Inside Voices (2020)

Carson Cooman (b. 1982) — Inside Voices (2020) for electric guitar and organ

Gene Pritsker, electric guitar
Carson Cooman, organ

When the period of home quarantine for coronavirus pandemic began in mid-March 2020, Gene Pritsker proposed to various colleagues a duet project where he would compose a series of short duos for himself (electric guitar) along with a wide array of other instruments. The two parts would be recorded by each musician at home. The instruments in the series range from the ubiquitous (piano) to the unusual (flowerpots). For those colleagues who were also composers, he asked if they’d also write a duo in the same manner. Gene wrote his "Pandemic Dance #30" for electric guitar and organ, and thus my contribution is this work, "Inside Voices."

The title refers to the fact that both the electric guitar and organ are instruments that have a stereotypically extroverted reputation: the ubiquitous guitar “shredding” in a rock concert or the “full-blast” organ toccata. However, like any musical instrument, both are capable of many other moods and textures. (The organ, while the loudest solo instrument, is also capable of being the quietest.) And of course the title comes also from thinking of an extended period of many people confined to their homes and a surely ubiquitous plea to fellow family members to use their “inside voices.”