The Boccaccio Project: “Intuit (a way to stay in this world)” by Miya Masaoka

Concerts from the Library of Congress developed The Boccaccio Project to provide some artistic responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ten composers were commissioned to write brief solo works, with the remotely recorded pieces premiered online in June 2020. Composer Miya Masaoka was paired with cellist Kathryn Bates of the Del Sol String Quartet to write a new work for solo cello entitled "Intuit (a way to stay in this world) ," which premiered on June 17, 2020.

From the composer:
This piece begins to push at the liminality of microtonal ways of playing within underlying tonal centers. How to balance dynamic range and tone color/timbre within a contemporary practice? What is sacrificed, what is gained in such a scenario? In this piece, there are limited modalities for the performer to control and negotiate the suggested and indicated delicate balance of these parameters in the score.

Just as this musical balance is negotiated, so is the balance of our lives in lockdown. This piece is a positive and optimistic hope for a way to be present in the outside world of lockdown, and a wish to find a healthy balance between our own interiority and the outside world, which, under such extraordinary circumstances, we seek relief.
~ Miya Masaoka

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