BMI Composer Awards 2025

ensemble: chamber orchestra (1[picc].1.1.1-2.1.1.0-2perc-strings)
duration: 10 minutes
written: fall 2019 - winter 2020
commissioned by: Durham Symphony Orchestra
premiere: April 10th, 2022; Durham, NC

more info: http://www.robertrankinmusic.com/no-name-in-the-street

Program Note:

       Reap they the field that is none of theirs, strip they the vineyard wrongfully seized from its owner. 
                           - Job 26:4

       As a life long resident of the Raleigh-Durham NC area, I was shocked that I had never heard about the history of Durham’s Hayti District. Founded as an independent black community after the Civil War, the Hayti District operated libraries, hotels, theaters, and a hospital becoming one of, if not the first, fully self-sufficient African-American community in the United States. Hayti continued to prosper throughout the 20th century until the 1950s with the urban revitalization of Durham which constructed the Durham Freeway directly down the middle of Hayti, splitting it in two. 
	
	My work, No Name In The Street, borrows its title from James Baldwin and is, in essence, about the history of Hayti. The piece begins with a long melodic solo line in the strings (based upon spelling the word HAYTI into musical pitches). This “Hayti theme” grows and fleshes out into a broad, sweeping statement. This moment is slowly taken over by the brass and winds which begin to distort and obscure the theme. The theme, now abstracted by the winds and brass, only occasionally can be heard. The piece reaches a great climax and is abruptly cut off.  The “Hayti theme” is now heard in its most clear and intimate form played by a solo string quintet. Slowly, over time, the theme begins to get erased by the orchestra, note by note, until one solo viola is left trying to sing out.

	No Name In The Street is, more broadly, about the erasure of history and communities and the importance of keeping the past alive even when forces greater than us attempt to eliminate them. 

WUNC, the local NPR station in the Raleigh-Durham area in North Carolina, published a magnificent investigation into the housing crisis: https://wunc915.atavist.com/where-we-live

No Name In The Street: for chamber orchestra (excerpts)

shit-post - dissonant city type beat with sub bass - use headphones :]

dissonance dance

walking into the local club on a snowy winter night

Parigonyx

Premiered by Jihwan Yoon, April 14th, 2024.
Baltimore, MD

Recording edit: Yeonsuk Jung

Yellow-shaped Eternity (노랑무늬영원) for piano solo (2024)

for flute, clarinet in Bb, violin, viola, and cello

Premiered by Earspace ensemble, January 27th, 2024.
Baltimore, MD

Recording edit: Yeonsuk Jung

The Archer for mixed quintet (2023)

Premiered by Old Bay New Music Ensemble, April 25th, 2024
Griswold Hall, Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University
Baltimore, MD

Enchanted Ocean for chamber orchestra (2024)

Four Harmonies: Reflections of Monet - for mixed quintet (2024)

i: propulsive harmony
ii: tender harmony
iii: floating harmony
iv: dancing harmony

Four Harmonies: Reflections of Monet responds to a series of paintings of Monet which I recently saw at Musée D’Orsay in Paris. The paintings were of the Rouen Cathedral and, as is typical of Monet, he painted multiple variations on the Cathedral’s façade with different hues and shadings, and he titled them various “Harmonies” depending on the colors that are primary in the painting. What struck me was not so much Monet’s characteristic cycles of paintings, but the simplistic, yet evocative titling of these as “Harmonies,” particularly since the “harmony” is what changes while the subject stays constant. In Four Harmonies, there are four continuous movements which are all based on closely related harmonic material. In this way, the constant subject is harmony in the musical sense, while the evolving contexts of each movement are treated like unfolding colors as harmonies in a visual art medium, in an effort to create different shadings and explorations of a single subject. In this way, the piece becomes an approximation of a single subject based on multiple viewpoints, angles, or perspectives, as is the case for the Monet series. 

Four Harmonies was written for and premiered by the TAK Ensemble in April 2024. Recording Engineer, David Bird.

Four Harmonies: Reflections of Monet - for mixed quintet

Composed for Alex Johnson and the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon.

Recorded and engineered by Christopher Willis.

and even the wall breaks

Dreaming Flotsam

On January 11th, 2023, an 18-year-old student from Indiana University Bloomington was stabbed in the head multiple times on a local bus. The stabber assumed the student was "Chinese," saying in an interview with the police, “it would be one less person to blow up our country.”

The crime was unprovoked; the stabber and the victim did not know one another. The victim was waiting for the bus door to open in order to get off when she was suddenly assaulted with a folding knife. The attacker then put the knife back into her pocket and returned to her seat as if nothing had happened. Soon afterwards, she exited the bus. She was charged with attempted murder, aggravated battery, battery by means of a deadly weapon, and a hate crime.

I wrote Silent Theater in response to this horrific incident. It is dedicated to everyone who has suffered from racial injustice and hate. There is nothing more heartbreaking than senseless hatred and violence, enabled by ignorance, indifference, and by turning a blind eye to others’ suffering.

Silent Theater

can I come over?  my cards are still on your table, my broken heart needs fixing, can you do that for me?  cigarettes look so cool, but they're so bad for you.  I can't see our future, but that's what lamps are for.  I don't know what will happen to us, but I'll stay right here. (can I come over?)  get away from those thorns, get away from those thorns.  all those folks blow their horns, yeah here comes the queen, here comes the queen.  (can I come over?)

Can I come over?

burnt sienna (2023)
for Chamber Orchestra 

Performed by the Contemporary Directions Ensemble at the University of Michigan, Jayce Ogren, conductor. 

For more information, visit colereyesmusic.com

burnt sienna (for chamber orchestra)

Performed by the Grossman Ensemble, 

conducted by Katherine Kilburn

Audio by Chris Willis

Program Note:

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 every single member of the Grossman Ensemble for their incomparable artistry, creativity, musicianship, and incredible warmth and generosity throughout this entire process. My upmost thanks also to Phil Pierick, Augusta Read Thomas, and the CCCC for their amazing support, diligence, and stellar work in cultivating this uniquely awesome organization and making it run so brilliantly.

Unfurling Dances (2024): for large ensemble

seven dreams about my body (2023/24) for sextet
i. dream in which i float on a black sea (for toru takemitsu)
ii. dream in which my body is a flock of birds (for ben johnston) 
iii. wasps’ – nest – dream (for gyorgy ligeti)
iv. dream in which my body is a constellation (for kaija saariaho) 
v. dream in which my body is clockwork (for unsuk chin)
vi. teeth – falling – out – dream (for andrew norman)
vii. dream in which i cannot walk (for anthony cheung)


Performed at University of Chicago Tea Time Series
Justin Weiss, conductor
Paul Novak, flute
Michael Tran, clarinet
Blaise Magniere, violin
Isidora Nojkovic, cello
Winston Choi, piano
John Corkill, percussion

Image: Salvador Dalí, "Archeological Reminiscence of Millet's Angelus"

seven dreams about my body (2023/24) for sextet

like Clockwork, perpetuum

https://alanmackwellmusic.com/

Described as "an original composer with new ideas and a command of complex symphonic writing" (BroadStreet Journal), New Zealander-American Alan Mackwell is a BMI award-winning composer and performer based in Boulder, Colorado. In his work, Alan seeks to explore atmospheres inspired by his experiences in the Permian Basin, northern New Mexico, and Appalachian North Carolina using a highly resonant and bluegrass-influenced musical language.

Chicago-based composer, singer, and musical collaborator.

Unfurling Dances (2024): for large ensemble

Benjamin T. Martin

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