David Cutler
David is a multi-dimensional composer who listens voraciously to a colossal range of musical styles. His enormously eclectic output reflects this large musical world, with a vocabulary that ranges from beautiful, lyrical, tonal realms to unusual sounds, dissonant clashes, and bizarre juxtapositions. Though many of his compositions refer to the sounds that surround him, they are far from simple imitations. Instead, these works are impressions of the music he hears, or commentary on them. In other words, they are indications of what happens to the music after it is processed by Cutler’s unconventional and deeply philosophical mind. For example, his offbeat, post-modern quintet Vango Tan Gogh is a far cry from a traditional tango, but it does attempt to capture the passion found in this intense Argentinean dance style while touching upon elements of jazz, country and western, heavy metal, and classical.
A piano trio entitled Trunk Music, combines the sorrow of a chanson by Renaissance composer Josquin de Prez (1440-1521) with the joy of an original Irish reel. He has a setting of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto for violin and avant garde jazz ensemble, in which the band literally destroys the music and upstages the soloist, and a fast 11/8 Kopanitza round dance in which the ensemble breaks into song in Bulgarian while the pianist plays a Cuban montuno pattern. Kartoon Music for the Kriminally Insane and Socially Delinquent reflects on the extremely violent yet delightfully quirky moments of Loony Tunes, while the orchestral tour de force Under the Big Top sets the scene for one of the most imaginative, extreme, and hypothetical circuses ever produced (certainly in Cutler’s own mind). Cutler is not afraid to use humor in his music, but other works are intensely serious, such as Chestnut Branches in the Court, a choral cycle dealing with the Holocaust. All of his music attempts to connect with the people who listen, though much of it pushes musical and performance boundaries, aiming to challenge as well as delight the audience.