"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. Partially deaf from birth, Dillon grew up in a bustling household with seven older siblings. He 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 North Carolina School of the Arts, where he has served as Music Director of the Contemporary Ensemble, Assistant Dean of Performance and Dean of the School of Music.
Dillon's music, in the words of American Record Guide, is "lovely...austere...vivid and impressive." His works are recorded by Albany Records, Channel Crossings and CRS, and published by American Composers Editions. He is represented by Jeffrey James Arts Consulting.
As I write this, I am listening to tracks from the recording session I had on Tuesday, taking notes in the score of where the glitches are, in the hopes of finding clean takes of every moment in Exit. I find this task both thrilling and stultifying: it’s exciting to hear great musicians playing my music so effectively, and to know that I’m getting closer and closer to a pristine rendition of the piece -- but it’s tedious to spend so much time listening to the same passages over and over, passages I’ve lived with for so long I have a hard time hearing them as if for the first time anymore. I’d rather be off creating something new. Instead I have to fool myself into thinking that my creative urges are satisfied by the effort it takes to listen knowledgably and innocently at the same time.
