A piece for solo flute with reverb/looper/trails.  This piece uses a variety of extended techniques such as whistle tones, singing and playing, and air sounds.  May the birds and wind be with you on this strange and difficult journey!

Crossing Yam Suph

"Healing Story" was requested as healing music in commemoration of the anniversary of the global pandemic of 2020-2021. The piece was composed during late winter hiking, when the year’s many layers of snowfall were just beginning to melt. Streams of melting ice and snow were beginning to form—underneath the snow! The water could be heard burbling down the mountain, deep beneath the surface of the snow. The ice caverns that formed these conduits also acted as resonance chambers for the journeying groundwater, and much of Healing Story aims to capture the strange and beautiful resonance that such a cavern provides for a burbling stream. When a stream’s passageway inevitably melts to the ground, the stream escapes into open air and continues its descent above a saturated stream bed. In these places, an unbelievably iridescent green algae comes to line the path of the stream and escort it down the mountain.

Healing Story

“A song for dusk unfolding” is a work for standard open-hole flute, that makes extensive use of the special technique of multiphonics.  To achieve the desired result, the multiphonics should be tuned to one another, and the pitches that form the multiphonics should be vivid and salient.  

performed by flutist Bonnie McAlvin

A Song Of Dusk Unfolding, For Solo Flute By Bonnie McAlvin

An arrangement of the stirring "Wayfaring Stranger" for solo multiphonic flute.  

Performed by Bonnie McAlvin

Wayfaring Stranger

Little Christmas uses the special technique of flute multiphonics--when a flutist plays more than one note at once.  The piece pushes the boundaries of this technique in order to achieve the sense of humility and joy that comes with honest gift-giving, and to evoke a sense of connection through shared light and darkness.

Sheet music and fingerings will be available mid-March.  You can check in (or subscribe) at www.bonniemcalvin.net to get updates.

Little Christmas, for solo multiphonic flute

Reinecke Sonata for Flute and Piano, movement 2

Reinecke Sonata for Flute and Piano, movement 1

Martinu 3 - 06:12:19 21.48

Martinu 2 - 06:12:19 21.46

Martinu 1 - 06:12:19 21.45

Flutist-composer Bonnie McAlvin is captivated by multiphonics.  She was winner of the National Flute Association’s national convention performer competition and is known for her rare ability to play multiphonics—a technique somewhat akin to playing double-stops on a string instrument. Her 2015 video release, “Parallel Transformations” drew international attention for its use of multiphonics in a completely tonal context, and she is featured on the list of famous flutists of All About Flute.
 
Her recent film score, “My First Kiss and the People Involved” recently premiered at the Los Angeles Film Festival, where it was the top pick of the festival for the LA Daily News; the score received a grade of ‘excellent’ from The Hollywood Reporter.  
​
Other recent commissions include Sandstone Peak, a work for the provocative pairings series of the Delaware-based chamber ensemble Melonamie, and Cherry Blossom, a solo flute work commissioned for a 2017 tour of Japan. Her works have been performed by members of the Cleveland Orchestra, members of the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, and world ragtime-piano champion William McNally.  Upcoming premieres include a work for the Chamber Orchestra of the Hamptons, Overlooking Hither Hills, a work for flute choir called "Flute Kids", and a work-in-progress for flute and piano called "And the joy will burn out the pain".

Bonnie McAlvin, Flutist, Composer

Popular tracks