Beautifully Paralyzed
Keeril Makan on his work Dream Lightly:
In Dream Lightly, we are placed in a word that is beautifully paralyzed, or perhaps paralyzed by beauty. The music does not move; it has fallen asleep but is not aware of it. It is stuck in a continual repetition of similar thoughts, slightly changing and rearranging them, cast in subtlety changing environments.
The guitarist almost always plays harmonics. These are notes produced by lightly touching the string at certain points to create sounds that sound higher and more fragile than ordinary pitches. The world of harmonics hovers above the guitar, oftentimes slightly, but purposefully, out of tune with instruments played in a conventional manner. All of the music is derived from or in response to the guitar. It is not a concerto in the traditional sense, as the soloist and the orchestra are not antagonists. Rather it is as if the orchestra exists inside of the guitarist's head, helping, supporting, and coloring.
1 Keeril Makan with ACO Principal Cellist Gene Moye
2 Soloist Seth Josel with Jeff Milarsky and Eva Gruesser, ACO Concertmaster
American Composers Orchestra is grateful to the many organizations that make its programs possible including Arthur F. & Alice E. Adams Charitable Fund, Altman Foundation, Amphion Foundation, Benevity, Aaron Copland Fund for Music, BMI Foundation, BMI, Inc., Charity Navigator's Giving Basket, Cheswatyr Foundation, Edward T. Cone Foundation, Communities Foundation of Texas, The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Ford Foundation’s Good Neighbor Committee, Give Lively, Francis B. Goelet Charitable Trust, Fromm Music Foundation, Steven R. Gerber Trust, G. Schirmer/Wise Music Foundation, The Hearst Foundation, Howard Gilman Foundation, The Adele and John Gray Endowment Fund, Jephson Educational Trusts, Jerome Foundation, MacMillan Family Foundation, Mellon Foundation, New Music USA’s Organization Fund, The New York Community Trust (Musical Arts Fund, Clara Lewisohn Rossin Trust, and Edward and Sally Van Lier Fund), Pacific Harmony Foundation, Paypal Giving Fund, Rexford Fund, Sphinx Venture Fund, TD Charitable Foundation, Turrell Fund, UKOGF Foundation, Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation.
Corporate gifts to match employee contributions are made by Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, Triton Container International Incorporated of North America, and Neiman Marcus.
Public funds are provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, Office of Brooklyn Borough President Reynoso, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
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