Roundabout (2020)

General Information

Commissioner: Parker Nelson
Written: July – August, 2020
Duration: ca. 4.5’
Instrumentation: hn + loop pedal

Performance History

August 13, 2021: Parker Nelson on the 53rd International Horn Symposium (Digital Premiere)

Perusal Score

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Program Note

Ever since I was a child, I've always been fascinated by roundabouts: circular traffic intersections where cars are required to move in one direction, and cars outside the roundabout must yield to those inside. From an urban planning perspective, roundabouts are a significantly more safe and efficient type of intersection when compared to traffic lights or stop signs. But for me, the best feature of roundabouts - much to the annoyance of any passengers or other drivers on the road - is anyone's ability to go around and around and around the roundabout without end. There's a beautiful and haunting feeling of movement but also of stasis as you see the car's gasoline meter reads lower and lower and you feel your body perpetually pushed towards one side of the car, even though you're not going anywhere at all.

From a sociopolitical standpoint, anyone would say that 2020 has been an intense year. From the worldwide coronavirus pandemic to a renewed racial awakening in America to ever-stronger natural disasters fueled by the onset of global warming, each day we wake up to another intense news cycle and another tragic story. Yet to paraphrase a sentiment I've heard from so many friends and family members, it feels like we're all trapped in some sort of vicious 'Groundhog Day': time passes, the tide turns, the sun rises and sets: but there is no change, there is no progress, and we are dealing with the same issues of ignorance and partisanship and hatred that we have been for tens, dozens, even hundreds of years. It's like we're all trapped in one giant, endless, manic roundabout: we're stuck in this stasis and we can't go anywhere despite all of the dizzying G-Forces and our fuel slowly drying up.

When Parker Nelson asked me to write an upbeat and 'pop-y' piece for horn solo and loop pedal, I never thought the work that I'd write would be so charged with meaning. But the whole piece, built off of fragments of material presented by the horn before the loop pedal begins, seems to almost programmatically echo the sentiments above. Sure, it's upbeat, and yes, it's 'pop-y', but by the end of the piece it grows into a dark, menacing, manic, and despairing looming mass as the loop pedal's cycle - perhaps symbolizing all of the vicious cycles we are caught in these days - builds and builds until all that is left is one voice crying out.