Gigue (2024)

The first collaborative project I completed was with composer Isaac Santos. We met in 2019 as part of the same cohort of composers at Oberlin, and quickly formed a close bond rooted in our shared musical interests and similar upbringings. Since graduating, we’ve remained in touch and decided to embark on a new project together. With funding provided by Syracuse University, I commissioned Isaac to write a solo piece for the Cuban tres. As a starting point, I shared with him the solo works of Efraín Amador—a prominent Cuban tresero and composer known for his pedagogical contributions to the instrument.

Isaac responded by composing a Gigue—a nod not only to the Baroque dance form and J.S. Bach’s cello suites, but also to a Gigue I had written during my time at Oberlin. In researching the tres, he became intrigued by its timbral similarities to the harpsichord, which led him to imagine an ahistorical scenario: what if the tres had existed in the Baroque period and been used to perform dance music? While drawing on Baroque references, Isaac employed modern harmonic sensibilities throughout the piece, including quartal harmonies and ambiguous key centers.

Interestingly, the piece also includes an unintentional use of scordatura. The standard tuning of the tres is G–C–E (from lowest to highest), but Isaac kept gravitating toward C minor harmonies and phrases built around E-flat. After noticing this pattern, I called him over the phone—half-jokingly congratulating him on writing what might be the first classical-style piece for tres that uses scordatura as an extended technique.

After learning and practicing the piece, I recorded it in my father’s studio. Currently, Isaac and I are planning to expand it into a multi-movement suite inspired by Bach’s cello suites. The only requirement I’ve given him is that all movements must use the G–C–E-flat tuning, to avoid the need for retuning during live performance.