Imaginary Landscape No. 4 (March No. 2) for 12 Radios: Book, Percussion

This piece demands that percussionists and directors think beyond conventional instrument technique. The orchestration of radios tuned to different stations creates an unpredictable sonic landscape that changes with every performance, making each reading genuinely unique. It's a work that opens conversations about what counts as music and what musicians can do with materials outside the traditional percussion arsenal.

The piece unfolds as a shifting tapestry of radio broadcasts, news snippets, music fragments, and static interference. Listeners encounter moments of strange coherence alongside pure chaos, creating an unsettling beauty that hovers between organized sound and ambient found-sound art.

Experimental music ensembles, contemporary music groups, and percussion ensembles ready to move beyond traditional instrumentation. This work suits advanced high school or college-level performers comfortable with aleatoric notation and performers willing to embrace unpredictability as a compositional feature rather than a limitation.

• Assign tuning responsibilities clearly before rehearsal. Each radio operator needs to understand their frequency range and practice finding their station quickly and smoothly.
• Coordinate volume levels across all 12 radios during initial run-throughs; the goal is textural balance, not individual radio audibility.
• Plan your performance venue carefully. Radio reception varies significantly by location and time of day, so scout the space ahead of time and potentially run a full technical rehearsal at performance site.
• Establish clear conducting cues for radio operators to turn their dials and adjust tuning in sync with the other stations; even small timing differences create the intended interference patterns.

Feature this as a centerpiece of a contemporary music concert or festival dedicated to experimental works. The piece works brilliantly as a conversation starter between conventional and avant-garde repertoire, or as the climactic moment in a program exploring sound, chance, and technology in music.

• Reading and interpreting aleatoric notation
• Ensemble coordination without traditional melodic reference points
• Technical radio operation and frequency tuning under performance conditions
• Collaborative listening and textural awareness across unpredictable sonic layers
• Understanding chance operations and indeterminacy as compositional tools