by Astoria Felix,
poster by Codes D'accès


Games I Don't Want to Play with Michelle Soicher

Games for four theatre artists and video

2020/2023
45:00
theatre work, multimedia“Games I Don’t Want to Play” is a series of games that mirror the Jewish lived experience of fragmenting one's own identity in response to different social situations. At what point can we be too Jewish, and how does that answer change depending on who we are with? Like all games, these games have defined rules and objectives, moments of fun and moments of challenge. More often than not the players fail. If they cannot succeed; they will at least fail beautifully. 

Created with: Segal Centre Jewish Arts Mentorship / The Museum of Jewish Montreal
Presented by: Michegos Theatre at Montreal Fringe 2023


Video by Michelle Soicher and Joseph Glaser


ARGOS
12 situations for chamber ensemble

2017/2020
5:30
saxophone, harp, electric guitar, percussion, pianetIn ARGOS, the movements of the audience control the action, in a reversal of the standard concert format where the performers’ body language is often scrutinised. At what point will the audience catch on that they’re provoking action? Will someone then take over or act unnaturally? What about the performer who’s listening beyond hope to the sounds outside the concert hall; will they play at all?

Formerly Giant with 100 Eyes

Premiered by: Toronto Creative Music Lab (TCML) 2017


Graham Banfield / Lisa Keeney / Austin Lamarche / Jackie Leung / Grace Scheele

Recorded by Paul Talbott and Emilie LeBel at ArraySpace Toronto
Mixed By Paul Talbott
Recording courtesy of the Toronto Creative Music Lab

Video by TCML,
Graphic based on Reveley (1791)


Daffodil
Opera in one act

2017-2018
25:00
opera, soprano, baritone, ‘cello, electric guitar, percussion, piano, live electronicsWritten as the final act of the collaborative opera Pandora by FAWN Chamber Creative and composers David Storen and Kit Soden with librettist David Brock.

In Daffodil, a woman stands in prosecution for her abuser condemning him to a life of repetition. The instrumental parts play the part of witness and stenographer, repeating and reporting on the action.

Premiered by: FAWN Chamber Creative

Photo by Francesca Chudnoff


The Body Politic
for large chamber ensemble

2017
11:00
1[afl]11[bcl]1-2211-perc-hp-str[11020]The medieval theory of the “body politic” posits that a state is analogous to a human body while still being made up of individuals. This work applies this concept to the body of bodies that is the large ensemble in music. As the piece unfolds, the movement of the individual is mimicked in gestures performed by the whole ensemble. In this way we can show how the concerns of the individual become the concerns of the community.

Premiered by: McGill Contemporary Music Ensemble - Guillaume Burgogne conductor



Image from Hobbes, T. ( 1651)


©2024Joseph Glaser