"Resistance and Assimilation" for Tuba

The score for "Resistance and Assimilation" for Tuba occupies a space that isn’t so much notated as it is constructed, built from a fabrication of notational elements that channel the same energy as the crushed, shaped, and formed metal sculptures of John Chamberlain. It’s a design language, but not one based in the flatness of traditional notation; rather, it’s a topographical architecture, a space where the musical structure is folded, distorted, and reassembled in such a way that the score itself becomes a site of provocation and exploration.

At the core of this composition is a material tension, not unlike the raw materials of architecture, where steel and concrete resist yet coexist. The score doesn’t aim for the comfort of linearity or the predictability of convention. Instead, it presents a topography of resistance—a landscape of notational archetypes that challenge our assumptions about form, about the very nature of representation. It poses novel questions of our own conventionality, but not through direct confrontation. Rather, it teases, it plays with the edges of what we know, asking us to engage with it as a living, breathing artifact, not a static set of instructions.

This brings us to the score's spatial intelligence, which, much like architecture, is built upon the understanding that space is not neutral. In architecture, space is political, cultural, social—an active participant in shaping the way we live and move. The score for "Resistance and Assimilation" taps into this same idea but within the domain of music. The irregularities and distortions in the score's visual landscape force the performer to navigate through it, to make decisions in real time, much as an architect must adapt to the complex and often contradictory forces of a building site. There is no single, dominant reading of the score, just as there is no single, ideal way to inhabit a building. It resists simplicity in favor of a more layered, fragmented experience—a conversation between structure and interpretation.

What’s most challenging about the score is how it provokes domesticated notions of coexistence. In architecture, the idea of coexistence is often domesticated by function, efficiency, and utility. Buildings must serve, they must shelter, they must conform. But here, the score rejects that. It refuses to be domesticated by tradition or functionality. Instead, it lives in a state of relentless provocation, where each notational element—each bend, each curve, each broken line—becomes an opportunity to rethink the very coexistence of sound and space. The score isn’t just a tool for generating music, but a commentary on the act of creation itself, on the ways we shape and are shaped by the forces of our environments.

There is a rawness to the score’s fabrication, much like the exposed structural elements of a building that deliberately refuse to hide behind walls or facades. The materiality of the score is front and center. You see the labor in it, the way it resists polish and refinement in favor of something more honest, more immediate. The alternate compositional intelligence at work here is not about smoothness or resolution, but about the dynamic interplay of elements that resist easy categorization. It’s a score that forces engagement, that demands to be read as a living artifact of performance, not a finished product.

Ultimately, the score for "Resistance and Assimilation" doesn’t settle. It doesn’t offer a place of repose. Instead, it positions itself as an active participant in the tension between forces—between tradition and innovation, between resistance and assimilation. It’s a structure that both shapes and is shaped, constantly in flux, constantly pushing against the boundaries of what we expect from a score, much like the buildings that challenge our assumptions about space, function, and form. It’s architecture for the ears, a site of dynamic interaction, and above all, a provocation to think differently about the spaces—both sonic and physical—that we inhabit.