An interview with J. Michele Edwards – IAWM Journal (2004)
The warm San Juan night is filled with the sound of the coqui, the ubiquitous Puerto Rican tree frog, as Judith Shatin and I stroll around the grounds of the College Music Society’s conference hotel. The gentle ko-kee of an individual frog layers into an exciting rhythmic pulse as hundreds or probably thousands of male coquies sing from dusk until dawn. Judith’s excitement at these musical sounds is infectious, and I become aware of this composer’s intense and skillful listening (CMS annual national conference, October 1998).
By coincidence in the fall of 2002, Judith and I found ourselves in Tokyo at the same time and attended several concerts together. We also introduced each other to our Japanese musical colleagues on a trip to Kobe via the Shinkansen. Judith’s musical and intellectual curiosity was ever present.
In addition to these travel encounters, I have had the rewarding experience of programming some of Judith’s compositions: Wind Songs for woodwind quintet on a concert co-sponsored by the IAWM in March 1998; and Adonoi Roi, a setting of Psalm 23, with large mixed chorus and string orchestra in April 1999. This was the first performance of the orchestral version of this composition, which, according to Judith, “flowed from my response to the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin on November 4, 1995, and is dedicated to his memory. I composed the main draft during the week following his murder. Though one feels that no response is adequate, music, as well as this particular psalm, offers some comfort” (Shatin’s Program Notes for this performance). Judith’s compositions develop new soundworlds and deep expression, each of which emerges from her personal experiences and commitments.
In addition to being a much commissioned and performed composer in many genres, Judith Shatin has also been a vigorous advocate for contemporary music in general and especially for women composers. She has fulfilled commissions from such prestigious performing ensembles as the Kronos Quartet, the Women’s Philharmonic, and the National Symphony. Her work as a composer has been recognized through fellowships, awards, and grants from organizations including the Ash Lawn Opera, Barlow Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Lila Acheson Wallace/Reader’s Digest Arts Partners Program, The Virginia Commission for the Arts, and the National Flute Association. Judith has remained at the University of Virginia since her arrival there as an assistant professor in 1979. She currently holds the title of William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Music, and she served two terms as chair of the McIntire Department of Music (1995-2002). She is also an advisor to the IAWM.
J. Michele Edwards: Tell me about your involvement with American Women Composers (AWC), one of the three organizations that merged to become IAWM.
Judith Shatin: I was President of AWC from 1989 until 1993; Stefania de Kenessey succeeded me. Soon after, AWC, International League of Women Composers (ILWC), and the International Congress on Women in Music merged to form the IAWM. A big impetus for that move came at the musicALASKAwomen conference [Fairbanks in August 1993]. I participated in a meeting where some of us tried to figure out why—other than issues that were historical—there was such a multiplicity of organizations. I had already thought that it would be hugely better—from the point of view of advocacy, administration, efficiency, everything— to create one group from that multiplicity.
During my presidency of AWC we established an annual concert at the National Museum for Women in the Arts [in Washington, D.C.] and started an annual recording award. The award has since been discontinued, but I hope that it will be reinstated by IAWM when funding permits. I still believe that recordings provide a crucial way to make our music available.
JME: Could you explain your involvement with AWC before you were President?
JS: I contacted AWC at the suggestion of Gilbert Roy at BMI [Broadcast Music, Inc., one of the performing rights organizations in the United States] when I first moved to Charlottesville. I think Tommie Carl really tried to find ways to promote the music of women and often succeeded. I first served as Secretary. There were some other committed participants, such as Alexandra Pierce and Ruth Schonthal, as well as a Board of Directors, but at the point when I became President, Tommie resigned. Either the organization was going to fold or members were going to have to step forward and pick up the reins.
It seemed important to me—although I’m still asked the questions: “Why are you willing to countenance groups that are exclusive in this way?” and “Isn’t it a problem ghettoizing women’s music?” My answer is that I don’t find men concerned about whether their music is performed on programs with only male composers! I don’t think it even occurs to anyone to ask the question because it is viewed as the norm. To me, the important point is to provide opportunities for women so that their voices are heard. This is especially true as the music created by women since the middle of the past century surpasses that of previous eras in both quantity and quality.
One of the happy results of serving as President of AWC was meeting so many talented women, both those who served on the Board and those I met around the country. It was an astonishing time for women in terms of their creativity, not only composers, but also conductors, performers and scholars. Let me also mention some key people who contributed to AWC: Stefania de Kenessey, Mary Kathleen Ernst, Elizabeth Hinkle-Turner, Priscilla Little, Mary Meyers, Patricia Morehead, Catherine Pickar, Janet Peachey and Suzanne Summerville.
JME: When we last talked, you were working on Tree Music. What has happened with that composition?
JS: Tree Music, my first interactive computer music installation, was commissioned by the University of Virginia Art Museum for a sculpture exhibit of the tree-trunk sculptures of the outstanding sculptor, Emilie Brzezinski. The exhibit, titled New Directions, ran from June to September 2003. I presented the design of the piece and some excerpts along with my colleague, David Topper, who presented his free interactive program GAIA (Graphical Audio Interface Application), at the NIME (New Interfaces for Musical Expression) 2004 conference in Hamamatsu, Japan. Although Hamamatsu is known as “Music City,” since it is the headquarters for Kawai and Yamaha, what I enjoyed most was how they used water in a way that I haven’t seen outside the Alhambra. There is a kind of crescendo of water as you walk around the town, ranging from still pools and quietly circulating water to some fountains that make a joyful noise.
Just one other thing about Tree Musicbecause I think it will affect a lot of my future work: the experience of going to Emilie Brzezinski’s studio in McLean, VA, hearing her work, and recording the sound as source material seemed very important. It made me more aware than ever of the physicality inscribed in the music, and I’m very interested in exploring this element further. I want to mark the music with its source of origin. In this, I don’t make a distinction between acoustic and digital. Rather, I often explore the border between them. I hope that’s not too abstract.
JME: Not at all. You’re talking about the physical experience.
JS: I also find myself unwilling to separate the notion of sounding and idea. They are so intricately part of one another.
JME: You are really tuned in to sounds, even more than many other composers I know.
JS: I think I may be unusually tuned in to the specificity of timbre. It’s not something I’ve cultivated; it’s just a sensitivity that one has—similar to a strong responsiveness to light or anything else. It’s a wonderful sensitivity to have as a source of inspiration and to be able to experience it so readily.
JME: I’m impressed with your transformations of sounds. It’s a way of accessing resources for composition.
JS: I think that it’s one reason I frequently combine them and continue to create separately for each, rather than focusing exclusively on acoustic instruments or on digital sound. It would feel very limiting to focus only on one or the other. I don’t feel or hear any fundamental difference between them.
JME: As I look at your catalogue of compositions, I have a suspicion that you may have been a flutist. What is your performing background?
JS: I studied both piano and flute, although piano was my main instrument. I also sang in a special chorus in junior high and played in the band and orchestra in public schools. I think that is one reason I really enjoy having physical relationships with instruments; even if I don’t play a particular instrument, I love exploring different instruments with expert performers.
JME: In many cases, you have written for specific performers.
JS: That’s true—among my favorite experiences have been composing for terrific performers such as clarinetist F. Gerard Errante, flutists Renée Siebert and Patricia Spencer, pianists Mary Kathleen Ernst and Gayle Martin Henry. I have also enjoyed creating for specific ensembles such as the Core Ensemble and Da Capo Chamber Players.
JME: I noticed that since around 1990, you have been creating more compositions with text, especially choral music and a few works for solo voice.
JS: Yes. Before I was a composer, when I was quite young, I used to write a lot of poetry. I see my involvement with texts as part of that original creative wellspring. Sometimes I create my own text, as in the libretto for COAL [a folk oratorio, completed in 1994, for mixed chorus, Appalachian instruments (banjo, fiddle, guitar, dulcimer, 2 Appalachian singers), synthesizer and electronic playback]. Other times I work with poets, such as Barbara Goldberg in Singing the Blue Ridge [2001-02, for mezzo, baritone, orchestra, and electronics made from wild animal sounds]. Or I find a particular text, such as a big chunk of the Declaration of Independence [in We Hold These Truths (1992), a 16-minute work for mixed chorus, brass quintet, and timpani]. This one was commissioned by the University of Virginia for Jefferson’s 250th birthday and premiered for an audience of 10,000 on the lawn after [Mikhail] Gorbachev’s keynote address.
I believe one reason I’ve composed more texted compositions in recent years is quite simply that I find it so pleasing to work with the human voice. In addition to SATB, I have created a number of pieces for treble voices such as Beetles, Monsters and Roses [treble chorus and electronic playback] for the San Francisco Girls Chorus.
JME: For you, what is different about composing a texted piece in contrast to writing for acoustic instruments or electroacoustic media?
JS: It’s a difficult question. I respond to the rhythm of words created both by verbal stress and by such elements as internal rhyme. I take great pleasure in thinking through how to embody verbal meaning and contour in sound. My Marvelous Pursuits, for vocal quartet and piano four-hands, with a wonderfully witty text, again by Barbara Goldberg, provided ample opportunities for such play. Text offers a fundamentally different starting point from purely instrumental pieces.
JME: You mentioned earlier your involvement with electroacoustic music and you’ve had a substantial relationship with it—is that right?
JS: I started the Virginia Center for Computer Music [at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville] back in 1987. Prior to that I had had some involvement with electronic and computer music, most importantly as a graduate student at Princeton, and before that with Buchla synthesizers at the Aspen Music Festival in the early 70s. But it wasn’t until the late 80s with the advent of MIDI and the ramping up of desktop computing that this undertaking felt much more feasible. And, of course, what had drawn me to it to begin with was the notion of this kind of Pandora’s Box of all possible sounds. I say Pandora’s Box because on the one hand there are fabulous possibilities and on the other hand there are terrible frustrations. For me, the measure is positive. And I was also interested in what I would learn about acoustics, what new technologies suggested for the invention of new instruments, and how this field would affect my thinking about music. Also, just the deep possibility of creating a much larger continuum of sounds, from the simplest human utterance to wild transformations, appealed to me. They offer entirely new compositional possibilities, merging the sounds of the world with the sounds of the mind. Free programs such as RTcmix (real-time cmix)—useful for synthesizing and processing sound—and GAIA—great for interactive pieces—make the technology so much more accessible.
JME: What impact has your electronic work had on your acoustic compositions?
JS: There has been a mutual influence, initiated by my sensitivity to timbre and interest in the invention of new timbral qualities. Also, I have noticed that a number of my pieces shine in the low register, and I think this is strongly influenced by my work with electroacoustic media.
JME: Please elaborate or offer an example.
JS: In Hosech Al P’ney HaTehom (1990) which means “Darkness upon the Face of the Deep” (inspired by the opening of Genesis), the music rises from such low tones that one can feel them before one hears them. I created this piece during a residency at Stanford’s CCRMA [Center for Research in Music and Acoustics], while I was exploring FM synthesis. I was trying for a sense of emergence from the void. What I noticed is that in my next piece, Piping the Earth [written in 1990 for large orchestra], the opening also emerges from a low shimmering.
JME: Are there connections between style and genre in your work?
JS: Different genres call up different styles. For example, when I was working on my folk oratorio COAL there was no way that I wanted to use the same style that I would in an orchestral piece. For COAL, I worked quite closely with Appalachian musicians. They were willing to stretch a certain amount, but were very cognizant of the limits of their sonic universe. I think there’s a certain amount of shaping that I do in relation to both genre and to the occasion. I have composed a number of occasion pieces, mainly for weddings, funerals and other public celebrations, and I find that process absorbing as well. This came to the fore in composing Hearing the Call, a two-minute fanfare for two trumpets and two snare drums, commissioned by the National Symphony. Here, I wanted to showcase a stereophonic rhythmic exchange and focused on clarity of beat. It’s difficult to describe exactly, but I am aware of the distinctions that I make in different genres. I do not have a monolithic approach, but I do have a harmonic language and compositional technique that cross genres.
JME: What other aspects of composition have you been thinking about recently?
JS: One that’s been on my mind recently is the sound of animals. Even before using the calls of animals themselves, I used the sound of the shofar, a ram’s horn, in Elijah’s Chariot (string quartet and electronics). Then, in Singing the Blue Ridge, I scored the piece for mezzo, baritone, orchestra and indigenous wild animal sounds. This piece was part of a larger project, Preserving the Rural Soundscape, undertaken by Wintergreen Performing Arts with sponsorship from Americans for the Arts. I was so captivated by the sounds of the different animals that I used, thanks to organizations such as the terrific Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at Cornell University, that I have wanted to work with them ever since. I am also interested in the ecologies of animals and how humans affect them. In future pieces, I will return to this theme. I want to focus on animal sounds not just because of their inherent beauty but to draw more awareness to our connection to the animal world. I want to contribute in any small way I can to people’s awareness of, and sense of responsibility to, that world.
JME: This brings up something I am very aware of in your music—both in obvious and subtle ways: your commitment to issues and ideas. As a composer, how do you approach these?
JS: I do think about it. Sometimes I tackle issues consciously, as in Singing the Blue Ridge. At other times, ideas seem to come out of nowhere. For example, a recent piece called Penelope’s Song was inspired by thinking about the Ulysses story from Penelope’s point of view. To focus on Penelope in relation to that story is to take a feminist view; that is, to try to give voice to a crucial character who is given precious little voice in the story’s telling. The original version of Penelope’s Song is scored for amplified viola and electronics derived from a recording I made of local weaver, Jan Russell, weaving on wooden looms. I created it for New York-based violist Rozanna Weinberger. I am in the process of creating additional versions for other instruments, including one for amplified clarinet and one for amplified cello. I also composed a companion piece called Penelope’s Loom for solo electronic playback. My long-time collaborator, Barbara Goldberg, created a series of Penelope poems, and I read one prior to the U.S. premiere of Penelope’s Song.
JME: Have you thought about setting these poems?
JS: I have, and it would be a different piece; I would really like to. Speaking of remarkable women and tall tales, I also have a composition, for which I wrote my own libretto, called Carreño. It’s for a soprano who is also an actress and pianist—a sort of one-woman extravaganza commissioned through the Painted Bride by Claudia Stevens, who premiered and then toured with it. [Teresa] Carreño’s story is really fascinating: she was one of the great early women virtuoso pianists, but she was also a singer and composer. She even briefly conducted the opera in her home city of Caracas. Rossini wanted her to be an opera star because he thought she had such a great voice; she was an early student of Gottschalk. She was quite an extravagant character: married four times and two of her husbands were brothers.
I have impulses to articulate the situation of particular women. I have a strong feminist impulse, which often surfaces in my pieces. My piano concerto, The Passion of St. Cecilia, is another example. I don’t make a big point of it, but do we know of any other musical passions composed about women? I was thinking about that when I was composing the concerto: it deals with Cecilia as a woman because she was the patron saint of music (apocryphal, raising the whole issue of fabrication). I was aware that it is the martyrdom of men that is typically celebrated in music, and this work was in response to the absence of such commemoration of women.
JME: What about the connection to Israel and Judaism that I see in your music—and not just in compositions with text?
JS: I spent my junior year at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and traveled throughout Israel. I also studied Hebrew at an ulpan (intensive language program) in the Negev Desert. I was very drawn to the landscape. I think I also have a very strong awareness—because of when I happened to be born—of relatives and generations lost in the Holocaust, of the history of the Jews, of a strong sense of cultural identity and community, even though I am not Orthodox and there are elements of that practice that I find problematic.
JME: I notice you said a “strong sense of cultural identity.”
JS: These things are complicated. I think it’s not just a cultural connection. I was struck that year in Israel by how different it felt to live in a culture as part of a majority group that shared the same religious-cultural tradition. Of course, there is the issue of what it’s like to be in a minority group there as well, and sadly the situation has become ever more complicated.
JME: So this is a part of your identity, just as being a woman is part of your identity.
JS: In the case of the latter, people still ask, “What is it like to be a woman composer?” You have no clue what it would feel like to be someone else; you just compose. But one of the things that has disturbed me over the years is the increased discussion of gender in relation to music with a tendency to use the same old descriptors associated with masculine and feminine. We describe certain things as “weak” or “soft” or whatever—adjectives that have traditionally gone with feminine. I don’t accept those descriptors as appropriate ways to define whatever we might mean by feminine or masculine. It seems to me that the tropes about music by women going in a certain way suggest underlying acceptance of those descriptors. I reject this. As a composer, I use the full range of emotional and physical expression, and I don’t want to see that essentialized. I think this is a really tough issue because on the one hand one wants the music of women discussed fully and likewise gender in relation to music; yet to accomplish this without essentializing is extremely difficult.
JME: Yes, but worth the effort. We work at refining how to express that musically or verbally. Can we touch on your teaching? Could you discuss the relationship between your teaching and your composition work?
JS: I just taught a course on songwriting for the first time. I found it delightful as a way to tap into what music is meaningful for students and to think about creative elements within that framework. I also teach computer music, composition, and a variety of analytic topics, and am so pleased to work with the terrific students in our new Ph.D. program. This fall, I’ll teach a graduate seminar on temporality in post-tonal music. I’m also team-teaching a new UVA Common Course, The Mind of the Artist, with cognitive psychologist Michael Kubovy [Judith’s husband] and art historian David Summers. It is fascinating. And what a joy it is to be able to work with the person I live with!
JME: What projects are you working on now?
JS: I have several current projects, and will just mention a couple: commissions for a large chamber ensemble piece, inspired by my study of drumming, for the newEar Ensemble in Kansas City; and a digital piece for the Jane Franklin Dance Company in Arlington, Virginia. It will have a site-specific component for performance in Fort C. F. Smith Park, Arlington, in April 2005, before moving to Gunston Theatre One. Since the Fort was the site of Civil War fortifications, I will base my piece on letters and/or diaries that resonate with the performance location.
Sources for further investigation:
http://www.judithshatin.com
http://www.virginia.edu/music/VCCM/index.html
http://www.sai-national.org/phil/composers/jshatin.html
http://www.composersforum.org/member_profile.cfm?oid=2944
Selected bibliography:
Ammer, Christine. Unsung: A History of Women in American Music, century ed. Portland, OR: Amadeus, 2001, pp. 301-302.
Burns, Kristine H., ed. Women and Music in America since 1900: An Encyclopedia, 2 vols. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002, pp. 14, 182, 307-308, 458, 553.
Bustard, Clarke. “Listen in as Wood Becomes Sculpture.” Richmond Times Dispatch (VA), 20 July 2003, p. G-1.
Cohen, Barry L. “Setting the Themes” [CD review of Piping the Earth]. New Music Connoisseur 12/1-2 (Spring/Summer 2004): 21-22.
Edwards, J. Michele. “North America since 1920.” In Women and Music: A History, 2nd rev. ed., ed. Karin Pendle. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001, see p. 350.
Ellis, Stephen. [CD review of Hearing the Call; Fantasìa sobre el Flamenco]. Fanfare, May/June 2000, pp. 292-93.
Hixon, Don L. and Don A. Hennessee, eds. Women in Music: An Encyclopedic Biobibliography, 2nd ed., 2 vols. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1993.
Kandell, Leslie. “Shatin: Coal; A Blueprint for Understanding Twentieth-Century Music.” Opera News 59, no. 12 (1995): 45.
Kosman, Joshua. [Review of Piping the Earth]. San Francisco Chronicle, 5 November 1990.
Kosman, Joshua. [Review of Elijah’s Chariot]. San Francisco Chronicle, 11 May 1996.
Larson, Anna. “The Premiere of COAL: Music and Libretto by Judith Shatin.” ILWC Journal, February 1995, pp. 12-13. [also available at www. iawm.org/articles/feb95/coal.html]
McLellan, Joseph. [Review of Ruah]. Washington Post, 23 February 1992.
Olivier, Antje and Karin Weingartz-Perschel. Komponistinnen von A-Z. Düsseldorf: Tokkata, 1988, see p. 13.
Randall, Annie Janeiro. “Shatin, Judith.” The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed. Edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan, 2001.
Schulman, David. “A Rich Vein: In West Virginia Mine Country, a Composer Creates a Work That Delineates a Community’s Life.” Inside Arts. Washington, D.C.: Association of Performing Arts Presenters, February/March 1995.
Silverton, Mike. [Review of Gabriel’s Wing]. American Record Guide 21/3 (January/ February 1998).
Zaimont, Judith Lang and Karen Famera, eds. Contemporary Concert Music by Women: A Directory of the Composers and Their Works. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1981.
Discography:
Dreamtigers. Innova 613 (2004) [Werther; Gazebo Music; Secret Ground; Dreamtigers; Akhmatova Songs; View from Mt. Nebo] Da Capo Chamber Players with guests Lucy Shelton (sop) and William Zito (gtr)
Piping the Earth. Capstone CPS-8727 (2003) [4 orchestral works] Moravian Philarmonic, Joel Suben (cond); Prism Chamber Orchestra, Robert Black (cond); Gayle Martin Henry (pno); Renée Siebert (fl)
A Hanukka Celebration [Milken Archive of American Jewish Music]. Naxos 8.559410 (2003) [Nun, Gimel, Hei, Shin] New London Children’s Choir, Ronald Corp (cond)
Music from the Virginia Center for Computer Music. Centaur Records CDCM series, vol. 29, CRC 2454 (1999) [Sea of Reeds; Three Summers Heat] F. Gerard Errante (cl), Susan Narucki (sop)
Bending the Light. New World Records 80559-2 (1999) [1492] Core Ensemble
Hearing the Call: 20th Century American Brass Music. Sonora Recordings SO22591 (1999) [Hearing the Call; Fantasia Sobre el Flamenco] St. Mary’s Brass
Dreams, Diversions and Digressions: Music of the 20th Century for a Flute and Cello. Chaminade CHAM 9663 (1998) [Gazebo Music] Patricia Dominowski (fl), Theresa Villani (vlc)
Divine Grandeur. New World Records CD 80504-2 (1997) [Adonai Roi] New York Concert Singers, Judith Clurman (cond)
Narcissus: Musgrave/Kairos: Shatin. Neuma 450-95 (1997) [Gabriel’s Wing; Fasting Heart; Kairos] Patricia Spencer (fl)
I Never Saw Another Butterfly: Songs of the Twentieth Century. San Francisco Girls Chorus CD6644 (1996) [The Wendigo]
A Birthday Celebration [for Jim Kraft]. Manhattan School of Music [cass] (1995) [Janus Quartet]
Judith Shatin/Peter Child. CRI 605 (1991) [Ruah] Prism Chamber Orchestra, Robert Black (cond), Renée Siebert (fl)
Bresnick/Ives/Shatin. CRI 583 (1990) [Ignoto Numine] Monticello Trio
Music by Allan Blank, Herbert Haufrecht, Max Schubel, Judith Shatin Allen. Opus One 144 [LP] (1986) [Gazebo Music] Roxbury Chamber Players
Premiere Recordings. Opus One 125 [LP] (1986) [Aura] Richmond Symphony, Jacques Houtmann (cond)
XIII International Viola Congress. New England Conservatory of Music [cass] (1985) [Glyph] Rosemary Glyde (vla)
Wind Songs: for Wind Quintet. Opus One 97 [LP] (1983-84?) [Wind Songs] Clarion Wind Quintet
J. Michele Edwards, a musicologist and conductor, is professor emerita at Macalester College. Her recent publications include “Women on the Podium,” a chapter in Cambridge Companion to Conducting (2003) edited by José Bowen. She is Music Director for Calliope Women’s Chorus and Music Director/Conductor for the Minnesota Center Chorale. She is on the IAWM Executive Board and serves as Treasurer.
Solo Works
1996 Fantasy on St. Cecilia (Pno, 20’)
1995 Chai Variations on Eliahu HaNavi (Pno, 21’)
1988 Meridians (Cl,11’)
1987 Fasting Heart (Fl, 8’)
1985 Assembly Line #1 (OboeVar., at least 9’)
1987 L’étude du Cœur (Vla, 8’)
1983 Widdershins (Pno, 8.5”)
1981 Scirocco (Pno, 4’)
1981 Sursum Corda (Vlc, 11’)
1973 Limericks (Fl, 12’)
1971 Ruth (Voice, 3’)
Chamber Music
2002 Fledermaus Fantasy (Vln, Vla, Vlc, Cb, Pno, 16’)
2001 Run (Pno Quartet, 9.5’)
2000 Fledermaus Fantasy (Vln, Pno, 16’)
2000 Ockeghem Variations (Fl, Ob, Cl, Bsn, Hn, Pno, 18’)
1997 Spin (Fl, Cl, Bsn, Vln, Vla, Vlc, 6.5’)
1996 Dreamtigers (Fl, gtr, 14’)
1995 Hearing The Call (2 Trumpets, 2 Snare Drums, 2’)
1995 The Janus Quartet (String Quartet, 12’)
1994 Sister Thou Was Mild and Lovely (Sop, Vla, 4’)
1992 1492 (Amp. Pno, Perc, 11’)
1990 Secret Ground (Fl, Cl, Vln, Vcl, 14’)
1989 Gabriel’s Wing (Fl, Pno, 9’)
1989 Doxa (Vla, Pno, 6’)
1987 Marvelous Pursuits (Vocal Quartet, Pno 4-hands, 21’)
1986 Ignoto Numine (Piano Trio, 14’)
1986 View From Mt. Nebo (Piano Trio, 15’)
1984 Glyph (Solo Vla, String Quartet, Pno, 18’)
1983 Icarus (Vln, Pno, 17’)
1983 Werther (Fl, Cl, Vln, Vcl, Pno, 9’)
1982 Akhmatova Songsi (Mezzo, Fl, Cl, Vln, Vcl, Pno, 10’)
1981 Gazebo Music (Fl, Vcl, 5’)
1981 Study in Black (Fl, Perc, 5’)
1980 Wind Songs (Wind Quintet 14’)
1974 Wedding Song (Sop, Eng Horn; or Alto Fl, Cl or Vla, 5’)
Choral Music
2003 Amulet (SSA, 5’)
2003 Tongue Twisters (SSA, 14’)
2001 Alleluia, In Memoriam 9/11 (SATB, 4’)
1999 Shapirit Y’fehfiah (The Lovely Dragonfly) (SSA, pno, 7’)
1998 Songs of War and Peace (SSA, 18’)
1995 Adonoi Roi (SATB, 2.5’)
1995 Nun, Gimel, Hay, Shin (2-part cho+descant, ca. 3’)
1994 COAL (SATB, Appalachian Instru, 2 Appalachian Singers, Synthesizer, Electronic Playbk, 90’)
1992 We Hold These Truths (SATB, Brass Quintet, Timp, 16’)
1991 Hark My Love (SATB, Pno, 3’)
1984 ’Tis a Gift to be Simple (SATB, 3’)
Orchestral Music
2003 Glyph (Solo Vla, String Orch, Pno, 18’)
2002 Singing the Blue Ridge (Mezzo, Bar, Orch, Electronic Playbk. 5’)
1991 Stringing the Bow (String Orch, 15’)
1990 Piping the Earth (Large Orch, 8.5’)
1985 Ruah (Concerto for Flute & Chamber Orch, 23’)
1983 The Passion of St. Cecilia (Piano Concerto, 20’)
1981 Aura (Orchestra, 19’)
1978 Arche (Viola and Orchestra, 17’)
Opera
1981-82 Follies and Fancies (Based on Molière’s Les Precieuses Ridicules, 55’)
Electronic Music
2003 Tree Music (Interactive Computer Music Installation, Var.)
2004 Penelope’s Loom (Electronic Playbk, 7.5’)
2003 Penelope’s Song (Amplified Vla, Electronic Playbk, 8.5’)
2001 Grito del Corazón (Video by K. Aoki, Varied Ensemble, also versions for Cl, Sax, Pno, Vlc, Vlc+ Pno with Electronic Playback)
1997 Sea of Reeds (Cl with PVC tubes and Live Electronics, 14’)
1995 Elijah’s Chariot (String Quartet and Electronic Playbk, 18’)
1993 Beetles, Monsters and Roses (Treble Cho and Electronic Playbk, 14’)
1990 Hosech Al P’ney HaTehom (Electronic Playbk, 11.5’)
1989 Three Summers’ Heat (Sop or Mezzo, Electronic Playbk, 18’)
Publishers
Arsis Press: Gazebo Music, Study in Black, ’Tis a Gift to be Simple Widdershins, Warner Brothers Publications: Adonai Ro’I; C.F. Peters: L’étude du Cœur; Colla Voce Music: Beetles, Monsters and Roses (The Wendigo, I Am Rose), Nun, Gimel, Hei, Shin
MMB Music, Inc., distributor for Wendigo Music: chamber and orchestral music Wendigo Music: all other music