Sin aliento
for two electric guitars

Work no. 90
2016

This was the first piece I composed in which I consciously incorporated pop and rock music influences, since I listen to those genres a lot, but before 2016 I think it was difficult for me to accept them into my music. So this music is about acceptance and letting go, and although the title is simply "breathless" in Spanish, for me it's from a specific quote from a Carlos Castaneda book: "Para mi solo recorrer los caminos que tienen corazon, cualquier camino que tenga corazon. Por ahi yo recorro, y la unica prueba que vale es atravesar todo su largo. Y por ahi yo recorro mirando, mirando, sin aliento." ("For me there is only the traveling on paths that have heart, on any path that may have heart. There I travel, and the only worthwhile challenge is to traverse its full length. And there I travel looking, looking, breathlessly.")

I think this sums up the intent behind the piece really well. Sin aliento was premiered by Luke Jackson and Noah Ward on April 5th, 2021, broadcast live on WAIF 88.3 radio program “Making Music Together”. I loved how the piece turned out, but it was a few years before I learned how to use this type of ensemble differently, and made pieces like Alguien and Let Fade Completely. In the meantime, in 2017 I composed a series of works based on various pop, rock, and jazz styles, all involving a rock drum set: the Traffic Lights.