Tara Helen O'Connor, flute
Monica Ohuchi, piano

LIVE recording of the premiere performance, Chamber Music Northwest, Kaul Auditorium, Reed College, Portland, OR, July 10, 2021
Recording produced by Chamber Music Northwest, 2021 Summer Festival. Sound recorded and edited by Alan Bise.

In the summer of 2020, I read an essay in the New York Times Magazine by Helen Macdonald called “The Mysterious Life of Birds Who Never Come Down” about the extraordinary ability of common swifts to ascend high into the sky until they are out of view to the human eye. This extreme ascent often occurs at nighttime (hence the term “vesper flights”) and the swifts appear to even partially sleep while they are high up in the sky. 

This phenomenon, its lovely poetic name, and the rich potential for metaphor in this time of loss and upheaval were the inspiration behind my new work Vesper Flight.  Towards the end of the piece, echoes of Henry Purcell's "Evening Hymn" begin to emerge, specifically the melody in which Purcell sets the following lines:
"Now that the sun has veil'd his flight
and bid the world good night
...Then to thy rest, O, my soul!"
Vesper Flight was commissioned by and is dedicated to flutist Tara Helen O’Connor with deep gratitude.

Vesper Flight for flute and piano (2021)

"She flies with her own wings" is the state motto of Oregon. With this energetic fanfare, I imagine the hopeful promise and potential of youth, courage, and individualism suggested by these words. Written between 2020-2022, it would be impossible to ignore the tremendous upheaval during that time. Rather, this work celebrates the resilient, irrepressible human spirit to overcome obstacles and search for ever greater heights.

Performed LIVE by Portland Youth Philharmonic, Dec. 26th, 2022, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland, OR.

she flies with her own wings: Fanfare for Orchestra

Originally written in 2003 for my experimental string band Nurse Kaya, I arranged this for piano trio a year later and then viola and piano in 2020. The title is a mashup of the Latin text "Dies Irie" meaning "day of wrath" and the Jamaican patois "Irie" meaning "everything is okay." Hence, this short and sweet song suggests a day when everything is okay.
Performed live by Kenji Bunch (viola) and Monica Ohuchi (piano), May 10th, 2020.

Thursday @ Three 5-14-20

Dies Irie for viola and piano

Recorded LIVE at the world premiere performance by violinist Paul Huang and The Percussion Collective, October 19th, 2023 at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater, Washington, D.C.
Commissioned by Washington Performing Arts and Taiwan Philharmonic, the National Performing Arts Center-National Symphony Orchestra.

Transcontinental celebrates the often uncredited role of Chinese workers in the connection of the
Central Pacific and Union Pacific railway lines in 1869 to create the first American transcontinental
railroad. Offered as counterpoint to the traditional glorification of the American West as well as the
emasculation of Asian men in American culture, this work imagines a day in the life of a Chinese
railroad worker, from daybreak to the bustling energy of a camp breakfast, to a day of backbreaking
and treacherous work, for which the Chinese workers were often paid less than half of their white coworkers.
The sounds of nature in the beautiful Sierra Nevadas weave together with sounds of colliding
cultures and the clang of the grueling task of forging this crucial artery for American commerce and
the annexation of Native lands.

Transcontinental for violin and percussion quartet (2023)

West coast premiere of my 5th String Quartet, "Songs For A Shared Space"
Sasha Callahan, Megumi Stohs-Lewis, violins
Kenji Bunch, viola
Leo Eguchi, cello
Willamette Valley Chamber Music Festival, Newberg, Or., Aug. 2023.

String Quartet no. 5: Songs For A Shared Space

Commissioned by Reed College in honor of Roger M. Perlmutter, the College's outgoing Chairman of the Board of Trustees and an accomplished jazz pianist, I wrote a short and sweet jazz-inflected piano piece that my dear Monica premiered. As I was writing it in April 2024, I realized I missed my chance to take my family to see the cherry blossoms at the Portland Japanese Garden. Oh well, maybe next spring! 

Maybe Next Spring for solo piano

The Viola Burns Longer (2024) is a suite of four short vignettes for solo viola with piano and string quartet. Reclaiming the familiar punchline of a well-worn viola joke (what’s the difference between the violin and viola…?), this work envisions the viola as a mythical creature of great beauty and supernatural power, capable of self-immolation and regeneration. The four movements use different aspects of fire as points of departure to explore disparate sound worlds that demonstrate the broad range and expressive capabilities the magical instrument possesses when in the hands of a highly skilled conjurer. They are:
I. Glow: a melody rises out of a blur of slowly expanding harmonies.
II. Flicker: sharp bursts of activity pop out of a texture of plucked, off-kilter rhythms. 
III. Smolder: a blues-tinged ballad evoking a smoky nightclub after hours.
IV. Blaze: a raging sprint to the finish!

This work was commissioned by The Colorado College Summer Music Festival for its 40th Anniversary season. It was written for and dedicated to violist Toby Appel, my great mentor and friend, who premiered the work.

The Viola Burns Longer mvt. II

The Viola Burns Longer mvt. IV

3/3/2025
Mason Symphony Orchestra
Dr. Soo Han, conductor
Center for the Arts at George Mason University

Water Sings Fire for Orchestra (2018) was commissioned by the League of American Orchestras and the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra with the generous support of the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Orchestral Commissions Program. Carlos Miguel Prieto conducted the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra for the premiere performances at the Orpheum Theatre in New Orleans, Louisiana in January 2019.

The piece draws inspiration from Leigh Bardugo’s short story, When Water Sang Fire – a feminist origin myth to the Hans Christian Andersen classic, The Little Mermaid – in which themes of ambition and betrayal are explored allegorically through Ulla’s transformation from obscure mermaid to tempestuous sea witch. 

With nimble precision, Ulla manipulates the mer-music’s magical properties - a show of power irresistible to an ambitious prince whose lack of natural talent drives his relentless pursuit of the throne. In the end, Ulla’s ability to transform wishes into reality rewards the treachery of the young prince, and it costs her everything. 

The loss of her voice, friend, and form illustrate the degradation of her true source of personal power. Desperate to survive, Ulla uses a magical mirror to amplify her weakened voice with the support of “all these broken, betrayed girls” reflected in the mirror. Together, they build a song of storm magic to pull apart the prince’s ill-begotten prize. 

Bardugo writes that following Ulla’s descent, she clutches her memories, and “…held each sorrow like a chafing grain of sand, and grew her grudges like pearls.” 

While this piece does not strictly adhere to the narrative arc of the story, its episodic form strings together grievances, while Ulla, who frets in the deep, waits for the “lonely, the ambitious, the clever, the frail, for all those willing to strike a bargain. She never waits long.” 

Like the story, the sparse textures of the opening moments conjure the barren lands stripped of life by Ulla’s storm, and slowly builds with the sorrow of each painful memory re-lived. The themes resonate with societal changes that challenge our nation ­– as we strive to give voice to the wronged and the disenfranchised. The work is dedicated, with hope and with gratitude, to “women who sing truth though the world rains fire upon them.” Duration ca. 12:00

— Notes by Andrea Reinkemeyer and Kate Verotsky

Andrea Reinkemeyer: Water Sings Fire for Orchestra (2018) - LIVE

Live recording of premiere performance, March 11, 2017
Oregon Symphony 
Carlos Kalmar, Music Director
Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland, Oregon

Aspects of an Elephant draws inspiration from the timeless parable of the so-called Blind Men and the Elephant, of which various versions have appeared throughout Asia and Europe since the 13th century. I was especially drawn to the version in Rumi’s epic collection of sacred Islamic texts, The Masnavi. In this retelling, the men are not blind, but are simply in a dark room with an elephant they can’t see, feeling the mysterious beast in order to describe it to each other, with only faint light from a small candle in each man’s hand.

Naturally, they each come up with a very distinct impression of the elephant that differs greatly from all of the others. For example, the man feeling the tusk declares “the elephant is a spear!” while the man feeling a leg is convinced the elephant is a large tree. A heated argument ensues in which they each feel so obviously right, they can’t imagine any other perspective being remotely accurate.

This conflict escalates almost to the point of violence until the men, who have now encroached on each other’s physical space, realize the combined light of their individual candles has now revealed the true nature of the elephant, and that, indeed, they were all partially correct in their assessments. 

I found this story engaging for a number of reasons. Without going into detail, its relevance to today’s deeply divided political climate is fairly obvious. Musically, it also seemed to lend itself particularly well to the many different colors of the orchestra- which I feel is, in itself, a compelling metaphor for a collection of diverse elements finding common ground and uniting to achieve beauty that transcends those individual labels and differences.  In this sense, Aspects... is, if not officially a "Concerto for Orchestra," certainly a celebration of the orchestra- and specifically, of the musicians of the Oregon Symphony, to whom this work is dedicated.

Aspects Of An Elephant: A Parable for Orchestra

Composer/performer of New American contemporary concert music, living in Portland, Oregon. 

Aspects Of An Elephant: A Parable for Orchestra

Kenji Bunch

Related tracks