Too Upset for Words (2003) for alto saxophone, guitar, and piano was commissioned by and is dedicated to Aris Carastathis and the Lakehead University New Music Ensemble.

The work is cast in two very short movements that use the same basic musical material. The work contrasts lyrical gestures with ones of extreme violence—all derived from the same musical sources.

The first movement, Rages, continually brings back a loud piano crash. Out of the harmonics of this sound come the saxophone and guitar’s material.

The second movement, Reflections, freely explores some of the gestures of the first movement. The pitches of the musical ideas become deconstructed—existing only as pitch entities in a free section.