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