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In writing the Concerto for Chorus, I had two primary aims. First: to explore themes of artistic creation and the artist’s legacy. The work’s three movements form a narrative progression that encompasses the artistic process: a classic invocation to the muse (soaked in frustration, naturally), followed by a somewhat abstract depiction of the creative act itself, and finally, a meditation on the idea that our works outlive us.

My second aim was to compose a choral work of sufficient scope and virtuosity to be worthy of the label ‘concerto.’ There are almost no choral works in the genre—the one example that naturally springs to mind is Alfred Schnittke’s 1985 Concerto for Chorus; however, Schnittke’s work belongs more to the genre of the Russian choral concerto—sacred, a cappella pieces popular in the 18th century—than to the concerto genre most people think of today. My own Concerto for Chorus is an attempt to extend the tradition of great instrumental concertos into the realm of choral music.

The opening movement, “An Address to My Muse,” features a poem by the 19th-century American poet Lucretia Davidson. Though Davidson wrote the poem at the age of just 14 (only three years before her tragic death), it contains an anxiety familiar to hordes of more experienced poets (or composers, for that matter). I may not necessarily believe in the notion of a muse—that is, creativity sparked by divine intervention—but the feeling of helplessness expressed in the text is the same one I experience at the outset of many a project (including, appropriately, the composition of this piece).

The middle movement is completely wordless; instead, the chorus performs an assortment of noises, nonsense syllables, and pure vowels, in a representation of creation itself. At first, they produce only the sounds of breathing, but as the movement embarks in search of a purpose, they discover new building blocks: sighing gestures, then humming, then basic phonemes. They begin to interact with the instruments of the orchestra. Eventually they start to form complete chords, and finally, they coalesce into an ecstatic chorale as their purpose is fulfilled.

The piece concludes with a setting of a poem by the English poet Charlotte Mew. “Do Dreams Lie Deeper?” considers the world from the perspective of a dead man, looking up “through daisies’ eyes” at all he left behind. He notes that his dreams cannot be buried with him, and wonders what will become of them now that he’s gone. It may require a bit of interpretation to equate one’s dreams with one’s works of art, but in either case, the poem is about the question of legacy. It gives me solace to know that an artist’s body of work outlives the artist, especially as I reflect on the passing of my former teacher Sven-David Sandström, whose death in 2019 spurred me, after much soul searching, to scrap my plans for a (very different) previous version of this piece, and instead pursue the version now seen here. More than any other composition teacher I ever had, Prof. Sandström wanted me to think about my reasons for composing music, and to make sure that I derive joy from the process. He was also extremely prolific himself, of course; he left us a multitude of great works, many of which continue to bring me comfort regularly. The man in the poem says of his dreams: “They are my children”; it’s easy for me to hear the same words in Prof. Sandström’s voice, referring to his body of work. As such, it was my hope to imbue the Concerto for Chorus with at least a hint of Prof. Sandström’s love of life and the joy he felt at creating new art.

Concerto for Chorus was completed in 2020, and premiered in 2021 in Bloomington, Indiana by NOTUS: IU Contemporary Vocal Ensemble and the IU New Music Ensemble with conductor Dominick DiOrio.

Recording: NOTUS: IU Contemporary Vocal Ensemble; The Indiana University New Music Ensemble; Dominick DiOrio, conductor (Bloomington, Indiana, 2021)

I. An Address to My Muse

Why, gentle Muse, wilt thou disdain
To lend thy strains to me?
Why do I supplicate in vain
And bow my heart to thee?

Oh! teach me how to touch the lyre,
To tune the trembling chord;
Teach me to fill each heart with fire,
And melting strains afford.

Sweep but thy hand across the string,
The woodlands echo round,
And mortals wond’ring, as you sing,
Delighted catch each sound.

Enchanted when thy voice I hear,
I drop each earthly care;
I feel as wafted from the world
To Fancy’s realms of air.

Then as I wander, plaintive sing,
And teach me every strain;
Teach me to touch the trembling string
Which now I strike in vain

Lucretia Davidson (1808–25)

II. The Very Coinage of Your Brain

(wordless)

III. Do Dreams Lie Deeper?

His dust looks up to the changing sky
Through daisies’ eyes;
And when a swallow flies
Only so high,
He hears her going by
As daisies do. He does not die
In this brown earth where he was glad enough to lie.

But looking up from that other bed,
‘There is something more my own,’ he said,
‘Than hands or feet or this restless head
That must be buried when I am dead.
The Trumpet may wake every other sleeper:
Do dreams lie deeper?
And what sunrise
When these are shut shall open their little eyes?
They are my children, they have very lovely faces—
And how does one bury the breathless dreams?—
They are not of the earth and not of the sea,
They have no friends here but the flakes of the falling snow;
You and I will go down two paces—
Where do they go?’

Charlotte Mew (1869–1928)