Do You Hear How Many You Are?

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 “Do You Hear How Many You Are?” for Concert Band was originally written in April and May of 2010 for SATB choir.  I made this concert band arrangement in 2012.  The origins of this piece and text come from a very interesting experience I had in December of 2009.  I have been learning a lot in the past few years about the state of our world and the many huge problems and crises we are faced with in the near future, and this discovery has been so daunting and overwhelming to me.  So much change needs to happen in order for the near and long-term future of our world to be just and stable that I have felt a lot of guilt over my choice of profession.  Why have I chosen to be a composer and musician when I could make more of an impact on solving these problems if I were a scientist or policy maker etc.?  I have been struggling to find a solution to this dilemma for a while now and I just happened to be thinking about it, while filled with lots of stress and worries, one night as I was falling asleep in December of 2009.  At the moment when I was in that state halfway between sleep and consciousness, I suddenly heard the line “Do you hear how many you are?” in my head, yet I felt as though I didn't come up with the line but that it was said TO me.  I was instantly comforted, as if a load fell off my shoulders, and then I began to hear it being sung, which I knew was the beginning of a choral piece.  I woke up, wrote down the music I was hearing (about the first six measures of the work) and then wrote down this entire poem.  I truly feel that this message came to me for a reason, and that I need to share it through the music I create.  Those of us who want to change the world for the better are not alone; we are many and we will make our voices hear in order to heal the world. 

Finalist, 3rd International Frank Ticheli Competition, 2013

Premiered April 19, 2013 by the Minot State University Symphonic Band, Devin Otto-conductor, in Minot, ND.

Recorded on Waltzing Dervish: The Wind Music of Keane Southard by the Northeastern State University Wind Ensemble, Norman Wika-conductor.