Unfurling Dances

When I compose, I tend to personify musical elements in my head as I’m working through them. I’ll think of certain melodic lines, rhythms, or instruments as characters in a play, neighbors in an imagined musical community— friends (or enemies, as the case may be) with whom I can converse in the largely solitary stretches of the compositional process. The protagonist of this piece, Unfurling Dances, has a very quirky and somewhat volatile personality. When they introduce themselves at the top of the piece, they come across as brash, slightly reckless, and sort of all-over-the-place, entreating the entire ensemble to follow them blindly on their precarious and lopsided rhythmic itinerary. They get easily distracted and change paths on a whim — a jaunty string section, a crazed piano figure, a wild drum break. However, after they run out of steam, we see a more vulnerable side of them in the form of incredibly slowed- down, disjointed versions of their original iteration over a bed of lush sound. Equipped with this newfound understanding, our protagonist attempts their original flight path once more against a more metrically grounded groove, and we learn they’re actually a pretty good dancer. This piece is presented with immense thanks to the American Composers Orchestra and the BMI team.