Meta

Meta was written for guitarist/composer Apostolos Paraskevas, who for several years headed the International Guitar Congress-Festival in Corfu, Greece; and for at least 20 years has been on the faculty of the Berklee College of Music.

The work is written using a somewhat free approach to musical composition using a variety of short sound objects, or “moments.” When I wrote the work, I did not have a lot of experience composing for guitar, so this brief composition was exploratory for me.

I decided to use “moment form,” or at least what I had thought of as moment form at the time; i.e., a piece of music defined as “a mosaic of moments,” where each moment is a self-contained, independent section of music. The term is most often associated with the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. In particular, I was thinking of Stockhausen’s Klavierstück XI (1956) when I composed the piece – though several scholars associate that particular work has having a “mobile” structure. Either way, my understanding of how to create and perform a score with a graphic layout, a series of fragments distributed on a single page, is inspired by this music.

I am very thankful for Apostolos Paraskevas who, for several years, programmed Meta at various performances he played while touring the U.S. and Europe.

The Greek word μετά (metá) has a variety of meanings, but in this case I was referencing the concept of “afterwards” or “later” – as in “see you later!”

• Kyiv Union of Composers, Kiev, Ukraine; October 30, 2000 
• The Irish Room, Gasson Hall, Boston College, Boston, MA; April 8, 2001 
• David Friend Recital Hall, Berklee College of Music, Boston, MA; February 21, 2002 
• VII International Guitar Congress-Festival, Corfu, Greece; August 21-27, 2003 
• San Francisco Guitar Society Café, San Francisco, CA; April 1, 2005 
• Advent Lutheran Church, New York, NY; June 17, 2006