Completed July 29, 2024
Premiered December 4, 2024 by the Attacca Quartet

Dedicated to the Attacca Quartet, whose omnivorous enthusiasm for music was as infectious as it was inspiring

When preparing to write a new piece for the incredible Attacca Quartet, I had to reformulate my attitudes toward music. Where other ensembles would specialize, Attacca approached a stunningly wide repertoire with wit, joy, and open-mindedness. For them, there could be no music too high or too low, too silly or serious, too old or new. Instead, any music could serve as its own justification. 

Loosely inspired by William Blake’s parallel poetry collections ‘Songs of Innocence & Experience,’ this piece is structured in two halves that correspond roughly to the titular themes. Blake completed Songs of Experience six years after Songs of Innocence, and he originally intended the former to be exclusively centered on adulthood while the latter concentrated on youth. By the time he finished the collections, however, neither half was purely innocent nor experienced. The two contained poems of the same subject matter, the same titles, and in some cases, the same content - Blake actually moved some of the poems in 'Innocence' to 'Experience' upon completion, suggesting a complex relationship between the halves. 

I reflected on the soundworld I had developed over the six years or so since I started composing: a music of rushing motion, extended techniques, and mischievous self-awareness. This style stood in stark contrast to the first few pieces I had written: pop-like chord progressions, simple melodies, emotional transparency to the point of embarrassment. I decided I would set these old, ‘naive’ ideas in conversation with my current musical language. 

I hope that by juxtaposing and interweaving these musics that I can cast some doubt upon the linear narratives of growth we often feed ourselves. Sometimes, perhaps, one must double back to go forward.

Music of Innocence & Experience, for string quartet

Live performance by the Viridian Strings on August 28th, 2025 in Traverse City, Michigan.

Air On Haydn's Name

"Permafrost Ghosts" by Will Healy, performed live by Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra with Will Healy. Recorded in Santa Monica, California, July 2025.

Permafrost Ghosts (2025)

heads and thraws (wring it out) (2025)
for pianist, keyboardist, and two percussionists
Written for the 2025 Yarn/Wire Institute

Performed by Yarn/Wire
13 August 2025. Queens, NY, USA

Yarn/Wire:
Laura Barger, piano
Julia Den Boer, keyboard
Russell Greenberg and Dustin Donahue (percussion)

Programme note:
I like to think that the creative process is comprised of a convoluted collection of threads which call out, at some point, either to be untangled or tied together (knotted) for one purpose or another. In my recent works, the knot has become one of my go-to metaphor for the act of “fixing” (i.e. fastening) musical ideas using notation. This current work is made of up two movements which exist as two unique “knots”. Their respective ternary musical structures mirror one another, and serve as a “preview” of two possible approaches to dealing with the limited set of sound objects which I’d established during the process of sketching. The first movement (“first knot”) is written in the manner of the opening of a larger work. The second (“second knot”) as a bite-size encapsulation of a larger, imagined work.

— Njabulo Phungula

https://www.njabulophungula.com/heads-and-thraws-wring-it-out

I. first knot

II. second knot

odes to the body unsung (2025) for 13 players

I've been thinking a lot recently about music and the body. We react to sound in every single part in our anatomy, from our limbic system to our respiration to our motor system. But when we talk about how our bodies respond to music, we tend to focus on only certain parts – we feel it in our guts, it pulls at our heartstrings, it makes us tap our feet – and ignore others. In this piece, I imagine the music which resonates and activates the “unsung” parts of the body. What would music for the gallbladder, for the eyelashes sound like? Here, I take inspiration from the wonderful poet Sharon Olds, whose odes praise parts of the body that aren’t typical poetic subjects. 
 
“ode to the ligaments of the ankle” is a jagged, raucous folk dance, and “ode to the gallbladder” is a lullaby in warm, pulsing microtonal harmony. “ode to the vertebrae of the spine” reimagines the keyboard percussion instruments as the backbone of a skeleton, and “ode to the eyelashes” unfurls in fluttering wisps. The piece is rendered in a shimmering, dreamlike microtonal language. I invite you to not just listen to this piece, but to feel it resonate in your whole body.

odes to the body unsung was commissioned by the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition. It was premiered by the Grossman Ensemble, conducted by Timothy Weiss. 

Performed May 2025 by the Grossman Ensemble conducted by Timothy Weiss
Recorded by Chris Willis

odes to the body unsung is scored for sinfonietta - 1(+picc, alto fl.)1(+e.h.)10.alto sax.1000.2perc.pno.hp.11110


odes to the body unsung (2025) for sinfonietta

Michigan State University Wind Symphony - Michael Gabriel, conductor

Some of my earliest memories are of intricate boxes. My father, a furniture maker, often restores antique pieces, and I remember being fascinated by wardrobes and desks that had secret drawers and spaces. These are often only accessible by putting one’s hands in the right spot with the right pressure, a type of haptic code. In writing Puzzle Box, I wanted to create a work that pays homage to these beautifully compact pieces, where one has to explore around an object and test it in various ways until a hidden passageway opens. Puzzle Box was written for the Cabrillo Festival as part of the 2024 Conductors / Composers Workshop and is dedicated to my father. The wind band arrangement of Puzzle Box was commissioned by Kevin Sedatole, Michael Gabriel, and the Michigan State University Wind Symphony.

Puzzle Box (2024-5) for wind symphony

Premiered November 4, 2025 by Ekmeles (Charlotte Mundy (soprano), Amber Evans (mezzo-soprano), Timothy Parsons (countertenor), Tomás Cruz (tenor), Jeffrey Gavett (baritone).

Spaceships can land vertically, horizontally, or use parachutes and airbags, as with rovers and capsules. Controlled descents rely on retropropulsion, requiring precision, friction, transformation, and ultimately arrival - the shift from vast motion to stillness. The first controlled landing on another planet was Viking 1 on Mars in 1976, the same year the Rubik’s Cube was officially launched in stores in Hungary.

Decks of cards likely originated in China in the 9th century, spreading to Europe via Egypt. Shuffling can serve as a metaphor for chance, fate, randomness, and recombination - each shuffle creating a new possible universe. A conventional deck has 8×10⁶⁷ possible arrangements, a number vastly smaller than the atoms in the observable universe, yet unimaginably larger than the number of seconds since the Big Bang.

Six cards were chosen from a deck created by THIRTYMINUTES. Jeff Gavett and Charlotte Mundy both responded to these six cards. Most of the text you will hear was generated from their reflections, and in the case of V. Soldiers, the text was written entirely by Charlotte. Many thanks to Ekmeles, for guiding this musical spacecraft safely to your ears.


Six Hands for six voices

Spirare was written for CULTIVATE 2018 and was premiered by the Music from Copland House ensemble at the Merestead estate in Mount Kisco, NY on June 10, 2018. 

Violin - Pala Garcia
Clarinet - Carol McGonnell
Violoncello - Alexis Pia Gerlach

Spirare (2018) for violin, clarinet in Bb, and violoncello

Her Majesty the Fool (2020)
by Oren Boneh
Fanny Vicens, XAMP mictrotonal accordion and electronics

For the video: https://youtu.be/hagaxRg15FE

Composed for Fanny Vicens for premiere at Festival Manifeste IRCAM 2020
Special thanks to Grégoire Lorieux, Thierry De Mey, and the IRCAM Pedagogical Team.
Filmed at Centre Pompidou, Paris
Video production: Année Zéro – Benoît Martin, Guillaume Foresti

Music of Innocence & Experience, for string quartet

Bobby Ge