dreaming Dragon lies under her Moon (2025) for Concert Flute

Performed by Anne Chao Concert Flute

New School of Music, Cambridge, MA, USA

Program Notes

“dreaming Dragon lies under her Moon” is my first exploration into the rich world of microtonality. The text is derived from the I Ching: The Classic Chinese Oracle of Change [The First Complete Translation with Concordance], translated by Rudolf Ritsema and Stephen Karcher and published by Element Books Limited in 1994. This book has been an integral element of my childhood, as my mom gifted this book to my dad before I was born. Each time I had a question I couldn’t answer that held personal importance, my parents would help me to consult the I Ching. Recently, I asked the I Ching a question about love––how would it impact my life if I welcomed this opportunity before me to experience real love? In response, I received a Hexagram I had not encountered before: Hexagram 1 / Force / Ch’ien. The upper and lower trigrams were all yang. I proceeded to read the chapter, struck by the relevance of the text to my current life experience. Each time I consult the I Ching I wonder, how is it that a text composed by 135 BCE could resonate so closely with my contemporary experience? The wisdom and historical context of the text, from both philosophical and divination perspectives, are important to recognize.

I am not human (2025) for Mezzo-Soprano, Alto Flute and Piano

Performed by Dagny von Mering Mezzo-Soprano, Sadie Goodman Alto Flute, and Qing Li Piano

New School of Music, Cambridge, MA, USA

Program Notes

“I am not human” is a poem from the book, A Child Is Not a Knife: Selected Poems of Gorän Sonnevi by Swedish poet, Gorän Sonnevi, translated from Swedish to English by Rika Lesser, and published by Princeton University Press in 1993. This collection of poems was gifted to my mom several decades ago. I discovered the book and found the poem to be so striking that I wished to set the text to music. My interpretation of the poem is of two figures, entangled and lost. The two figures are so intertwined, that it is unclear where one begins and the other ends. The figures have created this world between them that is destructive and tumultuous. The narrator is vulnerable and dissolving before the partnered figure, feeling as if they do not exist. The landscape of the poem shifts with the third stanza in which, inside the narrator, night is streaming/”whirling and starless”. I found this imagery of night, streaming, whirling, and starless to be incredibly evocative. The narrator appears to be without a compass, floating and unable to reach ground. In the last stanza, the narrator brings the partnered figure into this abyss: “you, too, dissolved/you were/water/between my fingers”, and our figures have dissolved together.

The Magical World of Delphi and Sofia (2025) for Violin and Cello

Performed by Huiying Ma Violin and Monroe Randall Cello

New School of Music, Cambridge, MA, USA

Program Notes

“The Magical World of Delphi and Sofia” is a composition dedicated to my relationship with my younger sister, Delphi. She is the most important person in the world to me, and I feel incredibly lucky to have her as my sister. When I was composing this piece, I knew it resembled a close relationship in my life, but I didn’t realize I was writing it for my sister. It was only once my mom heard the piece, that she told me it sounds like myself and Delphi. In this piece, Delphi and I are both the violin and cello voices. We are interwoven and ever-changing. I hope Delphi will always have this piece as a marker of our sisterhood for the rest of our lives.