Baroque Dances

Instrumentation: violin, tenor saxophone, and percussion
Duration: 7 minutes
Premiere: October 2019

Baroque Dances is from a series of "horse pieces" that are currently in progress. 

For reasons that are a complete mystery to me, I have been fascinated by horses for as long as I can remember. While being extremely sensitive creatures, horses can be amusingly unpredictable. Out of this unpredictability often comes extraordinary moments of grace and beauty which can in turn create equally extraordinary moments of exasperation for the rider. There is nothing more beautiful than a horse and rider in absolute harmony and nothing more discordant when the opposite occurs. I've tried to reflect these qualities in Baroque Dances through the shifting meters and accent patterns, partnered with some of my favorite moments from the music of J.S. Bach. 

Baroque refers to both a historical period of music and a dapple grey percheron that I have had the honor of knowing for many years and who has taught me more than I could have imagined. Dances is both a noun referring to dances common in the Baroque era, specifically in the music of J.S. Bach, and the verb "to dance", which horses often appear to do.