PORTFOLIO
Below you’ll find a sampling of the recorded evidence my various musical activities from past several years.
Aduantas (2024)
Link to Clarinet/Bass Clarinet Score
All music, arrangement, and lyrics by Eamon Fogarty except for a phrase from Spancill Hill (composer unknown)
Clarinets and bass clarinets performed and recorded by Jeff Tobias
Guitar performed and recorded by Eamon Fogarty
Vocals recorded by Don Cento
Mixed by Chris Schlarb
This song examines my complicated feelings about my Irish-American heritage, and begins by imagining the journey taken by my great-grandfather (a laborer who immigrated in 1910) in an attempt to find meaning, or failing that, freedom, in the erasures of assimilation. The first two verses are followed by a brief interpolation of a phrase from “Spancill Hill” a song in the Irish tradition which, interestingly enough, was purportedly composed in California in the 1850’s. A final verse reharmonizes the original melody and is written in the ‘voice’ of the absent great-grandfather character, lamenting the thing which so often happened to immigrants in the days of conscription, where by attempting to dodge one entrenched nationalist or civil conflict, they ended up in the jaws of another. The title is an Irish word meaning “the strange feeling of unease, anxiety or fear brought on by unfamiliar surroundings.”
Note: The score is in concert, with both clarinets and bass clarinets on treble clef because that is how the performer preferred to read them.
The Old World (2025, work-in-progress)
A short video wherein I attempted to draw the nations of Europe from memory, and my mistakes are commented upon by a chorus of imagined voices of the denizens of those nations.
An Organ Rite (2025)
Organ and programming by Eamon Fogarty
Dance and choreography by Steven Jeltsch
This is a filmed collaborative performance by myself and Steven Jeltsch, a dancer and performer currently studying at Queens College. The portable pump organ used in this performance was manufactured by the Estey Organ Company in Brattleboro Vermont in the early part of the last century. It is a haunted object, originally intended for military chaplains leading prayers and funeral services in the field. While it is in serious need of repairs to preserve the structural integrity of the case, the reeds bellows are not yet fully exhausted. Special thanks to those who lent their voices to this piece: Alex, Alice, Ananyaa, Andreas, Celine, Celine’s Daughter, Dave. Dorothea, Emma, Gina, Hannah, Henna, Jose, MJ, Natalie, Noah, Nora, PJ, Roman, Ryan, Steven, and Suzi.
The Well-Tuned Banjer (2019, unreleased)
Composed, recorded, arranged, and mixed by Eamon Fogarty
This is a piece I made for a workshop I audited at UCSB with the Los Angeles-based experimental duo Lucky Dragons. The piece is built from a series of sounds played on a banjo which I’d tuned to an open dominant 7 chord in just intonation. The resulting material was then doubled, cut up, reversed, and rearranged such that sounds are layered onto each other and the decaying sound of one sonic event coincides with the reversed decaying sound (now a swell) of another. Because of the naturally short “plucky” amplitude envelope of the banjo, (not to mention the way that notes, struck hard enough, will generally begin at a slightly higher pitch before settling in) the tails of the sounds are quite long, and when reversed, the beginning of each sound arrives quite unexpectedly. Panning is used to emphasize the element of surprise. Various permutations and combinations of material are explored. I recommend listening with headphones where possible.
Keep Hoping Machine Running (from “Why Be Dust” - 2020, DL from Orphean Kiosk Recordings)
CGDACD-tuned guitar, drums, monophonic synthesizers, ebow guitar solo, by Eamon Fogarty
Woodwinds performed and recorded by David Lackner
Composed, produced, and mixed by Eamon Fogarty
This piece is something of a collage, cobbled together during COVID-19 lockdown from some leftover materials from other projects that were languishing on my hard drive. David had originally recorded the woodwind section I’d written as an intro to another song I never ended up finishing. I added a simple drum groove, and the piece sat for two years untouched. Later, I tried looping the drum pattern, added some synthesized tuned “high-hats,” and found a guitar figure that suited the groove. The skeleton of the piece was dumped from my computer onto a Tascam 246 cassette tape recorder where I overdubbed the guitar and mixed it all down.
Remembering (from Bill’s 44th OST- 2022, DL from Orphean Kiosk Recordings)
I recommend watching the video (starting around 41:12 and going to about 50:30) so this piece can be understood in context.
Composition, mixing, software synthesizers, mellotron emulator, contact mic feedback by Eamon Fogarty
Saxophone by David Lackner
Probably the most programmatic music in this presentation, this piece was created in especially close collaboration (with regards to pacing and sequencing) with the puppeteers Dorothy James and Andy Manjuck, for their show “Bill’s 44th,” a meditation on loneliness and aging told through the lens of an eyeless, mustachioed, life-size puppet who requires two people to operate. The section featuring this piece coincides with a dark and introspective turn in the play: a low point in the character’s arc as he goes over the joys and failures of his life by way of a VHS tape documenting his past birthday parties, which are portrayed by a smaller puppet avatar. The soundtrack as a whole, which consists of close to an hour of original music with additional cues and enharmonic sound effects all composed, performed, (with the exception of the drums and saxophones) produced, and mixed by me, required me to write and record in a variety of styles. The main theme alone is reharmonized and reinterpreted throughout as, variously, a schlocky 90’s sitcom theme song, a dejected piano jazz number à la Vince Guaraldi, and a landscape of nostalgic, glacial analog synthesizer pads. I should mention here that the show has zero dialogue so music plays an enormous role in setting the mood and shaping the story, striking a delicate balance between humor and existential dread. David Lackner’s saxophone part begins with a through composed section followed by an improvised solo. The whole soundtrack can be found here
Press for Bill’s 44th:
If the Spirit (from Blue Values - 2017, LP/CD from Jealous Butcher Records)
Music, lyrics, woodwind arrangement, guitar, and voices by Eamon Fogarty
Double bass by Devin Hoff
Drums by Chad Taylor
Woodwinds by David Lackner
Vibraphone by Matt Evans
Piano by Cathleen Pineda
Engineered and mixed by Chris Schlarb
This is an example of my song-based work, which has been my main creative outlet in the last five years or so. The saxophone sextet that opens the piece consists of stacked polychords (mostly Lydian in flavor) that set a languid but unsettled mood as subtle vibraphone and monophonic synth creep in. The lyrics deal with my upbringing in the Catholic Church and eventual crisis of faith. The band assembled for these recording sessions features players from the worlds of new music and free improvisation. The whole thing can be found here.
Press for Blue Values:
Carriers (from Blue Values - 2017, LP/CD from Jealous Butcher Records)
Link to score for woodwind section
Composition, monophonic synthesizers, field recording by Eamon Fogarty
Woodwinds performed by David Lackner
Mixed by Chris Schlarb
I have always included instrumental interludes on my song-based records. This composition grew out of a challenge I set for myself to write a piece where the four voices are sounded two at a time, leap frogging one another in order to create a seamless and continuously evolving sonic texture where each new harmonic moment is intimately interleaved with the last. The piece opens with a field recording I made of the subtle buzzing and crackling given off by some electrical transmission towers on a mountainside in western Colorado. The saxophones are later joined by monophonic synthesizers which are modulated at near-audio rates, and mixed low. Headphones are recommended.
Apollon avait un oiseau sur son épaule (2010) for string quartet.
This piece was composed for the first of the advanced composition workshops I took at Middlebury College. It was heavily influenced by the soundworld of the French ‘impressionist’ composers as well as my love of the Sufi devotional music of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.