viola and piano; duration ca. 9 mins.

      Although they rarely make contact with my musical practice, I’ve long loved listening to indie folk and indie pop music. I find myself charmed by the music’s candor, clarity, and intimacy; and I’ve thought for years about finding a way to bring elements of this idiom into my own music. In attempting to do so, Creaking Stair Set, Take Me Skyward became not an “indie folk viola piece,” but a piece about this process of merging and juxtaposing styles and modes of listening. As steady pulses and melodies begin to emerge, the music is never able to settle down comfortably into the foreign style from which it’s drawing, and this inherent contrast/conflict becomes the driving force of the piece.

      The piece’s title is taken from the opening lines of “Lick Your Wounds,” a song by Canadian singer-songwriter Andy Shauf. A beautiful phrase, I believe the lyric – and Shauf’s work in general – represents the essence which I find so appealing in this music, and which this piece longingly attempts to capture.