https://www.dylankcook.com/projects daily 0.75 2025-12-01 https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/southwest-sketches-post-2 monthly 0.5 2025-12-01 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/5300b418-e329-4a55-b283-cb3b2c7c8c3a/IMG_0292.jpeg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #2 - Make it stand out The White Sands themes are the most complete on paper. I wrote the opening melody and harmony, Hannah worked out the voicings, and the up-tempo melody is fairly true to the original improvised tune we came up with. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/661bc50f-7358-4043-adf5-0acbfd53d7aa/IMG_0290.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #2 - Make it stand out For the New Mexico theme, I was drawn to the whole tone scale for its wandering quality, and because it is a favorite of mine to play on the flute. I don’t know how Hannah came up with the sonorities to accompany the melody but whatever she played ended up sounding lovely. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/2f4f86cf-0978-45bc-971a-ec34df18e2fd/IMG_0288.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #2 - Make it stand out This melody is a transcription of an improvisation I played on the whistle during my first visit to the canyon. We had hiked a ways along the rim and I loved the way that the high A-natural sang back from the high walls, so I centered the tune on and around that pitch. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/daac45d2-429e-405a-b49c-d0f052ce11d9/IMG_0185.jpeg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #2 - Make it stand out Hannah and I premiered Southwest Sketches as the penultimate work of my Senior Recital in the Fall of 2024. Listen to it Here I am incredibly grateful for my fiancée with whom I shared such an impactful trip, to Hannah for being such a terrific collaborator, and to my studio professor Dr. Brian Luce, who encouraged the composition and supported its inclusion on my capstone recital. https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/southwest-sketches-post-one monthly 0.5 2025-12-01 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/783f8dd0-a218-44c5-a166-a12bee46d97d/IMG_2936.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #1 - Make it stand out The setting sun in White Sands, New Mexico. I drew inspiration from the stillness of this place and the impact that each little footprint had on an individual’s perception of the area. There is no small disturbance when everything in sight is so uniform. I loved it here. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/93c9361e-0611-4961-9a8d-53fb33297528/IMG_1729.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #1 - Make it stand out A fallen log over a stream which carved through the back of our campsite. We drove aimlessly through Northern New Mexico, letting intuition find us somewhere to stay. We landed here, a site we could only get to because we were in the Subaru, and it was breathtaking. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/98a496ba-c5f9-4c51-9a9b-38f05f2978a8/IMG_1844.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #1 - Make it stand out From the petroglyph trail at Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado. This trail seemed infinite, teeming with stories from an unknowable history. I felt humble and appreciative as I walked where so many had walked before me. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/f2e26428-c40b-44e1-a642-cf99ab42070f/DSC01152.jpg Projects - Southwest Sketches - Post #1 - Make it stand out Sunrise at the Grand Canyon, Arizona. This became my favorite place on this Earth in the very instant I reached the lookout. I am left speechless by the Canyon. I am in awe of the unimaginable history that cascades down its layered walls; the strength of the elements at their most excellent display. The Canyon is not something which I can really speak about. I tried to do the next best thing in the music I wrote for it. https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-8 monthly 0.5 2024-07-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/f5af0d18-1a5b-4307-a550-ce6df0c6958d/IMG_0073.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #8 - Make it stand out The left is my style of notation for the extended technique of producing a percussive pitch with a forceful articulation that does not create typical flute tone. The right is a set of rhythmically ambiguous passages that move through the indicated mode. The top excerpt utilizes the A Harmonic Minor note collection with the turnaround points of d, e, and f in different octaves. The bottom starts with a similar note collection but shifts to a descending whole-tone scale, a nod to Barradas’ extensive classical training. The lines allow the pacing of these runs to fit my ability and musical decision, rather than a precise unit of subdivision. Expanding the Work - Inviting Collaboration I knew that the full scale of Barradas’ initial work, which calls for two percussionists, flute, bass, keyboard, and cuatro (a string instrument in the guitar family), would be impractical for my performance. However, I could never have captured the essence of the piece that initially drew me in without at least expanding beyond solo flute. This led me to reach out to Katelynn Ward, a percussionist with a background in Latin American music, who met my request with an incredible passion and enthusiasm. For four weeks, Katelynn and I worked together to iron out our shared interpretation of the score, develop a realistic but authentic assortment of percussion instruments for her to play in the performance, and overall have fun playing something with so much to offer. For both of us, it was a new experience to have a performance goal that was not clearly defined and to tread the simultaneous path of reproducing ideas and creating original ideas. I learned a lot about my playing in the way I received hers, and it was wonderful to be exposed to her wealth of knowledge and expertise. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/35417992-c377-41cc-8079-6b3acdffa539/IMG_2725.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #8 - Make it stand out This image is a scan of Katelynn’s notes. She used both a live and studio recording of Pajarillo to deconstruct and replicate the percussionists’ approach. She then assigned each section an instrumentation based on what we had access to and played from a combination of these notes and my score. Her ability to synthesize all of this information and still keep the performance engaging and within her unique style is an incredible display of her skill and I was honored to work with her on this project. Finally, we put on the performance as part of my Third Year Undergraduate Recital on April 14, 2024. It was a terrific experience for us and the audience and I felt immense pride to bring that work which I admired so much to new ears. Reflection: The following is a video I created that highlights the information of this post on the backdrop of the performance itself. I have lined up a few pieces of media, from my transcription process and score to rehearsal moments, with their occurrences on stage to show the way that my vision of the final product guided each step. It concludes with the sentiment: We wanted to allow ourselves to have fun with our creative ideas and, suffice to say, we succeeded. https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-7 monthly 0.5 2024-04-15 https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-6 monthly 0.5 2024-04-03 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/bdb3626b-2661-47eb-bb84-6d2cccf33596/IMG_2725.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #6 - Make it stand out Katelynn’s Percussion Outline https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-5 monthly 0.5 2024-03-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/60450714-e8d5-46fd-8f06-08f43e67f999/IMG_2692.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #5 - Make it stand out Katelynn and I after our first project meeting https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/54350f4e-5e13-48f5-91c7-164829ff455e/IMG_0033.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #5 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/b4a1330c-83d2-47f7-9e62-e84d97c27604/IMG_0034.jpeg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #5 - Make it stand out An insight into Katelynn’s method for taking apart rhythmic figures and assigning them to different instruments https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-4 monthly 0.5 2024-03-14 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/2d3fee6f-5096-43bd-a5a4-e67a1a09d1d7/image.jpg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #4 - Make it stand out The bar lines in this excerpt divide statements of the theme rather than reference points for a stable meter. It is unnecessary to determine a meter for this pattern. This technique is borrowed from my experience with the works of Olivier Messiaen who made extensive use of the notation of precise rhythms without the confines of a meter. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/420223a3-b4fc-4ab7-ab74-a7cd31c2b7d1/image.jpg Projects - Transcription Project - Post #4 - Make it stand out This excerpt is visually striking due to the lack of stems. To notate exactly, it could be written as sixteenth note sextuplets over two and a half bars with an accelerando marked in the first few beats. This felt inefficient so I decided to leave it metrically ambiguous with the marking “fast,” reminding myself to allow the natural energy of the phrase to speed me up into its conclusion. https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-3 monthly 0.5 2024-03-14 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/3db6449c-d385-4dc3-9742-199d08362859/PercussiveNotation.png Projects - Transcription Project - Post #3 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/6ef7cc2e-3c7d-4ac5-b3ac-a523e0fdf5de/ModalRunNotation.png Projects - Transcription Project - Post #3 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcription-project-post-2 monthly 0.5 2024-03-14 https://www.dylankcook.com/projects/transcriptionprojectpost1-glcj4 monthly 0.5 2024-02-14 https://www.dylankcook.com/home daily 1.0 2026-03-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/56847b91-343e-406a-a07c-475d670a10ff/IMG_0180.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/1e2a8f4a-255e-49d6-a394-643813b9ea48/SUHeadshot_Cook.jpg https://www.dylankcook.com/services daily 0.75 2025-12-01 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/7fda2e4f-649c-4903-bd1e-df4f79e88ecb/Lesson.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/9f6fdc1c-4b65-4871-8480-62da759fd338/DSC06389-Enhanced-NR.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/16597556-1e56-48ee-bada-5df4dcde137a/IMG_2752.png https://www.dylankcook.com/about daily 0.75 2025-12-24 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/3bf2818f-5c23-46cc-8f91-35e75abd1cf0/DSC01669-Enhanced-NR-2.jpeg https://www.dylankcook.com/performing daily 0.75 2024-12-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/4782909b-aa2b-400b-ac90-4cbe18d65aec/DSC07492-Enhanced-NR.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/cafcbbfc-23d8-4e31-b52d-b24de8cc8191/IMG_0175.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/685f45ae-3695-4ba0-8815-08b55ecd8570/IMG_0107.jpeg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/30cb2348-d895-46f2-9d30-2b159b4451dd/IMG_3401.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/66958a8a-da52-460b-b857-4a744fc2c093/IMG_0177.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/7d5c46fe-3ef8-4b07-8c79-086bcedf9d0a/GWQ_Wide.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/654edc83872b676c6c9c2f04/e7ddc92f-2df0-4994-9f5f-3343fc95e4d0/NFAPhoto.jpg https://www.dylankcook.com/contact daily 0.75 2023-11-16