Serenade

for Euphonium and Piano

Serenade is an aesthetically mesmerizing work meant to embody the experience I have when drifting off to sleep. When I feel myself dozing off, I experience a pleasing sense of paralysis, while still maintaining awareness that I am awake. Contrary to my understanding of when dreams are supposed to happen in the sleep cycle, I begin to dream during these initial moments of rest often causing sleep talking and walking a mere half hour after laying down to sleep. Eventually this anxious process ends as I lay back down to get a full night’s sleep. This piece captures this bizarre (or perhaps completely normal?) process by first creating a tranquil environment, then leading to a culmination of tension and activity, which gradually transgresses back to the initial serenity. The work personifies an internal struggle that perhaps points to underlying problems in my own mind or is, much more likely, an expression of my own restlessness.

This piece was composed for Eric Dluzniewski.