Earl MacDonald
Earl MacDonald

Sound, space, and resistance

Current Work

I’m developing a new body of recorded music with the Black Square Ensemble, a fully notated chamber song cycle for bass-baritone, cello, piano, and percussion.

The work is text-driven, built from limited materials, controlled harmonic color, and restraint of gesture. These pieces engage contemporary civic and ecological realities, treating composition as a form of witness rather than escape.

Recording is underway, with releases planned in stages.

The Studio

Studio with piano and work table

The work happens here, away from the rush.

This is where fully notated works are developed slowly, through sustained attention to form, sound, and consequence.

A table. A piano. Paper marked, erased, and marked again.

Time slows enough to hear what’s actually being asked.

This is a practice of attention.

I’m in the midst of composing new music—built with sound shaped by space, and decisions made deliberately.

The focus now is clarity over quantity, intention over output.

This site is a partial window into that world: compositions, collaborations, teaching, and reflections in progress.

It’s not exhaustive. It’s not promotional. It’s a working document.

Enter quietly.

Engagements

 
My work extends beyond composition into collaborations with artists, institutions, and communities in settings where music meets education and civic inquiry.
 
 

Engagements are selective and context-driven.