Where Do We Go from Here:

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Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Beloved Community? is a Concertino for Orchestral Winds composed in the summer and fall of 2021 as part of my dissertation project for the PhD in composition at the Eastman School of Music.  The title is a slightly altered version of the title of Dr. Martin Luther King’s final book Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? from 1968.  The piece is a musical portrayal of King’s vision of Beloved Community—the ideal society we should all strive for where all people can achieve justice, fulfill our potential as human beings, and live together in peace—and King means all people literally; it includes every race, faith, gender, nationality, etc., and most importantly those with whom we disagree with, those who harm us, and those who we find difficult to love.  Individual identity is not lost in Beloved Community, but instead diversity is celebrated while we recognize the humanity within all people and understand how all life is interconnected and interdependent.

To show this idea of diversity, the ensemble is divided into eight different groups, each consisting of 1-4 instruments of similar timbre so that each group has a distinctive sound color.  To make the groups even more contrasting from each other, each plays in their own musical style.  For example, group 2 (2 oboes and English horn) play only in a contrapuntal baroque style while group 7 (piano) plays only in a blues/rock and roll style.  All the styles employed in the work are ones that I have personal experience with as a practicing musician and reflect the diversity of both my musical tastes as a listener and influences as a composer.  As my overall compositional output is quite eclectic, on one level the work could be seen as an attempt to synthesize the many facets of my life in music.  The work also takes the form of a “concerto for ensemble” where every player has the opportunity to shine and realize their fullest potential.

The piece begins with all groups playing at the same time, and predictably, the result of this layering of different styles makes chaos.  Then the groups take turns presenting their own different identities.  After all eight groups have presented, pairs of these groups each find a way to successfully blend their styles and work together to create something new while still maintaining their uniqueness.  This process is then repeated as pairs of these new larger groupings merge together forming mega-groups where four different musical styles are working together.  At this point, the ensemble is split in half with four groups on each “side”, each harmonious within themselves but completely different from the other mega-group.  In other words, the whole ensemble is now polarized and in conflict with itself.  These two contrasting halves of the ensemble “battle” against each other for supremacy until shattering into chaos like the beginning, except now all twenty-four players are on their own as even their original groupings have been dissolved.  Here the conflict has reached its nadir with Beloved Community seemingly unachievable.  But out of the ashes, one player finds a new way forward, and one-by-one the other players find a way to play “in harmony” with the rest of the ensemble until everyone is working together to create something new and beautiful in one large, complex, and diverse Beloved Community while still maintaining their own unique identities. 

This work is dedicated to my son, Theron, that he may inherit a world that has moved closer to Beloved Community.

Premiered Jan. 31, 2026 by the Florida State University Wind Orchestra, Rodney Dorsey, conductor, at the Florida State University New Music Festival in Tallahasee, FL.