My debut album Borne by a Wind featuring Nathaniel Mackey, Mellissa Hughes, Deviant Septet, Conrad Tao, Lilit Hartunian, and the Da Capo Chamber Players is out today on New Focus Recordings! Available on streaming platforms and everywhere CDs are sold. For more information, visit the album’s page at New Focus Recordings.

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Also out today, the music video for LUNE featuring Lilit Hartunian. View it here: LUNE Music Video.

I’m excited to announce my debut album, Borne by a Wind, set to be released February 12th on New Focus Recordings.

It opens with Red Wind (2017), a collaboration with experimentalist poet and National Book Award-winner Nathaniel Mackey that features Mackey as narrator in excerpts from his poetry collection Blue Fasa alongside the Deviant Septet and soprano Mellissa Hughes. Earlier works on the album include There is no sleep so deep (2016), recorded by pianist Conrad Tao; LUNE (2015), performed by violinist Lilit Hartunian; and Astrolabe(2014), recorded by the Da Capo Chamber Players.

The album is available for pre-order on bandcamp here: bandcamp.com.

Recorded and mixed by Rick Nelson at Duke University with support from the Department of Music, the Office of the Vice Provost for the Arts, and Duke Performances. Mastered by Ryan Streber at Oktaven Audio and featuring an incredible album design by Jessica Slaven.

I was so thrilled to participate in the inaugural Tidriks Distance Learning session today, a Percussion Practicum for Composers with percussionist Chris Froh put together by the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music. I wrote a short percussion sketch for Chris, who enlightened us on a whole range of topics related to it, from beater choice to notation, timbre, and setup issues. I especially enjoyed hearing fellow composer Eliana Echeverry’s sketch, which featured some complex rhythmic subdivisions over a constant pulse. A huge thank you to Gabriela for putting together this new initiative, to Chris for sharing his knowledge, and to all the other composers for weighing in. I can’t wait to hear Chris and Haruka Fujii play the other composer participants’ sketches over the course of the weekend.

I am overjoyed to be joining the composition faculty at the New England Conservatory of Music. Today was convocation and the first day of online classes. It was a pleasure meeting my students virtually; it promises to be an exciting new chapter for me here in Boston.

I had a fantastic experience in Buffalo at the American Composers Orchestra EarShot New Music Readings with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. They gave a thrilling performance of my piece Door to the River. A big thank you to all the players and staff of the BPO, ACO, Maestro Thachuk, and of course our composer mentors Chen Yi, Robert Beaser, and Jared Impichchaachaaha’ Tate. I especially enjoyed the other pieces by SiHyun Uhm, Sakari Vanderveer, and Vincent Calianno, which were great!

I’m thrilled to be presenting on my piece Red Wind today to the composers in the School of Music at the University of Florida, Gainesville. It’s a pleasure to share my work with them, and to see my good friend Scott Lee in his new role as Assistant Professor of Composition here at UF.

I’m happy to be spending the first four weeks of 2020 back at the Hermitage Artist Retreat doing a residency. It’s quite a shock to go from full-blown winter in Boston to what feels like summer here in Florida. I’m excited to get to work on a bunch of projects for the coming year, including a commission from the Tanglewood Music Center, a piece for flute, harp, and viola commissioned by harpist Chloe Tula, and sound design for a new play at Duke, Angel Mounds by Valerie Muensterman, on which I’ll be collaborating with my friend Matt Campbell.

I’m still elated from the fantastic premiere of my dissertation piece Red Wind, which took place on July 21st in Ozawa Hall at the Tanglewood Music Center. Thank you so much to the players who made it come to life in a riveting performance: Olivia Cosio, Ben Quarles, Federico Montes, David Kidd, Greg LaRosa, Gabe Polinksy, and Killian Farrell who conducted. And a huge thank you to Nathaniel Mackey, whose poetry inspired and breathed life into this project. The performance was of the last two movements of the piece, and I’m hoping that down the road the entire work will be produced.

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Now I’m looking forward to the remaining composition projects here at Tanglewood, including my score to accompany a silent film, Buster Keaton’s Our Hospitality, as part of the Festival of Contemporary Music on August 10th. On August 17th, at the end of the festival, we’ll get to hear three pieces we each wrote over the course of a day for three days straight, brought to life by the incredible Fromm Players.

Thrilled to be in Salt Lake City for the Utah Arts Festival and the premiere of Gramarye, which was commissioned for this year’s event. It’s been a pleasure working with Sinfonia Salt Lake and and conductor Rob Baldwin on this new work. We had a productive recording session today at the University of Utah, and tomorrow is the premiere at the Salt Lake City Library Auditorium.

I’ve enjoyed a productive and stimulating residency at the Hermitage Artist Retreat in Florida these past few weeks. It’s been a delight to get to know the work of my fellow residents and to swim in the ocean every day. I’m already looking forward to returning for another residency here in early 2020.