Delaware State Arts Conference 2025 High School Reading Session

This piece was written to honor Patti Kroth on her retirement from teaching at MacDonald Middle School in East Lansing, Michigan. While I worked on the music, I learned about Patti’s vibrant personality and her description as being “solar powered.”  I titled the piece Sunward to reflect the energy, warmth, and joy that the sun brings to the human spirit. The music captures a spirit of optimism, mirroring the vibrant and uplifting qualities of an encouraging human being.

My absolute favorite book from middle school was Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time, the classic science fiction novel from 1962. A wonderfully rich cast of characters are thrust into a world beyond their comprehension, but it is only through empathy and friendship that they are able to struggle forward. Central to the story is the fictional form of travel called the "tesseract" that involves transcending the bonds of our four dimensions to move light years in an instant. In the novel, the protagonist Meg and her companions use a tesseract to travel to the beautiful planet Uriel where they fly above powerful, centaur-like beings and confront "The Black Thing" for the first time. My composition will depict this fantastic journey across dimensions in the form of a propulsive and energetic scherzo. Opening with mysterious crystalline textures for metallic percussion and woodwinds, a powerful accelerando follows from brass and drums to depict the dramatic tesseract itself. This gives way to "the flight above the centaurs" with a shift to a rollicking ostinato. After a brief terrifying encounter with "The Black Thing" the work concludes triumphantly as the journey ends for now.

The musical narrative comes from an old folk tale told in Scandinavia. The tale explains that the beautiful, awe-inspiring northern lights are actually carrying fallen solders and Vikings up to heaven. Over versions of this folklore explained that the lights were their final exhales and farewells before entering the afterlife. To musically tell this tale, the composer, who has deep, familial roots in Finland, utilized modes, six-note scale, and progressions that possess the feel of a Scandinavian folk tune. The first section represents a burial hymn to those that have passed, as family members say their last goodbyes with somber hearts. The piece quickly progresses into a flurrying, colorful dance of the northern lights as they appear to sweep away the fallen into a new life. There is a mixing of themes as the fallen understand that they too must let go of their loved ones still on Earth. Musical motion continues throughout as a signal of the ever-shifting shapes and contours of the northern lights. The composer at one point shifts into a waltz that carries over themes from the hymn as a picture of the fallen reuniting with those they love in heaven. The piece ends with a restatement of the beginning theme as a new day begins to override the voyage of the lights, and those remaining on Earth must continue to live life, carrying the memory of the night of the northern lights. Voyage of the Northern Lights is an exciting piece that acts as a tribute to the beauty of nature, the composer's heritage, and to the continued dedication of music teachers and students that make pieces like this possible.

Score and Parts, Softcover Go on an emotional and thrilling adventure. The exotic sounds of the harmonic and double harmonic minor scales along with syncopated and 16th note rhythms, great percussion scoring and dramatic melodies will make this the highlight of your next concert program.

Commissioned by the Ramona High School Bands in California (Abbie Gerdes, director), this work sets to tell the story of the mysteries of the night and the excitement of springtime. As a child, my grandfather would always remind me that "we all see the same moon." This was an especially important lesson for me, especially during times that I missed my family in the Dominican Republic. Puerto Rico and Cuba. The power in those words ring true to me today, but for other reasons. We are all equal, we have the same worth, we matter.

Clocktower Fanfare (originally titled With Tower High) was commissioned by the University of Wisconsin–Stout in Menomonie, Wisconsin to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the founding of the campus. The name comes from the familiar chimes of the Westminster Quarters, the melody run by the clock tower of UW–Stout's Bowman Hall, and features melodies from the UW–Stout fight song and alma mater. 

Add some bluegrass to your next concert with this joyful celebration of love and life! Traditional bluegrass harmonies, paired with colorful orchestrations, will make Joy of Love and Life by Tyler S. Grant an instant hit with your students. An optional washboard part creates a unique visual experience that will be memorable for audiences. Simply exhilarating! (5:00)

FANTASY OF COLORS is inspired by Baroque artwork and the genre of musical fantasias popularized by Johann Sebastian Bach, Franz Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. I admire the massive scale and exuberance found in Lauri and Gagliardi's epic painting Carousel in Honour of Queen Christina in the Courtyard of the Palazzo Barberini in Rome on 2nd February 1656, and Johann Ulrich Kraus' Celebrations in St. Peter's, Rome, for the Jubilee Year of 1700, and the everlasting thematic developments, stark contrasts and intricate contrapuntal layers found in baroque musical works like Bach's Fantasia in C Minor and Mozart's Fantasia in D Minor. IN FANTASY OF COLORS, the timpani provide a festive, rhythmic and harmonic foundation for two sparring musical character motives, one first stated in the clarinets and saxophones, versus another in the horns and trombones. The match is interrupted with a new character personified as a lyrical waltz, showcasing the oboe, soprano saxophone and flutes. Droplets of musical color follow, with a fugato variation on our characters' motives, showcasing the low woodwinds, euphonium and percussion. The piccolo, clarinets and trumpets push the celebration to a feverish crescendo, as all our characters vie for the musical spotlight.