Lawrence Dillon@Sequenza21.com
"There are no two points so distant from one another that they cannot be connected by a single straight line -- and an infinite number of curves."
Composer Lawrence Dillon has produced an extensive body of work, from brief solo pieces to a full-length opera. Three disks of his music are due out in 2010 on the Bridge, Albany and Naxos labels. In the past year, he has had commissions from the Emerson String Quartet, the Cassatt String Quartet, the Mansfield Symphony, the Boise Philharmonic, the Salt Lake City Symphony, the Ravinia Festival, the Daedalus String Quartet, the Kenan Institute for the Arts, the University of Utah and the Idyllwild Symphony Orchestra.

Although he lost 50% of his hearing in a childhood illness, Dillon began composing as soon as he started piano lessons at the age of seven. In 1985, he became the youngest composer to earn a doctorate at The Juilliard School, and was shortly thereafter appointed to the Juilliard faculty. Dillon is now Composer in Residence at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, where he has served as Music Director of the Contemporary Ensemble, Assistant Dean of Performance, and Interim Dean of the School of Music. He was the Featured American Composer in the February 2006 issue of Chamber Music magazine.

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Friday, July 03, 2009
350th Anniversary

There have been a number of auspicious anniversaries in the past year, Carter’s and Messiaen’s centennials being the most widely noted. But today trumps them all in my book.

Today I am 350 years old.

In dog years.

That’s not so impressive by many people’s standards, but it’s a lot longer than this old dog expected to live.

I’m celebrating big time all year. In January, the Daedalus Quartet will premiere my fourth quartet at Wolf Trap. In February, the nu ensemble will premiere a work I haven’t even begun to dream up yet. In March, the Emerson Quartet will premiere my fifth quartet in Köln. In May, the Idyllwild Symphony will premiere my Schumann Trilogy in California, with followup performances by orchestras in Utah, Idaho and Ohio.

I have three disks of my music coming out this year. Naxos will issue a CD of my complete violin works played by the ultimate Sphinx, Danielle Belén. Albany has a disk of my vocal music in the works. And Bridge will release a disk containing my piano quartet and three string quartets.

But before all of that comes about, this is an appropriate occasion on which to pass along a few observations on becoming 350:
• One morning I looked at my ratty socks and thought they must be older than I am. Then I realized they’re not -- and I don’t look so hot either.

• Stubbly jaws look better than stubbly jowls.

• I used to smile at strangers in the grocery store, and sometimes they would smile back. Now I smile at them and they almost always smile back – at my kids. And I’d do the same, if I were in their sandals.

• It’s amazing how quickly the passionate opinions of your youth can start sounding like the cranky whinings of old age.
Keeping that passionate crankiness to myself will be an ongoing challenge for my next semi-centennial.

posted by Lawrence Dillon 6:22 AM