Sleep & Dream Flying at Brattleboro Music Center

Here’s an excerpt of this gorgeous piece that I commissioned by Akshaya Avril Tucker and premiered last Sunday at the Brattleboro Music Center - in my hometown!

Akshaya crafted this piece with me in mind, using the open tuning I use for Indian music and leaving space for improvisation and ornamentation. While the piece makes use of the fluidity of Indian techniques, its subject is more personal.

This is what Akshaya wrote about this music:

Asleep, with waves of rest and restlessness, my imagination takes over. Where can I travel, what laws of physics can I break tonight? As a kid, I used to have a recurring dream. It was generally a bit lucid; I had some degree of control. I would walk out to the front yard of our house in Western Massachusetts - an expansive grassy incline with tall trees on either side. I jumped. My body flew up and was suspended high in the air, just above the tree tops. Then I’d fall slowly down to earth, and I’d try to repeat this over and over...

This idea: the will to propel yourself upwards, and gravity slowly pulling you down... This gesture is what the piece describes. Sometimes, magically, we are suspended even longer in the air, a bird’s eye view. Flying.

I’m so happy to launch this piece! Look out for the recording of it, which will come out on my album next year.

Credits Vitor Hirtsch - Audio Recording/Mixing Alessio Romano - Director of Photography & Camera Operator Studio 42 - Production . . . . . . . #cello #celloextendedtechniques #newmusic #akshayatucker #contemporaryclassical #violoncello #concerts #musicfestival #livemusic #hindustaniclassicalmusic #hindustanicello #indianclassicalcello #indianclassicalmusic #celloconcerto #cellist #ragastrings #strings #gayakiangcello #composer #jakecharkey #cellolove #solocello #indiancello #performance #contemporarymusic #northindiancello #ragacello