Orchestration

for piano and electronics

Duration

12 and a half minutes

Commissioned by/Premiere

Premiered by Timo Andres on June 22nd, 2025 at Little Island in New York City.

Jointly commissioned by Metropolis Ensemble for Timo Andres, with support by Raulee Marcus and Steven Block; and Mark Stevens with support by the South Dakota Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Score

This score is in exclusivity until July 1, 2025. Contact me to purchase the music.

Notes

My wife Carrie and I were delighted to welcome our son, Matteo Sun Cerrone, into the world in March 2025. In the early months of his life, I was struck by how young children are guided so much more by sound than sight, and I tried to take my few spare moments to document the sounds that he must be experiencing so viscerally as a newborn.

At the same time, two pianists had both approached me about writing short piano pieces, and when they heard word of my son’s birth, they suggested that I approach the topic of fatherhood somehow. I suggested combining the two commissions into one piece and the result is The Matteo Songs, a piece for piano and electronics where each of the four movements samples a sound that Matteo experienced. I called them songs because each piece is a “song without words.”

The first song, “Lullaby with Hiccups,” features a recording of Matteo’s hiccups—something Carrie and I noticed he was prone to even before he was born and that sometimes impeded his ability to fall asleep. The sample became the rhythmic backdrop of a gentle lullaby in ¾ time.

The second song, “B.P.P. (Breast Pump Phase),” features the sound of Carrie’s breast pump. The two pumps had a way of going in and out of phase with one another, reminding me of Steve Reich’s classic phase pieces. I wrote a rhythmic piece where a series of high muted notes on the piano imitate the rhythmic drive of the pump.

The third song, “Qiao’s Song,” features a snippet of his grandmother, Qiao, soothing him by singing to him—an accidentally recorded snippet while trying to record his sleeping. She whispers to me “what is this for?” It’s a question about my microphone, but also a question that every new parent does have to ask of themselves suddenly.

The last movement, “Still Life with Noise Machine,” features the sound “shh” in every way—a way to soothe Matteo to sleep, a way to make sure no one wakes him up, but also the sound of the myriad noise machines in the house to help him stay asleep, a wash of white noise.

Each movement features a motto woven into the texture—A, B, C, A, B, C, D—which inadvertently represents these basic steps of learning in life.

The Matteo Songs are, naturally, dedicated to Matteo with enormous thanks to his mother and grandmother for helping raise him in these early months, as well as to Timo and Mark for giving me the opportunity to share this music.