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"content": "\u003cp>Tokimonsta went through a lot in making her new record, \u003cem>Eternal Reverie\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inspiration for the record’s sound — sunny and joyful, but with an edge — struck at an unlikely moment. Toki was travelling in São Paulo, Brazil, with her friend Regina Biondo, when they spotted a street vendor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s just this young guy with crates and crates of vinyls, with a very beat-up record player and beat-up headphones, just waiting for people to buy these records,” said Tokimonsta, whose real name is Jennifer Lee. “It felt very serendipitous.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rifling through the collection, the Los Angeles-born-and-raised musician — who also goes by Toki — came across a worn-out old record by Brazilian artist Jaime Além, featuring a catchy, disco-inflected track with a soulful vocal called “Disco Fevers.” The song immediately fired up her imagination.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s something special about finding a very dusty sample and being like, ‘How can I give this new life again?’” Toki said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she got back to her studio in California, Toki put the sample in her music software and cut it up, intuitively picking the best snippets, then rearranging them. Then she programmed drums, followed by synthy chords and strings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, I want this to be like a banger. And I created [it] with that sense of freedom,” she said. “I wanted it to sound vintage, nostalgic, gritty, and to have a lot of energy and power behind it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmmEa7dn4cw&list=OLAK5uy_mE6AAvK650TowwoSX1G5xtPKnuANtQzqU&index=2\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The track, which she called “Corazón: Death by Disco Part 2” and features on the new album, took on more meaning than Toki could have predicted when she was making it. Regina Biondo — Toki’s best friend who was with her in Brazil and helped her find the sample —died of cancer last year. Toki postponed the release of her album so she could care for Regina in her final days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I will never regret that,” she said. “I am happy that this album is out in the world, because it’s important for this journey of mine to share it with people, because it is the way that I can celebrate Regina, but also a way for me to process her loss, because it’s a long road and it hurts a lot.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_12041727 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250530-ASTRALOGIK-13-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am so grateful, because without her, I would not be the person I am today,” Toki said. “Her legacy and her impact on my life is the way I carry her forever.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki grew up in Torrance, a coastal city in southwest L.A., and was mostly raised by her mother, who owned a small business. She started piano lessons at around 6 years old, but she didn’t really love practicing classical pieces. It was a very different sound that captured her imagination as a little girl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Toki was in the fourth grade, a classmate turned up at school with a CD in his backpack: \u003cem>Dookie,\u003c/em> the third album by the pop-punk band Green Day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was just showing it off to all the kids, and I was like, ‘Wow, this is really cool.’ It was exuberant, it was wild. It also felt very L.A.; there’s this freedom and sunniness. This punk attitude resonated with me as a very young kid.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Toki didn’t stick to just punk music: soon after, she discovered hip-hop and R&B. She listened to TLC’s iconic “Chasing Waterfalls”, “Gangsta’s Paradise” by Coolio and even Enya — strains of which can all be heard in her music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRF1NlM6ooQ\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As she was growing up, Toki absorbed all of these sounds and musical textures like a sponge. She also listened to house music and more experimental electronic artists like Aphex Twin and Squarepusher.[aside postID=news_12000787 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-10-BL_qut-1020x680.jpg']This moment, in mid-2000s L.A., was at the beginning of what became known as the Beat Scene: a collective of musicians exploring leftfield electronic music and underground hip-hop. In her late teens, Toki began going to beat ciphers: competitions where musicians play a beat or rappers freestyle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You had 15 seconds to 30 seconds to play a beat, and it had to hit within that amount of time,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone looked at me like [I was] a crazy person, because I didn’t look like someone who’d make heat, like I wouldn’t come with the fire, the bangers or whatever. I was just this Asian girl in South L.A. [But] I played my beats and everyone recognized at that time that it was possible for someone that looked like me to make music that was really authentic and real and also pretty good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki went to club nights at influential venues like Project Blowed and later Low End Theory — using them to sharpen her production skills. “Without being in L.A., I don’t think I would have the gusto to be as experimental as I was when I was younger,” she said. “The city and the community is a very integral part of [who I am] as a musician.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-12047262\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-160x240.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"240\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-2000x2999.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-1366x2048.jpg 1366w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-scaled.jpg 1707w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around 2009, she started making music under the name Tokimonsta. “Toki means rabbit in Korean, and monsta … I thought that was a cool way to say monster. I was in high school; it was my iChat name.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the time, she didn’t think the name would stick. “And yet, I’ve grown to also love my name because it represents who I am. I am this soft thing and this hard thing. I am this lightness and I am this darkness, I am this uplifted and strong, and I am this sensitive person.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki continued to hone her signature, shapeshifting sound and went on to make five full-length albums, collaborating with Ty Dolla $ign, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Anderson .Paak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RF5RdUzQxjI\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve always wanted to push the limits of who I am as a musician — forward, backwards, every direction. That meant being the weird one for a very long time, for making music that people didn’t really understand but somehow resonated [with them].”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW0giCDArjE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki points to a track on \u003cem>Eternal Reverie\u003c/em> called “Say Tell Me” as an example of her reflective side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The song starts out gentle, but shifts halfway through, the tone mirrored by a heavy arpeggiating bass line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I always like to think of all my songs as a ‘hero’s journey,’ and to follow that path of, where is this melody taking us? Where is the song taking us? And [so] when the bass comes in, that is the peak moment in that song,” she said. “That is the hero accomplishing its big thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-12047263\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-160x240.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"240\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-1366x2048.jpg 1366w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3.jpg 1451w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki has been on her own epic journey, one with an unimaginable hurdle and a surprising twist for her musical career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of 2015, Toki was diagnosed with Moyamoya disease, a rare and life-threatening blood vessel condition where some arteries become blocked and affect blood flow to the brain. She needed surgery immediately.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The surgery itself comes with all these side effects, which was how I came to have aphasia, how I lost my ability to understand music,” she said. “Those were all because someone tinkered with my brain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After surgery, music sounded like noise in Toki’s ears: There was no rhythm or melody.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very disheartening. … I was alive, which is the most important thing. But what is a life without music? What is a life for me without being able to create, which is what brings me joy in life?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Slowly, Toki’s brain gradually began to heal and music started to make sense. After just a few months of recovery, she produced a song called “I Wish I Could,” featuring Belgian artist Selah Sue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just felt like a heroic feeling,” Toki said. “It was relief. It was joy. It was like, oh my god, ‘I’m back.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHLLeZ6UXP8\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Soon after, Toki was back on stage. During her recovery, she made an album called \u003cem>Lune Rouge\u003c/em>, which was nominated for a Grammy in 2019, making her the first female Asian American producer to be nominated in the dance/electronic album category.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>“\u003c/em>I would love to think that I’m superhuman now, but unfortunately, not. I’m just me, but with less headaches and still alive. So I’m pretty happy with that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite having a singular vision for her work, being in the music industry for decades has taken a toll on Toki. Early last year, the pressures of social media and the demands of touring prompted Toki to take a break from performing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was starting to feel a bit jaded,” she said.“When I sensed that cynical feeling creeping into me, I knew it was time to take a step back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To regain her energy, Toki spent time with friends going to clubs and underground raves in L.A., focusing on rekindling her eternal love of music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s important to remember that that dreamer exists, and sometimes I need to be reminded,” she said. “I hope for the rest of my life I remain this inquisitive dreamer forever. I hope that spark never goes away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Tokimonsta went through a lot in making her new record, \u003cem>Eternal Reverie\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inspiration for the record’s sound — sunny and joyful, but with an edge — struck at an unlikely moment. Toki was travelling in São Paulo, Brazil, with her friend Regina Biondo, when they spotted a street vendor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s just this young guy with crates and crates of vinyls, with a very beat-up record player and beat-up headphones, just waiting for people to buy these records,” said Tokimonsta, whose real name is Jennifer Lee. “It felt very serendipitous.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rifling through the collection, the Los Angeles-born-and-raised musician — who also goes by Toki — came across a worn-out old record by Brazilian artist Jaime Além, featuring a catchy, disco-inflected track with a soulful vocal called “Disco Fevers.” The song immediately fired up her imagination.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s something special about finding a very dusty sample and being like, ‘How can I give this new life again?’” Toki said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she got back to her studio in California, Toki put the sample in her music software and cut it up, intuitively picking the best snippets, then rearranging them. Then she programmed drums, followed by synthy chords and strings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, I want this to be like a banger. And I created [it] with that sense of freedom,” she said. “I wanted it to sound vintage, nostalgic, gritty, and to have a lot of energy and power behind it.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/OmmEa7dn4cw'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/OmmEa7dn4cw'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The track, which she called “Corazón: Death by Disco Part 2” and features on the new album, took on more meaning than Toki could have predicted when she was making it. Regina Biondo — Toki’s best friend who was with her in Brazil and helped her find the sample —died of cancer last year. Toki postponed the release of her album so she could care for Regina in her final days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I will never regret that,” she said. “I am happy that this album is out in the world, because it’s important for this journey of mine to share it with people, because it is the way that I can celebrate Regina, but also a way for me to process her loss, because it’s a long road and it hurts a lot.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am so grateful, because without her, I would not be the person I am today,” Toki said. “Her legacy and her impact on my life is the way I carry her forever.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki grew up in Torrance, a coastal city in southwest L.A., and was mostly raised by her mother, who owned a small business. She started piano lessons at around 6 years old, but she didn’t really love practicing classical pieces. It was a very different sound that captured her imagination as a little girl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Toki was in the fourth grade, a classmate turned up at school with a CD in his backpack: \u003cem>Dookie,\u003c/em> the third album by the pop-punk band Green Day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was just showing it off to all the kids, and I was like, ‘Wow, this is really cool.’ It was exuberant, it was wild. It also felt very L.A.; there’s this freedom and sunniness. This punk attitude resonated with me as a very young kid.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Toki didn’t stick to just punk music: soon after, she discovered hip-hop and R&B. She listened to TLC’s iconic “Chasing Waterfalls”, “Gangsta’s Paradise” by Coolio and even Enya — strains of which can all be heard in her music.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/YRF1NlM6ooQ'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/YRF1NlM6ooQ'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>As she was growing up, Toki absorbed all of these sounds and musical textures like a sponge. She also listened to house music and more experimental electronic artists like Aphex Twin and Squarepusher.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>This moment, in mid-2000s L.A., was at the beginning of what became known as the Beat Scene: a collective of musicians exploring leftfield electronic music and underground hip-hop. In her late teens, Toki began going to beat ciphers: competitions where musicians play a beat or rappers freestyle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You had 15 seconds to 30 seconds to play a beat, and it had to hit within that amount of time,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone looked at me like [I was] a crazy person, because I didn’t look like someone who’d make heat, like I wouldn’t come with the fire, the bangers or whatever. I was just this Asian girl in South L.A. [But] I played my beats and everyone recognized at that time that it was possible for someone that looked like me to make music that was really authentic and real and also pretty good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki went to club nights at influential venues like Project Blowed and later Low End Theory — using them to sharpen her production skills. “Without being in L.A., I don’t think I would have the gusto to be as experimental as I was when I was younger,” she said. “The city and the community is a very integral part of [who I am] as a musician.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-12047262\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-160x240.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"240\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-2000x2999.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-1366x2048.jpg 1366w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/blue-background3_FINAL-WEB-scaled.jpg 1707w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around 2009, she started making music under the name Tokimonsta. “Toki means rabbit in Korean, and monsta … I thought that was a cool way to say monster. I was in high school; it was my iChat name.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the time, she didn’t think the name would stick. “And yet, I’ve grown to also love my name because it represents who I am. I am this soft thing and this hard thing. I am this lightness and I am this darkness, I am this uplifted and strong, and I am this sensitive person.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki continued to hone her signature, shapeshifting sound and went on to make five full-length albums, collaborating with Ty Dolla $ign, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Anderson .Paak.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/RF5RdUzQxjI'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/RF5RdUzQxjI'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“I’ve always wanted to push the limits of who I am as a musician — forward, backwards, every direction. That meant being the weird one for a very long time, for making music that people didn’t really understand but somehow resonated [with them].”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/bW0giCDArjE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/bW0giCDArjE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Toki points to a track on \u003cem>Eternal Reverie\u003c/em> called “Say Tell Me” as an example of her reflective side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The song starts out gentle, but shifts halfway through, the tone mirrored by a heavy arpeggiating bass line.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I always like to think of all my songs as a ‘hero’s journey,’ and to follow that path of, where is this melody taking us? Where is the song taking us? And [so] when the bass comes in, that is the peak moment in that song,” she said. “That is the hero accomplishing its big thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-12047263\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-160x240.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"160\" height=\"240\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3-1366x2048.jpg 1366w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/07/TOKI-BLUE-AND-SILVER-3.jpg 1451w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 160px) 100vw, 160px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Toki has been on her own epic journey, one with an unimaginable hurdle and a surprising twist for her musical career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of 2015, Toki was diagnosed with Moyamoya disease, a rare and life-threatening blood vessel condition where some arteries become blocked and affect blood flow to the brain. She needed surgery immediately.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The surgery itself comes with all these side effects, which was how I came to have aphasia, how I lost my ability to understand music,” she said. “Those were all because someone tinkered with my brain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After surgery, music sounded like noise in Toki’s ears: There was no rhythm or melody.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very disheartening. … I was alive, which is the most important thing. But what is a life without music? What is a life for me without being able to create, which is what brings me joy in life?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Slowly, Toki’s brain gradually began to heal and music started to make sense. After just a few months of recovery, she produced a song called “I Wish I Could,” featuring Belgian artist Selah Sue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just felt like a heroic feeling,” Toki said. “It was relief. It was joy. It was like, oh my god, ‘I’m back.’”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/PHLLeZ6UXP8'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/PHLLeZ6UXP8'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Soon after, Toki was back on stage. During her recovery, she made an album called \u003cem>Lune Rouge\u003c/em>, which was nominated for a Grammy in 2019, making her the first female Asian American producer to be nominated in the dance/electronic album category.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>“\u003c/em>I would love to think that I’m superhuman now, but unfortunately, not. I’m just me, but with less headaches and still alive. So I’m pretty happy with that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite having a singular vision for her work, being in the music industry for decades has taken a toll on Toki. Early last year, the pressures of social media and the demands of touring prompted Toki to take a break from performing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was starting to feel a bit jaded,” she said.“When I sensed that cynical feeling creeping into me, I knew it was time to take a step back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To regain her energy, Toki spent time with friends going to clubs and underground raves in L.A., focusing on rekindling her eternal love of music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s important to remember that that dreamer exists, and sometimes I need to be reminded,” she said. “I hope for the rest of my life I remain this inquisitive dreamer forever. I hope that spark never goes away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "can-a-raga-bring-rain-to-la-reena-esmail-makes-music-for-drought-wildfire",
"title": "Sitars and Symphonies: LA Composer Reena Esmail Fuses Indian Ragas with Western Rhythms",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of The California Report Magazine’s series about \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/california-composers\">\u003cem>California composers\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. You can hear Esmail’s compositions and learn more about her work by listening to the audio story above, or by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\">\u003cem>subscribing\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> to The California Report Magazine podcast.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reena Esmail’s childhood in Los Angeles had two soundtracks: the Western classical music her parents loved, and the old, scratchy Bollywood tapes her paternal grandparents would play over and over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Western classical music was Esmail’s first love, inherited from her mom’s side. That branch of the family — Catholics from Goa, a part of India once colonized by Portugal — eventually relocated to Kenya.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It would be some really hot night in Mombasa. And my grandfather would turn off all the lights and put on a record of a Beethoven symphony,” Esmail recalled. “He would just sit in the dark and listen as if it was a religious experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, her dad’s parents, who lived with her in L.A., loved Bollywood soundtracks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those multicultural influences shaped what would become the driving question of her work: how do you invite people from different cultures onto the same stage to build a relationship and create music together?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12039910\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1772px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12039910\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1772\" height=\"1182\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg 1772w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1772px) 100vw, 1772px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A photograph taken in 1997, after Esmail’s first time playing a piano concerto with an orchestra at age 14, with her grandparents, Zaitoon Esmail and Esmail Abdul Kader. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Reena Esmail/Ozair Esmail)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It starts the dialogue because you’ve both already created beauty together,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As an elementary school student, Esmail would beg her parents to tag along to classical music concerts. It was too heavy, they told her. She wouldn’t appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail’s response? “I will appreciate it. I will figure out how to appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I remember thinking, ‘I need to figure out how this music works,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail’s talent soon became clear. She began playing piano at age 11.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had a practice curfew. My dad would kick me off the piano at 11:00 p.m. every night, [saying] ‘You have to be done. We need to go to sleep.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12039918\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1331px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12039918\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1331\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg 1331w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-800x1202.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-1020x1533.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-1022x1536.jpg 1022w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1331px) 100vw, 1331px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reena Esmail studied Western classical music at Juilliard and Yale, and spent time as a Fulbright scholar studying Hindustani music in India. She’s drawn on both of those influences in her work over the past two decades. \u003ccite>(Hannah Arista)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But performing on stage was a different story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My arms would shake. My legs would be shaking. Sometimes when you panic, your fingers get sweaty and then your hands are sliding off the keys,” Esmail recalled. “Just an avalanche of disaster.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You are terrified every time you have to play in front of people,” she recalls her parents telling her. “Are you sure you want to do this for the rest of your life?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her teachers at the L.A. County High School for the Arts encouraged her to consider a different way of making music without having to perform on stage: composing. Her early compositions got her into Juilliard, earned her a Fulbright in India and launched a career that’s earned her countless accolades, including her current stint as \u003ca href=\"https://lamasterchorale.org/artist-details/117/reena-esmail\">artist-in-residence with the L.A. Master Chorale.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Composing is how Esmail has made her mark — by putting Western classical musicians in conversation with Indian artists, building bridges between violinists and sitar players, tabla drummers and Western singers. Her music has been performed by major orchestras and choirs all over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just feel like I’m living my dream because as a young child, there were so many times where I couldn’t rectify the cultures that I was living in,” Esmail said. Now, her music is helping others bridge those worlds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Indian American] teenagers… now actually say to me, ‘We had that same feeling. We felt like we couldn’t rectify these cultures. And then we heard your music and it was everything that we are in one piece.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12041201\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1296px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12041201\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1296\" height=\"864\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg 1296w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1296px) 100vw, 1296px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reena Esmail performs “Tarekita” with the Urban Voices Project in 2016. They are a choir of people who are currently or have recently experienced homelessness on Skid Row in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Photo courtesy of Reena Esmail)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of her most-performed compositions is a piece called \u003ca href=\"https://www.reenaesmail.com/catalog-item/tarekita/\">Ta Re Ki Ta\u003c/a>, originally created with singers from the \u003ca href=\"https://urbanvoicesproject.org/\">Urban Voices Project\u003c/a> who have currently or recently experienced being unhoused on L.A.’s Skid Row.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How [do] these people who have so many major life concerns find the time to sing?” Esmail remembers wondering. “Then when you meet them,” Esmail said, “you realize this is how they’re getting through all those things.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail taught the singers onomatopoeic sounds that imitate the sound of a tabla, kind of like scatting in jazz. Today, choirs around the world can follow Esmail’s instructions to pronounce the syllables using different parts of the mouth and tongue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKK1YKfcGAw\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of Esmail’s most ambitious works for the L.A. Master Chorale, called \u003ca href=\"https://www.reenaesmail.com/catalog-item/malhaar-requiem-for-water/\">Malhaar,\u003c/a> focuses on drought and water in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project is inspired by music Esmail heard while attending Catholic church, listening to requiems, or songs of mourning.[aside postID=news_12000787 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-10-BL_qut-1020x680.jpg'] To capture the sense of loss she felt when thinking about drought and climate change, she chose lyrics by \u003ca href=\"https://williamodaly.com/bio/\">William O’Daly\u003c/a> — a poet and translator — who also worked for the state’s Department of Water Resources as lead author of the recent California Water Plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece brings together choral singers with a tabla player and a Hindustani singer performing ragas, a traditional melodic framework for improvisation in Indian music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Malhaar is a family of ragas that are supposed to beckon rain,” Esmail said. “The lore goes that if it is the driest desert and someone sings the most perfect Malhaar, suddenly water droplets are going to form in the air.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, on the day of Malhaar’s premiere at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2023, L.A. was drenched in a record rainstorm, as the choir sang: \u003cem>“Without you, how will we weep when we need to? How will the earth smell after the last drops of rain?”\u003cbr>\n\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNYsF550DUM\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s this slow march towards grief that will just flatten you and change you,” Esmail said. “Without water, how can we actually cry tears?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail lives in\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12038756/an-historic-altadena-church-lost-to-the-eaton-fire-begins-the-long-journey-to-resurrection\"> Altadena, a community full of grief\u003c/a> right now. Luckily, the house she shares with her husband, violinist Vijay Gupta, is still standing after the Eaton Fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail kept returning to that line: how will the earth smell after the last drops of rain? Now, she said, she knows. It’s the smell of ash in the air after a fire has torn through a drought-stricken landscape.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These days, Esmail is working on a harp concerto about wildfire. The piece ends with the harpist holding a light in her hand. While fire can easily destroy everything in its path, Esmail said, it can also help find a way forward as it lights the path to whatever comes next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of The California Report Magazine’s series about \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/california-composers\">\u003cem>California composers\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. You can hear Esmail’s compositions and learn more about her work by listening to the audio story above, or by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\">\u003cem>subscribing\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> to The California Report Magazine podcast.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reena Esmail’s childhood in Los Angeles had two soundtracks: the Western classical music her parents loved, and the old, scratchy Bollywood tapes her paternal grandparents would play over and over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Western classical music was Esmail’s first love, inherited from her mom’s side. That branch of the family — Catholics from Goa, a part of India once colonized by Portugal — eventually relocated to Kenya.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It would be some really hot night in Mombasa. And my grandfather would turn off all the lights and put on a record of a Beethoven symphony,” Esmail recalled. “He would just sit in the dark and listen as if it was a religious experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, her dad’s parents, who lived with her in L.A., loved Bollywood soundtracks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those multicultural influences shaped what would become the driving question of her work: how do you invite people from different cultures onto the same stage to build a relationship and create music together?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12039910\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1772px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12039910\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1772\" height=\"1182\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED.jpg 1772w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-3-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1772px) 100vw, 1772px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A photograph taken in 1997, after Esmail’s first time playing a piano concerto with an orchestra at age 14, with her grandparents, Zaitoon Esmail and Esmail Abdul Kader. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Reena Esmail/Ozair Esmail)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It starts the dialogue because you’ve both already created beauty together,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As an elementary school student, Esmail would beg her parents to tag along to classical music concerts. It was too heavy, they told her. She wouldn’t appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail’s response? “I will appreciate it. I will figure out how to appreciate it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I remember thinking, ‘I need to figure out how this music works,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail’s talent soon became clear. She began playing piano at age 11.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had a practice curfew. My dad would kick me off the piano at 11:00 p.m. every night, [saying] ‘You have to be done. We need to go to sleep.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12039918\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1331px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12039918\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1331\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED.jpg 1331w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-800x1202.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-1020x1533.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/250513-REENA-ESMAIL-5-KQED-1022x1536.jpg 1022w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1331px) 100vw, 1331px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reena Esmail studied Western classical music at Juilliard and Yale, and spent time as a Fulbright scholar studying Hindustani music in India. She’s drawn on both of those influences in her work over the past two decades. \u003ccite>(Hannah Arista)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But performing on stage was a different story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My arms would shake. My legs would be shaking. Sometimes when you panic, your fingers get sweaty and then your hands are sliding off the keys,” Esmail recalled. “Just an avalanche of disaster.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You are terrified every time you have to play in front of people,” she recalls her parents telling her. “Are you sure you want to do this for the rest of your life?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her teachers at the L.A. County High School for the Arts encouraged her to consider a different way of making music without having to perform on stage: composing. Her early compositions got her into Juilliard, earned her a Fulbright in India and launched a career that’s earned her countless accolades, including her current stint as \u003ca href=\"https://lamasterchorale.org/artist-details/117/reena-esmail\">artist-in-residence with the L.A. Master Chorale.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Composing is how Esmail has made her mark — by putting Western classical musicians in conversation with Indian artists, building bridges between violinists and sitar players, tabla drummers and Western singers. Her music has been performed by major orchestras and choirs all over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just feel like I’m living my dream because as a young child, there were so many times where I couldn’t rectify the cultures that I was living in,” Esmail said. Now, her music is helping others bridge those worlds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Indian American] teenagers… now actually say to me, ‘We had that same feeling. We felt like we couldn’t rectify these cultures. And then we heard your music and it was everything that we are in one piece.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12041201\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1296px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12041201\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1296\" height=\"864\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita.jpg 1296w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/05/Tarekita-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1296px) 100vw, 1296px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reena Esmail performs “Tarekita” with the Urban Voices Project in 2016. They are a choir of people who are currently or have recently experienced homelessness on Skid Row in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Photo courtesy of Reena Esmail)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of her most-performed compositions is a piece called \u003ca href=\"https://www.reenaesmail.com/catalog-item/tarekita/\">Ta Re Ki Ta\u003c/a>, originally created with singers from the \u003ca href=\"https://urbanvoicesproject.org/\">Urban Voices Project\u003c/a> who have currently or recently experienced being unhoused on L.A.’s Skid Row.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How [do] these people who have so many major life concerns find the time to sing?” Esmail remembers wondering. “Then when you meet them,” Esmail said, “you realize this is how they’re getting through all those things.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail taught the singers onomatopoeic sounds that imitate the sound of a tabla, kind of like scatting in jazz. Today, choirs around the world can follow Esmail’s instructions to pronounce the syllables using different parts of the mouth and tongue.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/rKK1YKfcGAw'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/rKK1YKfcGAw'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>One of Esmail’s most ambitious works for the L.A. Master Chorale, called \u003ca href=\"https://www.reenaesmail.com/catalog-item/malhaar-requiem-for-water/\">Malhaar,\u003c/a> focuses on drought and water in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project is inspired by music Esmail heard while attending Catholic church, listening to requiems, or songs of mourning.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp> To capture the sense of loss she felt when thinking about drought and climate change, she chose lyrics by \u003ca href=\"https://williamodaly.com/bio/\">William O’Daly\u003c/a> — a poet and translator — who also worked for the state’s Department of Water Resources as lead author of the recent California Water Plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece brings together choral singers with a tabla player and a Hindustani singer performing ragas, a traditional melodic framework for improvisation in Indian music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Malhaar is a family of ragas that are supposed to beckon rain,” Esmail said. “The lore goes that if it is the driest desert and someone sings the most perfect Malhaar, suddenly water droplets are going to form in the air.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, on the day of Malhaar’s premiere at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2023, L.A. was drenched in a record rainstorm, as the choir sang: \u003cem>“Without you, how will we weep when we need to? How will the earth smell after the last drops of rain?”\u003cbr>\n\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/zNYsF550DUM'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/zNYsF550DUM'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“It’s this slow march towards grief that will just flatten you and change you,” Esmail said. “Without water, how can we actually cry tears?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail lives in\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12038756/an-historic-altadena-church-lost-to-the-eaton-fire-begins-the-long-journey-to-resurrection\"> Altadena, a community full of grief\u003c/a> right now. Luckily, the house she shares with her husband, violinist Vijay Gupta, is still standing after the Eaton Fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Esmail kept returning to that line: how will the earth smell after the last drops of rain? Now, she said, she knows. It’s the smell of ash in the air after a fire has torn through a drought-stricken landscape.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These days, Esmail is working on a harp concerto about wildfire. The piece ends with the harpist holding a light in her hand. While fire can easily destroy everything in its path, Esmail said, it can also help find a way forward as it lights the path to whatever comes next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of The California Report Magazine’s series about \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/california-composers\">\u003cem>California composers\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. Listen to this and more in-depth storytelling by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\">\u003cem>subscribing\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> to The California Report Magazine podcast.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s early evening and a group of musicians — led by co-composers Wendy Reid and Lulu — is beginning to assemble in Berkeley’s Live Oak Park under a small redwood grove wrapped by a creek.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike at a concert hall, the audience here is tasked with finding their own seats. Some settle into the ivy or perch on the stairs that lead down to the performance area. Others sit on the grassy bank high above the musicians. I find a spot under a redwood tree. There is a sense of anticipation in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the people here tonight have been following Reid’s work for years. ”Her pieces are virtuosic,” said Kattt Atchley, a Bay Area improvisational artist. “ Wendy’s unusual — I mean, this is unusual — but she can pull it off. I don’t think many people can. But she can.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in many ways, Lulu feels like the star of this unusual performance. People whisper her name and strain to see her warming up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lulu and Reid have been making music together for almost two decades. And though they don’t speak the same language, they communicate through musical composition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I interact with Lulu, I’m learning her language and then she’s learning my language,” said Reid, who earned a Master of Arts degree from Mills College and studied with renowned composer, Nadia Boulanger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12026551\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12026551 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with glasses plays violin next to a grey parrot in a purple-lit cage.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Wendy Reid, and Lulu, her African grey parrot, practice in Reid’s apartment in Berkeley on Feb. 6, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As the musicians start warming up, they form a semicircle around the star of the show, Lulu, the one so many people came here to see. But Lulu is still quietly observing, unassuming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lulu is perched on a bar in a brightly lit cage — because Lulu is a bird: an African grey parrot.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘Ambient Bird’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>This performance is called Ambient Bird. It’s based on Reid and Lulu’s interactions, which Reid transcribes into musical compositions and invites ensemble members to perform. Tonight, there are a dozen musicians playing alongside the two co-composers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The quietest of all the performers is Lulu herself. With all eyes on her and so many interesting sounds, she tends to get a little stage fright. However, Reid is prepared for that and plays recordings of Lulu alongside the live music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"more stories on california composers\" tag=\"california-composers\"]As the performance begins, some people wander over from the park to join the audience. The music intermingles with birdsong, dog barks, and kids playing in the creek below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Reid, these sounds are not interruptions but part of the reason she loves performing in these kinds of public spaces and surprising people who happen upon her music — like Joe Silber.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just stumbled into this with our kids,” he said in a whisper. “I think it’s a human/bird collaboration.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And though they aren’t paying attention to the performance, for a moment, Silber’s kids become part of it, yelling to each other across the creek as they scramble over the bank’s exposed roots. The musicians continue to play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s exactly what I want in this piece,” Reid said. “I want that ambient sound of people just living their lives as this odd little piece goes on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The kids, the dogs, the water, cars whizzing by, wind in the trees — it’s all part of Reid’s composition. It also feels like a celebration of her relationship with Lulu and of the liminal human/bird world that they’ve created together.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Housemates\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At Reid’s home in Berkeley, Lulu’s crate is next to the door, surrounded by stacks of books and records. She’s gray, with light eyes and a bright red undercoat. And she likes being sprayed with water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wendy sprays her as she talks to her. They go back and forth, saying “OK” to each other and laughing, Lulu imitating the sounds of Wendy’s laughter with an almost eerie perfection. Lulu is an entertainer and has learned how people interact with each other and with her. She repeats phrases people say to her: “cute” or “pretty girl” or “beautiful bird.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But don’t get too close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you get too close to her, she’ll bite you,” Reid said. “And she’ll know you’ll say ‘ouch.’ So she says ‘ouch’ before you. And then she’ll start laughing because that’s what people do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Laughing, Reid said, “It’s kind of embarrassing because it’s not her intellectual side. It’s her conniving side, really.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The composition process\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Reid and Lulu compose music in their living room. “We improvise a little bit probably every day,” Reid said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She records and transcribes their interactions. Their composing process is spontaneous and unique every time. Sometimes, Reid will try to inspire Lulu with a birdcall. “You know how you kind of yell to somebody when you want to just hear their voice?” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reid also teaches violin lessons at her home and said that when a student is practicing, Lulu loves to chime in with squawks, songs, and, occasionally, a note correction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Sometimes somebody’s playing a little out of tune, and then she’ll throw them the right note, and I’ll say, ‘Just like Lulu — a little bit higher.”’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This has a way of lightening the mood. “When a teacher corrects you, it’s much more intimidating, but when a bird is correcting you, it’s funny,” Reid said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12026553\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12026553 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with glasses looks at a grey parrot perched on her shoulder.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Wendy Reid and Lulu pose in Reid’s apartment in Berkeley on Feb. 6, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Reid’s been making music with animals for decades. She even collaborated with her border collie, Twinkie.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That dog didn’t have the vocabulary of a bird, so she wasn’t going to be featured in all my pieces,” Reid said. “But all the birds that I’ve had have been featured in my music since 1980.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Birdsong is also embedded in Reid’s earliest memories of music when she’d go to her grandmother’s ranch in Wyoming and escape to a nearby forest to play her violin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ranch was similar in some ways to the Live Oak performance space.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was surrounded by all these trees and a creek,” said Reid, recalling how she would take her violin and explore the music she knew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a child, Reid didn’t want people to follow her to the creek and listen to her play. “I just wanted to be out there by myself and do my own thing and not be thinking that I have to perform for somebody,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I think of her as an equal’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the materials for the Live Oak performance, Lulu’s name is listed before Reid’s — a signal that Lulu is not a mere sound effect in their music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think of her as an equal when I write a piece of music. She can’t write the notes down, but she’s definitely creating the ideas with me,” Reid said. “I always call her half-human, and I’m half-bird.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the night of the performance at Live Oak Park, Reid doesn’t pay much attention to the audience and their response, or let it inhibit her work. “If somebody thought it was stupid, that wouldn’t have any effect on me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the performance ends and the sounds of chirping crickets fill the void, I walk up to Reid and Lulu to ask them how they think it went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“She likes to listen to herself I think, that’s the problem,” Reid said. “She might have done a few peeps.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just a few peeps. Lulu cocks her head to the side. I wonder what she makes of all this — I wish I could understand her the way Reid does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think she gets mesmerized by the whole situation,” Reid said. “She hears the instruments playing, and she hears herself playing, and she’s thinking, ‘Maybe I should just be listening.’”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of The California Report Magazine’s series about \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/california-composers\">\u003cem>California composers\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. Listen to this and more in-depth storytelling by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\">\u003cem>subscribing\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> to The California Report Magazine podcast.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s early evening and a group of musicians — led by co-composers Wendy Reid and Lulu — is beginning to assemble in Berkeley’s Live Oak Park under a small redwood grove wrapped by a creek.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike at a concert hall, the audience here is tasked with finding their own seats. Some settle into the ivy or perch on the stairs that lead down to the performance area. Others sit on the grassy bank high above the musicians. I find a spot under a redwood tree. There is a sense of anticipation in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the people here tonight have been following Reid’s work for years. ”Her pieces are virtuosic,” said Kattt Atchley, a Bay Area improvisational artist. “ Wendy’s unusual — I mean, this is unusual — but she can pull it off. I don’t think many people can. But she can.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in many ways, Lulu feels like the star of this unusual performance. People whisper her name and strain to see her warming up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lulu and Reid have been making music together for almost two decades. And though they don’t speak the same language, they communicate through musical composition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I interact with Lulu, I’m learning her language and then she’s learning my language,” said Reid, who earned a Master of Arts degree from Mills College and studied with renowned composer, Nadia Boulanger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12026551\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12026551 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with glasses plays violin next to a grey parrot in a purple-lit cage.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00232-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Wendy Reid, and Lulu, her African grey parrot, practice in Reid’s apartment in Berkeley on Feb. 6, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As the musicians start warming up, they form a semicircle around the star of the show, Lulu, the one so many people came here to see. But Lulu is still quietly observing, unassuming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lulu is perched on a bar in a brightly lit cage — because Lulu is a bird: an African grey parrot.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘Ambient Bird’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>This performance is called Ambient Bird. It’s based on Reid and Lulu’s interactions, which Reid transcribes into musical compositions and invites ensemble members to perform. Tonight, there are a dozen musicians playing alongside the two co-composers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The quietest of all the performers is Lulu herself. With all eyes on her and so many interesting sounds, she tends to get a little stage fright. However, Reid is prepared for that and plays recordings of Lulu alongside the live music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>As the performance begins, some people wander over from the park to join the audience. The music intermingles with birdsong, dog barks, and kids playing in the creek below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Reid, these sounds are not interruptions but part of the reason she loves performing in these kinds of public spaces and surprising people who happen upon her music — like Joe Silber.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just stumbled into this with our kids,” he said in a whisper. “I think it’s a human/bird collaboration.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And though they aren’t paying attention to the performance, for a moment, Silber’s kids become part of it, yelling to each other across the creek as they scramble over the bank’s exposed roots. The musicians continue to play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s exactly what I want in this piece,” Reid said. “I want that ambient sound of people just living their lives as this odd little piece goes on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The kids, the dogs, the water, cars whizzing by, wind in the trees — it’s all part of Reid’s composition. It also feels like a celebration of her relationship with Lulu and of the liminal human/bird world that they’ve created together.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Housemates\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At Reid’s home in Berkeley, Lulu’s crate is next to the door, surrounded by stacks of books and records. She’s gray, with light eyes and a bright red undercoat. And she likes being sprayed with water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wendy sprays her as she talks to her. They go back and forth, saying “OK” to each other and laughing, Lulu imitating the sounds of Wendy’s laughter with an almost eerie perfection. Lulu is an entertainer and has learned how people interact with each other and with her. She repeats phrases people say to her: “cute” or “pretty girl” or “beautiful bird.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But don’t get too close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you get too close to her, she’ll bite you,” Reid said. “And she’ll know you’ll say ‘ouch.’ So she says ‘ouch’ before you. And then she’ll start laughing because that’s what people do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Laughing, Reid said, “It’s kind of embarrassing because it’s not her intellectual side. It’s her conniving side, really.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The composition process\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Reid and Lulu compose music in their living room. “We improvise a little bit probably every day,” Reid said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She records and transcribes their interactions. Their composing process is spontaneous and unique every time. Sometimes, Reid will try to inspire Lulu with a birdcall. “You know how you kind of yell to somebody when you want to just hear their voice?” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reid also teaches violin lessons at her home and said that when a student is practicing, Lulu loves to chime in with squawks, songs, and, occasionally, a note correction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Sometimes somebody’s playing a little out of tune, and then she’ll throw them the right note, and I’ll say, ‘Just like Lulu — a little bit higher.”’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This has a way of lightening the mood. “When a teacher corrects you, it’s much more intimidating, but when a bird is correcting you, it’s funny,” Reid said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12026553\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12026553 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with glasses looks at a grey parrot perched on her shoulder.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/02/20250206_Ambient-Bird_DMB_00482-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Wendy Reid and Lulu pose in Reid’s apartment in Berkeley on Feb. 6, 2025. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Reid’s been making music with animals for decades. She even collaborated with her border collie, Twinkie.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That dog didn’t have the vocabulary of a bird, so she wasn’t going to be featured in all my pieces,” Reid said. “But all the birds that I’ve had have been featured in my music since 1980.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Birdsong is also embedded in Reid’s earliest memories of music when she’d go to her grandmother’s ranch in Wyoming and escape to a nearby forest to play her violin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ranch was similar in some ways to the Live Oak performance space.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was surrounded by all these trees and a creek,” said Reid, recalling how she would take her violin and explore the music she knew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a child, Reid didn’t want people to follow her to the creek and listen to her play. “I just wanted to be out there by myself and do my own thing and not be thinking that I have to perform for somebody,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I think of her as an equal’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In the materials for the Live Oak performance, Lulu’s name is listed before Reid’s — a signal that Lulu is not a mere sound effect in their music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think of her as an equal when I write a piece of music. She can’t write the notes down, but she’s definitely creating the ideas with me,” Reid said. “I always call her half-human, and I’m half-bird.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the night of the performance at Live Oak Park, Reid doesn’t pay much attention to the audience and their response, or let it inhibit her work. “If somebody thought it was stupid, that wouldn’t have any effect on me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the performance ends and the sounds of chirping crickets fill the void, I walk up to Reid and Lulu to ask them how they think it went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“She likes to listen to herself I think, that’s the problem,” Reid said. “She might have done a few peeps.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just a few peeps. Lulu cocks her head to the side. I wonder what she makes of all this — I wish I could understand her the way Reid does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think she gets mesmerized by the whole situation,” Reid said. “She hears the instruments playing, and she hears herself playing, and she’s thinking, ‘Maybe I should just be listening.’”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "how-experimental-composer-and-performer-kishi-bashi-brings-new-ideas-to-life",
"title": "How Experimental Composer and Performer Kishi Bashi Brings New Ideas to Life",
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"content": "\u003cp>Whether Kishi Bashi is composing new music or performing it on stage, he is open to improvisation and imperfection. This might explain why he’s not afraid to release albums that experiment with genre and keep fans guessing. Kishi Bashi’s music moves between classical, rock, electronic, and indie pop — his lyrics are a combination of English and Japanese.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At his home near San José, Kishi Bashi demonstrated his spontaneous approach to composition. “If I want something super epic, I imagine what that could be in my head, and then I try to verbalize it,” he said, beatboxing an epic fanfare off the top of his head as an example.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi is also an accomplished multi-instrumentalist. He picked up a guitar and made up a riff on the spot. As he strummed, he began humming and then singing, not worrying if his stray phrases about love and longing made any sense. Kishi Bashi called this “mouthing words.” Even as improvised sketches, his easy playing and sweet falsetto were captivating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi took the same playful approach to demonstrating how he composes, using each of his violins. The first violin he picked up was tuned differently than a Western classical violin. The second was built with an extra string so that Kishi Bashi could play the violin down into the lower range of a viola. He was playing around on that five-string violin-viola when he composed “For Every Voice That Never Sang.” The finished song is rich with musical layers, but you can hear those initial arpeggios in the background.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSWMx8-0-i0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whenever Kishi Bashi explores an idea for a new song, he records it onto his phone so he can review it later. For example, “Violin Akai” is the first song on \u003cem>Kantos\u003c/em>, his latest album. In the recording he made of his initial “Violin Akai” idea, he sang a melody with a swinging beat, his voice serving as the violin. It’s a very rough sketch — a few pencil lines, really — that Bashi later built into an exuberant, multi-instrument song for his band.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yt5jUFjf8qg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before Bashi became the solo artist Kishi Bashi, he was born Kaoru Ishibishi (now Kaoru Dill-Ishibashi). Kishi Bashi’s parents grew up in Japan and met at the University of Washington in Seattle. Kishi Bashi was born there, though the family soon moved to Ithaca, New York.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My parents moved every 5 to 10 years,” Kishi Bashi said. “So I never felt grounded anywhere.” Bashi also regularly visited family in Japan while trying to fit in with predominantly white classmates at school.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Ithaca, Kishi Bashi started learning the Suzuki violin, a method created by Japanese violinist Shinichi Suzuki that teaches children to learn violin as though learning a second language. Kishi Bashi started playing violin at age 7 — relatively late for a Suzuki student — yet he was soon called a child prodigy. By high school, Bashi and his family had moved to Virginia, where Kishi Bashi was exposed to jazz violin and improvisation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After high school, Kishi Bashi attended Cornell University, where he continued playing jazz violin. Officially, though, he was majoring in engineering. It took him a couple of years to realize that music could be more than a hobby. Once that realization hit, he dropped out of Cornell and went to the Berklee School of Music to study film scoring. After graduating, he moved to New York to score films and write jingles for commercials.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020444 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bashi holds a custom guitar decorated with Manga cartoons at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi’s true passion, however, was composing indie rock songs and playing in a band. In 2003, he founded a band called Jupiter One and explored another instrument: his voice. He recalled the moment things started taking off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Before], we had tens of people — maybe all our friends — showing up at our shows,” Kishi Bashi said. “But then, once I started singing, more and more people started showing up. Girls and their boyfriends show up when you start singing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wlpmnAvGwk\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2010, after touring with Jupiter One and opening for \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sondre_Lerche\">Sondre Lerche\u003c/a>, he decided to go solo. This was when he became the artist “Kishi Bashi.” He was 35, married, and had a young daughter. He and his family moved back in with his parents while he made the Kishi Bashi leap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi was no stranger to the challenge musicians face in making a living and being creative. Going solo was both exciting and risky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I was starting my debut album, I was kind of struggling with the idea of imperfection,” he said. “I’m very self-conscious and afraid of judgment because one negative thing can crush my excitement. To me, that’s dangerous.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020446\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020446 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bashi plays a 1970s Wurlitzer electric piano at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bashi needn’t have been afraid. Once he finally released his first album, \u003cem>151a\u003c/em>, in 2012, it was well-received. When read in Japanese, \u003cem>151a\u003c/em> resembles the Japanese phrase \u003cem>ichi-go ichi-e\u003c/em>, which Bashi explained means “that one time, that one meeting; it is unique to itself, even with its imperfections.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That debut album launched a successful solo career. Kishi Bashi recently released his fifth solo album and went on an international tour. At his San Francisco show last September, long-time fan Kevin Adamski described a typical Kishi Bashi concert as “a very joyful experience, very optimistic, very hopeful. The whole crowd is dancing. There’s confetti.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EewB7xHHIvE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Much of that San Francisco show was upbeat and celebratory, but in the middle, there was a moment of calm. The band exited the stage for a costume change, leaving Kishi Bashi standing alone in a spotlight with his violin. He plucked a rhythm, which continued looping as he added layers of mournful strings. Then he sang. As though under a spell, the audience’s boisterous energy settled into momentary stillness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi looked utterly at ease on stage with the surprises and improvisations of live performance. At one point, he started a violin loop for a new song and then stopped and restarted, saying he could do better. Everyone cheered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020447\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020447 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kishi Bashi received this award from the Roger Ebert’s Film Festival in 2024, photographed in his home last month. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Early in Kishi Bashi’s career, messing up on stage felt like a big deal. One time, back when he was opening for Sondre Lerche, he had to restart a loop over and over again because the timing was off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I started to realize that I was just really not nailing it that night,” he said. That might seem like a panic-inducing moment for a live performer, but Kishi Bashi kept going, and the crowd started cheering. They kept cheering until he finally got the loop right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They wanted to see me succeed,” he said. It taught him a valuable lesson about live performance. “[The audience] are not just there to hear a perfect iteration of something … they [like] the idea that they’re supporting someone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJUQzs4n_3c\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of every Kishi Bashi show, the band does an acoustic encore. Kishi Bashi said it started when a venue told them to stop playing. “I got really annoyed and took the music to the crowd.” Taking the music into the crowd was an unexpected, almost spiritual end to the recent San Francisco show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After playing with mics and amps on an elevated stage during the entire show, the band left the stage, grabbed acoustic instruments, and walked down into the middle of the audience. A couple of hundred fans clustered around the band, and then Kishi Bashi led everyone in a giant and intimate sing-along. Whatever improvisations and imperfections led to this unique moment, it was the perfect experience to share with other people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020448\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12020448\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Kishi Bashi poses for a portrait at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "We went to San Francisco and lined up to experience the genre-defying music of California artist Kishi Bashi and take part in what fans call a 'Kishakening.' ",
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"title": "How Experimental Composer and Performer Kishi Bashi Brings New Ideas to Life | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Whether Kishi Bashi is composing new music or performing it on stage, he is open to improvisation and imperfection. This might explain why he’s not afraid to release albums that experiment with genre and keep fans guessing. Kishi Bashi’s music moves between classical, rock, electronic, and indie pop — his lyrics are a combination of English and Japanese.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At his home near San José, Kishi Bashi demonstrated his spontaneous approach to composition. “If I want something super epic, I imagine what that could be in my head, and then I try to verbalize it,” he said, beatboxing an epic fanfare off the top of his head as an example.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi is also an accomplished multi-instrumentalist. He picked up a guitar and made up a riff on the spot. As he strummed, he began humming and then singing, not worrying if his stray phrases about love and longing made any sense. Kishi Bashi called this “mouthing words.” Even as improvised sketches, his easy playing and sweet falsetto were captivating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi took the same playful approach to demonstrating how he composes, using each of his violins. The first violin he picked up was tuned differently than a Western classical violin. The second was built with an extra string so that Kishi Bashi could play the violin down into the lower range of a viola. He was playing around on that five-string violin-viola when he composed “For Every Voice That Never Sang.” The finished song is rich with musical layers, but you can hear those initial arpeggios in the background.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/kSWMx8-0-i0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/kSWMx8-0-i0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Whenever Kishi Bashi explores an idea for a new song, he records it onto his phone so he can review it later. For example, “Violin Akai” is the first song on \u003cem>Kantos\u003c/em>, his latest album. In the recording he made of his initial “Violin Akai” idea, he sang a melody with a swinging beat, his voice serving as the violin. It’s a very rough sketch — a few pencil lines, really — that Bashi later built into an exuberant, multi-instrument song for his band.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Yt5jUFjf8qg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/Yt5jUFjf8qg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Before Bashi became the solo artist Kishi Bashi, he was born Kaoru Ishibishi (now Kaoru Dill-Ishibashi). Kishi Bashi’s parents grew up in Japan and met at the University of Washington in Seattle. Kishi Bashi was born there, though the family soon moved to Ithaca, New York.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My parents moved every 5 to 10 years,” Kishi Bashi said. “So I never felt grounded anywhere.” Bashi also regularly visited family in Japan while trying to fit in with predominantly white classmates at school.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Ithaca, Kishi Bashi started learning the Suzuki violin, a method created by Japanese violinist Shinichi Suzuki that teaches children to learn violin as though learning a second language. Kishi Bashi started playing violin at age 7 — relatively late for a Suzuki student — yet he was soon called a child prodigy. By high school, Bashi and his family had moved to Virginia, where Kishi Bashi was exposed to jazz violin and improvisation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After high school, Kishi Bashi attended Cornell University, where he continued playing jazz violin. Officially, though, he was majoring in engineering. It took him a couple of years to realize that music could be more than a hobby. Once that realization hit, he dropped out of Cornell and went to the Berklee School of Music to study film scoring. After graduating, he moved to New York to score films and write jingles for commercials.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020444 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00056-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bashi holds a custom guitar decorated with Manga cartoons at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi’s true passion, however, was composing indie rock songs and playing in a band. In 2003, he founded a band called Jupiter One and explored another instrument: his voice. He recalled the moment things started taking off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Before], we had tens of people — maybe all our friends — showing up at our shows,” Kishi Bashi said. “But then, once I started singing, more and more people started showing up. Girls and their boyfriends show up when you start singing.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/7wlpmnAvGwk'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/7wlpmnAvGwk'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>In 2010, after touring with Jupiter One and opening for \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sondre_Lerche\">Sondre Lerche\u003c/a>, he decided to go solo. This was when he became the artist “Kishi Bashi.” He was 35, married, and had a young daughter. He and his family moved back in with his parents while he made the Kishi Bashi leap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi was no stranger to the challenge musicians face in making a living and being creative. Going solo was both exciting and risky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I was starting my debut album, I was kind of struggling with the idea of imperfection,” he said. “I’m very self-conscious and afraid of judgment because one negative thing can crush my excitement. To me, that’s dangerous.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020446\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020446 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00140-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bashi plays a 1970s Wurlitzer electric piano at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bashi needn’t have been afraid. Once he finally released his first album, \u003cem>151a\u003c/em>, in 2012, it was well-received. When read in Japanese, \u003cem>151a\u003c/em> resembles the Japanese phrase \u003cem>ichi-go ichi-e\u003c/em>, which Bashi explained means “that one time, that one meeting; it is unique to itself, even with its imperfections.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That debut album launched a successful solo career. Kishi Bashi recently released his fifth solo album and went on an international tour. At his San Francisco show last September, long-time fan Kevin Adamski described a typical Kishi Bashi concert as “a very joyful experience, very optimistic, very hopeful. The whole crowd is dancing. There’s confetti.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/EewB7xHHIvE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/EewB7xHHIvE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Much of that San Francisco show was upbeat and celebratory, but in the middle, there was a moment of calm. The band exited the stage for a costume change, leaving Kishi Bashi standing alone in a spotlight with his violin. He plucked a rhythm, which continued looping as he added layers of mournful strings. Then he sang. As though under a spell, the audience’s boisterous energy settled into momentary stillness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kishi Bashi looked utterly at ease on stage with the surprises and improvisations of live performance. At one point, he started a violin loop for a new song and then stopped and restarted, saying he could do better. Everyone cheered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020447\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12020447 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00151-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kishi Bashi received this award from the Roger Ebert’s Film Festival in 2024, photographed in his home last month. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Early in Kishi Bashi’s career, messing up on stage felt like a big deal. One time, back when he was opening for Sondre Lerche, he had to restart a loop over and over again because the timing was off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I started to realize that I was just really not nailing it that night,” he said. That might seem like a panic-inducing moment for a live performer, but Kishi Bashi kept going, and the crowd started cheering. They kept cheering until he finally got the loop right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They wanted to see me succeed,” he said. It taught him a valuable lesson about live performance. “[The audience] are not just there to hear a perfect iteration of something … they [like] the idea that they’re supporting someone.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/LJUQzs4n_3c'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/LJUQzs4n_3c'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>At the end of every Kishi Bashi show, the band does an acoustic encore. Kishi Bashi said it started when a venue told them to stop playing. “I got really annoyed and took the music to the crowd.” Taking the music into the crowd was an unexpected, almost spiritual end to the recent San Francisco show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After playing with mics and amps on an elevated stage during the entire show, the band left the stage, grabbed acoustic instruments, and walked down into the middle of the audience. A couple of hundred fans clustered around the band, and then Kishi Bashi led everyone in a giant and intimate sing-along. Whatever improvisations and imperfections led to this unique moment, it was the perfect experience to share with other people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12020448\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12020448\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/01/20250106_KishiBashi_DMB_00206-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Kishi Bashi poses for a portrait at his home. \u003ccite>(David M. Barreda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Birds. Rain. Barbed Wire. Sounds of a Vineyard Become A Musical Score in ‘Harvest in Twelve Parts’",
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"headTitle": "Birds. Rain. Barbed Wire. Sounds of a Vineyard Become A Musical Score in ‘Harvest in Twelve Parts’ | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>On a recent foggy morning, composer and winemaker Brook Munro stood perfectly still next to a row of grapevines, listening to a chorus of birds and insects. He likes to tune into the sounds of the vineyard early, well before any visitors show up to the tasting room at the Claiborne and Churchill Winery in San Luis Obispo’s Edna Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/\">Munro\u003c/a> is keenly aware of the sounds of the winemaking process — as both a lifelong musician and a professional winemaker. He spent years figuring out how to combine these two passions with his debut album \u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/test-music\">“Harvest in Twelve Parts,” which draws on \u003c/a>sounds he recorded from the wine harvest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wD8BgLk7pQ8\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of my favorite things to do is to record unique sounds or ordinary sounds and manipulate them — bend them to my will, so to speak,” said Munro, who’s toured with a rock band called “The Mighty Fine” and scored several \u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/watch\">indie films\u003c/a>. “I’ve recorded everything from kitchen sinks to toothbrushes to the sound of cars.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004870\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004870\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing a hat and a dark shirt holds a wine glass behind a counter in a tasting room.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In Clairborne & Churchill Winery’s tasting room, Brook Munro taps a wine glass to create a sound he used throughout “Harvest in Twelve Parts.” \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2021, Munro — who’s worked as a manager at Claiborne and Churchill for 15 years — had an idea: to record the sounds of the vineyard during harvest season, one of the busiest and most vibrant parts of the winemaking process.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The artistry of winemaking and music-making are quite similar. There [are] a lot of inputs and a lot of variables that are controlled and some that are not controlled,” Munro said. “This idea just kind of struck me: what would it sound like if I could express winemaking from a musical perspective?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004869\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004869\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing a hat and dark shirt has his hands in a grapevine.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">At Claiborne & Churchill Vineyard, Brook Munro demonstrates how pulling on a trellis wire creates a sound he used on the track “Jubilaüm.” \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Munro took a field recorder and captured sounds like bird calls, the twang of a trellis wire, and the splash of rainwater hitting the grapes. He then manipulated those sounds in his music software to create virtual “instruments” he could arrange into melodies and harmonies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time, I didn’t know what the album would sound like,” he said. “I knew that it would be experimental to a degree. I didn’t know how much. I thought perhaps I [could] make the whole album literally just the sounds from the winery.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004874\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1333px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004874\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing headphones, a hat and jean jacket holds two mallets near a wine barrel.\" width=\"1333\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg 1333w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-800x1200.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-1020x1530.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-1024x1536.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1333px) 100vw, 1333px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brook Munro records himself hitting a wine barrel with mallets. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Michelle Cordova)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>With two harvests’ worth of sounds, Munro got to work arranging them into music. Some of the tracks on “Harvest in Twelve Parts” have clear melodies, while others feature more of an ambient, experimental soundscape. Munro also decided to blend the recordings with traditional instruments like cello and guitar to create a unique musical experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s not just experimentation for its own sake — for Munro, every song has a story, even if there aren’t any words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted it to be a sonic journey through harvest,” he said. “And to do so, it had to go through kind of an arc in a way…The first track is a prologue, the final track is an epilogue, and everything else is the journey.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004871\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004871\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg\" alt='Rows of grapevines with a sign that reads \"Pinot Noir.\"' width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rows of pinot noir grapevines at Claiborne & Churchill Winery in San Luis Obispo’s Edna Valley. \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Each of the album’s twelve tracks has distinct sounds and moods. Tracks like “Jubilaüm” and “Under the Harvest Sky” feature recordings of birds and have a tranquil quality, while some tracks like “What We Overcome” use rain sounds to create a dire, intense feel. Only one track, “Harvest for Orchestra,” was recorded exclusively on traditional instruments — by the Cape Town Philharmonic — with no processed vineyard sounds.[aside postID=\"arts_13963901,arts_13961151\" label=\"Related Stories\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On other tracks, it can be hard to tell the difference between traditional instruments and field recordings that Munro digitally processed to sound like instruments. “Macerated Lines,” for example, begins with a xylophone-like sound that Munro created by striking wine glasses with a soft mallet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Through some digital processing, I could then create this really cool sound, almost like a toy piano,” he said. “Probably 75 percent of the album is all recorded on nontraditional instruments, but a lot of them are layered in such a way where you could hear a sound, and it’s actually four different winery sounds creating one tone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004873\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1333px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004873\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A hand crushes grapes while the other holds audio equipment.\" width=\"1333\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg 1333w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-800x1200.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-1020x1530.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-1024x1536.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1333px) 100vw, 1333px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brook Munro records himself crushing wine grapes during harvest season. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Michelle Cordova)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Munro said he hopes “Harvest in Twelve Parts” inspires others to embrace experimentation — in both music and wine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If someone else took their experiences into the vineyard, into the cellar, into the barrel room, and they crafted something musically or artistically, it would be beautiful, and it wouldn’t sound like me — it would sound like them,” he said. “Music and wine, the end result is always going to be very much an extension of the person who created it.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "Birds. Rain. Barbed Wire. Sounds of a Vineyard Become A Musical Score in ‘Harvest in Twelve Parts’ | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>On a recent foggy morning, composer and winemaker Brook Munro stood perfectly still next to a row of grapevines, listening to a chorus of birds and insects. He likes to tune into the sounds of the vineyard early, well before any visitors show up to the tasting room at the Claiborne and Churchill Winery in San Luis Obispo’s Edna Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/\">Munro\u003c/a> is keenly aware of the sounds of the winemaking process — as both a lifelong musician and a professional winemaker. He spent years figuring out how to combine these two passions with his debut album \u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/test-music\">“Harvest in Twelve Parts,” which draws on \u003c/a>sounds he recorded from the wine harvest.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wD8BgLk7pQ8'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wD8BgLk7pQ8'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“One of my favorite things to do is to record unique sounds or ordinary sounds and manipulate them — bend them to my will, so to speak,” said Munro, who’s toured with a rock band called “The Mighty Fine” and scored several \u003ca href=\"https://www.brookmunro.com/watch\">indie films\u003c/a>. “I’ve recorded everything from kitchen sinks to toothbrushes to the sound of cars.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004870\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004870\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing a hat and a dark shirt holds a wine glass behind a counter in a tasting room.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-02-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In Clairborne & Churchill Winery’s tasting room, Brook Munro taps a wine glass to create a sound he used throughout “Harvest in Twelve Parts.” \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2021, Munro — who’s worked as a manager at Claiborne and Churchill for 15 years — had an idea: to record the sounds of the vineyard during harvest season, one of the busiest and most vibrant parts of the winemaking process.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The artistry of winemaking and music-making are quite similar. There [are] a lot of inputs and a lot of variables that are controlled and some that are not controlled,” Munro said. “This idea just kind of struck me: what would it sound like if I could express winemaking from a musical perspective?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004869\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004869\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing a hat and dark shirt has his hands in a grapevine.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-01-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">At Claiborne & Churchill Vineyard, Brook Munro demonstrates how pulling on a trellis wire creates a sound he used on the track “Jubilaüm.” \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Munro took a field recorder and captured sounds like bird calls, the twang of a trellis wire, and the splash of rainwater hitting the grapes. He then manipulated those sounds in his music software to create virtual “instruments” he could arrange into melodies and harmonies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time, I didn’t know what the album would sound like,” he said. “I knew that it would be experimental to a degree. I didn’t know how much. I thought perhaps I [could] make the whole album literally just the sounds from the winery.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004874\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1333px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004874\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing headphones, a hat and jean jacket holds two mallets near a wine barrel.\" width=\"1333\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED.jpg 1333w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-800x1200.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-1020x1530.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-07-KQED-1024x1536.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1333px) 100vw, 1333px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brook Munro records himself hitting a wine barrel with mallets. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Michelle Cordova)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>With two harvests’ worth of sounds, Munro got to work arranging them into music. Some of the tracks on “Harvest in Twelve Parts” have clear melodies, while others feature more of an ambient, experimental soundscape. Munro also decided to blend the recordings with traditional instruments like cello and guitar to create a unique musical experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s not just experimentation for its own sake — for Munro, every song has a story, even if there aren’t any words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted it to be a sonic journey through harvest,” he said. “And to do so, it had to go through kind of an arc in a way…The first track is a prologue, the final track is an epilogue, and everything else is the journey.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004871\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004871\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg\" alt='Rows of grapevines with a sign that reads \"Pinot Noir.\"' width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-03-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rows of pinot noir grapevines at Claiborne & Churchill Winery in San Luis Obispo’s Edna Valley. \u003ccite>(Benjamin Purper for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Each of the album’s twelve tracks has distinct sounds and moods. Tracks like “Jubilaüm” and “Under the Harvest Sky” feature recordings of birds and have a tranquil quality, while some tracks like “What We Overcome” use rain sounds to create a dire, intense feel. Only one track, “Harvest for Orchestra,” was recorded exclusively on traditional instruments — by the Cape Town Philharmonic — with no processed vineyard sounds.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On other tracks, it can be hard to tell the difference between traditional instruments and field recordings that Munro digitally processed to sound like instruments. “Macerated Lines,” for example, begins with a xylophone-like sound that Munro created by striking wine glasses with a soft mallet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Through some digital processing, I could then create this really cool sound, almost like a toy piano,” he said. “Probably 75 percent of the album is all recorded on nontraditional instruments, but a lot of them are layered in such a way where you could hear a sound, and it’s actually four different winery sounds creating one tone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12004873\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1333px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12004873\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A hand crushes grapes while the other holds audio equipment.\" width=\"1333\" height=\"2000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED.jpg 1333w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-800x1200.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-1020x1530.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/09/240916-WINE-COUNTRY-MUSIC-BP-06-KQED-1024x1536.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1333px) 100vw, 1333px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brook Munro records himself crushing wine grapes during harvest season. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Michelle Cordova)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Munro said he hopes “Harvest in Twelve Parts” inspires others to embrace experimentation — in both music and wine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If someone else took their experiences into the vineyard, into the cellar, into the barrel room, and they crafted something musically or artistically, it would be beautiful, and it wouldn’t sound like me — it would sound like them,” he said. “Music and wine, the end result is always going to be very much an extension of the person who created it.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "oakland-composer-and-harpist-destiny-muhammad-has-always-charted-her-own-path",
"title": "Oakland Composer and Harpist Destiny Muhammad Has Always Charted Her Own Path",
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"headTitle": "Oakland Composer and Harpist Destiny Muhammad Has Always Charted Her Own Path | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dropcap]S[/dropcap]itting on stage with her harp resting in her lap, Destiny Muhammad repeats this mantra: “Excellence, Beauty, and Success.” It’s part mic-check and part pump-up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she first started learning to play the harp, the Oakland-based composer and musician used to suffer from stage fright. Now, more than 30 years later, she commands the stage with a presence fit for a woman who calls herself the “sound sculptress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her acclaimed career has been peppered with awards and honors, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.recordingacademy.com/membership/governance\">Governor of the Board for the SF Chapter of the Recording Academy\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://arts.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/CAC_INA_2021_Fellows.pdf\">California Arts Council Legacy Fellow\u003c/a>. But before she was any of this, she was a self-described “shorty in Compton,” inspired by \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZuh8r93yqM\">watching Harpo Marx play the harp on an episode of \u003cem>I Love Lucy\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad was 9 years old, and that was the first time she had ever seen a harp. She was mesmerized. “That’s what I want to do,” she remembers saying. But when she ran out to tell her mom her revelation, she was stopped in her tracks. Her mother had just gotten divorced from her father, and they were struggling, living in what she calls the “projects,” surviving on welfare and food stamps. Playing the harp was not a dream that Muhammad could afford to have. So she put it in the back of her mind, where it lived quietly for the next decade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she graduated high school, she hoped to go to college to finally be able to study music, but financial circumstances required her to follow her mother’s advice instead and get her barber’s license. She opened her first barber shop when she was 21 years old. It was the height of the crack epidemic, but she was making a good living for herself, and she liked the work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11995890\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11995890\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"Two people in a barber shop, one about to cut the other's hair.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad at her barbershop circa 1990. \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy of Destiny Muhammad)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Then, serendipity struck. She was dating a man who was friends with a harp builder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s when the dream came rushing back,” Muhammad says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Didn’t I say I wanted to do this when I was a shorty back in Compton, watching an episode of \u003cem>I Love Lucy\u003c/em>? I said I wanted to do this!”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Do we, as Black people, do this?’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Muhammad bought her first harp on layaway for $400. But she had no idea how to play it, so she started taking lessons. It was a humbling experience. At 30 years old, she was the oldest student in the class. Her peers also had more resources and a lineage of European classical music training. And one other big thing stood out: the color of her skin. Her friends and family questioned what she, a Black woman, was doing playing a harp: “Do we, as Black people, do that?” she says, remembering those conversations. She recalls one particularly painful moment when a friend called her up to go out dancing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘Hey girl, I can’t go, I’m practicing. I’m learning how to play the harp,’” she told her friend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The friend says: “‘Harp? Girl, you are old and Black, and we don’t do that.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She remembers looking at the phone and then looking at her harp. Back then, she says, you could slam the phone down. But she didn’t. She just hung up and let her talk to the dial tone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Destiny Muhammad wasn’t deterred by her friend’s doubts or the obstacles that stood in her way. In her heart, she knew she didn’t have a choice: “Even though the path didn’t appear charted, I knew that I had to move forward on it in the only way I could,” she says. “For Destiny Muhammad, the path was always invisible until I would take the step.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11995889\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11995889\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A woman playing the harp with several sunflowers behind her.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad at a Bay Area Farmers Market circa 2005. \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy of Destiny Muhammad)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Her big break came when she started playing at farmers markets around the Bay Area. She would spend hours playing to no one in particular, slowly adding more songs into her sets and then her own improvised pieces as she got more comfortable. And then someone walked up to her and asked her to play at their wedding. That was her first paid gig.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>From Celtic to Coltrane\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Destiny Muhammad calls her musical style “Celtic to Coltrane.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m cross-pollinating between straight-ahead Celtic music and straight-ahead jazz… I hear the jazz in the Celtic music,” she explains.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the first songs she learned to play were traditional Celtic compositions. She was captivated by the stories behind these classics, like \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeP5tDroavw\">the Irish song “The Butterfly Jig” from the early 1900s\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad says that when researching the song, she found it was originally called “The Widow’s Jig” because so many women lost their husbands during the Irish Potato Famine. When these widows came with their children to the United States, the song’s name changed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Butterflies are symbolic, at least for me, of transformation and evolution,” Muhammad says. “And that just brought it to life for me. I have kept it in at least a part of my sets because I love that story of transformation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/q-0flgjUBfE?si=myjmd6-4sLBYDDVP&t=117\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Coltrane in “Celtic to Coltrane” refers to none other than the multi-instrumentalist Alice Coltrane. Known as Alice McLeod before she married fellow jazz musician John Coltrane, Alice was one of the few harpists in the jazz world in the late 1960s. Her music is ethereal, free, and genre-bending.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12000831\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2502px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12000831\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white photo of a Black woman playing the harp\" width=\"2502\" height=\"2424\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane.jpg 2502w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-800x775.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1020x988.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-160x155.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1536x1488.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-2048x1984.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1920x1860.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2502px) 100vw, 2502px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">American jazz musician and composer Alice Coltrane (1937 – 2007), playing a harp, circa 1965. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I heard Alice Coltrane on the radio on the jazz station. And I’m hearing this pentatonic empress just flourishing. I was like, ‘Oh my God, what is that?’” Muhammad remembers. She plays songs written by both Coltranes in her sets, and you can hear the influence of these two jazz greats in her original compositions.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Composing with the edginess of Oakland\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Today, Destiny Muhammad works as a composer, performer and teacher in the Bay Area, where she’s been for the last 30 years. She composes original scores for her group, The Destiny Muhammad Trio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWuJKGB3nCM\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her style of composition is personal and inspired by another jazz great: “Duke Ellington would write scores out for his musicians. But as opposed to putting sax here, drum here, he would put the person’s name because he knew exactly how they were going to interpret what he shared with them,” Muhammad says. “And that’s the way I feel with many of the musicians. When I pick a person … I’ve already felt them breathe life into my composition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also doesn’t feel constrained to rely on traditional sheet music notation: “If you ever look at sheet music, especially music that’s scored out for a particular type of ensemble, the composer will have markings or words in there about how to interpret. They might even usually have it in Italian. My Italian is at zero. So I wrote, “‘Give me a gangsta feel right here. Hella gangster right here.’ You know, I live in Oakland. We say stuff like that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She says her musicians in Oakland respond well to this unorthodox composition because they play with a unique “gutsiness” and “edginess” that she loves. “There’s a level of refinement without being edited,” she says. “I love Oakland and the Bay Area for that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The long way around\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Destiny Muhammad describes her career trajectory as “the long way around.” She says she probably could have been famous earlier, but it would have compromised her integrity. Like the time, a photographer asked her if she wanted to do a photoshoot naked in the woods with her harp.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I said, ‘How about we don’t!’” Muhammad says, laughing. “There are just some things I’m just not going to do. I have too many ancestors to answer to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This doesn’t mean she hasn’t had brushes with major celebrity though. In 2019, Kanye West, who now goes by Ye, invited her to play at his infamous Sunday Services in Los Angeles. These weekly concerts were hosted at secret locations and featured a gospel choir, music, and speakers. Guests included David Letterman, Katy Perry, Brad Pitt, and A$AP Rocky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad played a few Sundays before she was cut. “I am grateful. I can honestly say he paid on time,” she says of the experience working with Ye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And the funds that I secured from my work with him helped us to purchase another vehicle. Amen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11990530\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11990530\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woman playing the harp in white while people do yoga behind her. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad, a Bay Area musician, vocalist and composer, plays the harp during a yoga class at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco on June 12. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of her weekly gigs now is playing the harp during a yoga class at San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral. Hearing her play in this space with soaring ceilings and light filtering in through stained glass windows adds a reverence to her music. She plays with her eyes closed, head bowed as if in prayer. Here, Muhammad isn’t just playing music; she’s channeling something bigger through it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The spirit of humanity, even in the midst of the madness as we see it now. I know the spirit is good. The real spirit is good. I get a chance to evoke it every opportunity I get.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s what keeps her as excited about the harp today as she was when she got her first one on layaway 30 years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "When she first started learning to play the harp, she suffered from stage fright. Now, more than 30 years later, she commands the stage with a presence fit for a woman who calls herself the 'sound sculptress.",
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"title": "Oakland Composer and Harpist Destiny Muhammad Has Always Charted Her Own Path | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">S\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>itting on stage with her harp resting in her lap, Destiny Muhammad repeats this mantra: “Excellence, Beauty, and Success.” It’s part mic-check and part pump-up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she first started learning to play the harp, the Oakland-based composer and musician used to suffer from stage fright. Now, more than 30 years later, she commands the stage with a presence fit for a woman who calls herself the “sound sculptress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her acclaimed career has been peppered with awards and honors, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.recordingacademy.com/membership/governance\">Governor of the Board for the SF Chapter of the Recording Academy\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://arts.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/CAC_INA_2021_Fellows.pdf\">California Arts Council Legacy Fellow\u003c/a>. But before she was any of this, she was a self-described “shorty in Compton,” inspired by \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZuh8r93yqM\">watching Harpo Marx play the harp on an episode of \u003cem>I Love Lucy\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad was 9 years old, and that was the first time she had ever seen a harp. She was mesmerized. “That’s what I want to do,” she remembers saying. But when she ran out to tell her mom her revelation, she was stopped in her tracks. Her mother had just gotten divorced from her father, and they were struggling, living in what she calls the “projects,” surviving on welfare and food stamps. Playing the harp was not a dream that Muhammad could afford to have. So she put it in the back of her mind, where it lived quietly for the next decade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When she graduated high school, she hoped to go to college to finally be able to study music, but financial circumstances required her to follow her mother’s advice instead and get her barber’s license. She opened her first barber shop when she was 21 years old. It was the height of the crack epidemic, but she was making a good living for herself, and she liked the work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11995890\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11995890\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"Two people in a barber shop, one about to cut the other's hair.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-02-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad at her barbershop circa 1990. \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy of Destiny Muhammad)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Then, serendipity struck. She was dating a man who was friends with a harp builder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s when the dream came rushing back,” Muhammad says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Didn’t I say I wanted to do this when I was a shorty back in Compton, watching an episode of \u003cem>I Love Lucy\u003c/em>? I said I wanted to do this!”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Do we, as Black people, do this?’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Muhammad bought her first harp on layaway for $400. But she had no idea how to play it, so she started taking lessons. It was a humbling experience. At 30 years old, she was the oldest student in the class. Her peers also had more resources and a lineage of European classical music training. And one other big thing stood out: the color of her skin. Her friends and family questioned what she, a Black woman, was doing playing a harp: “Do we, as Black people, do that?” she says, remembering those conversations. She recalls one particularly painful moment when a friend called her up to go out dancing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘Hey girl, I can’t go, I’m practicing. I’m learning how to play the harp,’” she told her friend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The friend says: “‘Harp? Girl, you are old and Black, and we don’t do that.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She remembers looking at the phone and then looking at her harp. Back then, she says, you could slam the phone down. But she didn’t. She just hung up and let her talk to the dial tone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Destiny Muhammad wasn’t deterred by her friend’s doubts or the obstacles that stood in her way. In her heart, she knew she didn’t have a choice: “Even though the path didn’t appear charted, I knew that I had to move forward on it in the only way I could,” she says. “For Destiny Muhammad, the path was always invisible until I would take the step.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11995889\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11995889\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A woman playing the harp with several sunflowers behind her.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1500\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/07/DESTINY-MUHAMMAD-01-KQED-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad at a Bay Area Farmers Market circa 2005. \u003ccite>(Photo Courtesy of Destiny Muhammad)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Her big break came when she started playing at farmers markets around the Bay Area. She would spend hours playing to no one in particular, slowly adding more songs into her sets and then her own improvised pieces as she got more comfortable. And then someone walked up to her and asked her to play at their wedding. That was her first paid gig.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>From Celtic to Coltrane\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Destiny Muhammad calls her musical style “Celtic to Coltrane.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m cross-pollinating between straight-ahead Celtic music and straight-ahead jazz… I hear the jazz in the Celtic music,” she explains.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the first songs she learned to play were traditional Celtic compositions. She was captivated by the stories behind these classics, like \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeP5tDroavw\">the Irish song “The Butterfly Jig” from the early 1900s\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad says that when researching the song, she found it was originally called “The Widow’s Jig” because so many women lost their husbands during the Irish Potato Famine. When these widows came with their children to the United States, the song’s name changed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Butterflies are symbolic, at least for me, of transformation and evolution,” Muhammad says. “And that just brought it to life for me. I have kept it in at least a part of my sets because I love that story of transformation.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/q-0flgjUBfE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/q-0flgjUBfE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The Coltrane in “Celtic to Coltrane” refers to none other than the multi-instrumentalist Alice Coltrane. Known as Alice McLeod before she married fellow jazz musician John Coltrane, Alice was one of the few harpists in the jazz world in the late 1960s. Her music is ethereal, free, and genre-bending.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12000831\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2502px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12000831\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white photo of a Black woman playing the harp\" width=\"2502\" height=\"2424\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane.jpg 2502w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-800x775.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1020x988.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-160x155.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1536x1488.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-2048x1984.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/Cropped_Coltrane-1920x1860.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2502px) 100vw, 2502px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">American jazz musician and composer Alice Coltrane (1937 – 2007), playing a harp, circa 1965. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I heard Alice Coltrane on the radio on the jazz station. And I’m hearing this pentatonic empress just flourishing. I was like, ‘Oh my God, what is that?’” Muhammad remembers. She plays songs written by both Coltranes in her sets, and you can hear the influence of these two jazz greats in her original compositions.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Composing with the edginess of Oakland\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Today, Destiny Muhammad works as a composer, performer and teacher in the Bay Area, where she’s been for the last 30 years. She composes original scores for her group, The Destiny Muhammad Trio.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/WWuJKGB3nCM'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/WWuJKGB3nCM'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Her style of composition is personal and inspired by another jazz great: “Duke Ellington would write scores out for his musicians. But as opposed to putting sax here, drum here, he would put the person’s name because he knew exactly how they were going to interpret what he shared with them,” Muhammad says. “And that’s the way I feel with many of the musicians. When I pick a person … I’ve already felt them breathe life into my composition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also doesn’t feel constrained to rely on traditional sheet music notation: “If you ever look at sheet music, especially music that’s scored out for a particular type of ensemble, the composer will have markings or words in there about how to interpret. They might even usually have it in Italian. My Italian is at zero. So I wrote, “‘Give me a gangsta feel right here. Hella gangster right here.’ You know, I live in Oakland. We say stuff like that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She says her musicians in Oakland respond well to this unorthodox composition because they play with a unique “gutsiness” and “edginess” that she loves. “There’s a level of refinement without being edited,” she says. “I love Oakland and the Bay Area for that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The long way around\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Destiny Muhammad describes her career trajectory as “the long way around.” She says she probably could have been famous earlier, but it would have compromised her integrity. Like the time, a photographer asked her if she wanted to do a photoshoot naked in the woods with her harp.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I said, ‘How about we don’t!’” Muhammad says, laughing. “There are just some things I’m just not going to do. I have too many ancestors to answer to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This doesn’t mean she hasn’t had brushes with major celebrity though. In 2019, Kanye West, who now goes by Ye, invited her to play at his infamous Sunday Services in Los Angeles. These weekly concerts were hosted at secret locations and featured a gospel choir, music, and speakers. Guests included David Letterman, Katy Perry, Brad Pitt, and A$AP Rocky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Muhammad played a few Sundays before she was cut. “I am grateful. I can honestly say he paid on time,” she says of the experience working with Ye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And the funds that I secured from my work with him helped us to purchase another vehicle. Amen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11990530\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11990530\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woman playing the harp in white while people do yoga behind her. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240611-DestinyMuhammad-22-BL_qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Destiny Muhammad, a Bay Area musician, vocalist and composer, plays the harp during a yoga class at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco on June 12. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of her weekly gigs now is playing the harp during a yoga class at San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral. Hearing her play in this space with soaring ceilings and light filtering in through stained glass windows adds a reverence to her music. She plays with her eyes closed, head bowed as if in prayer. Here, Muhammad isn’t just playing music; she’s channeling something bigger through it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The spirit of humanity, even in the midst of the madness as we see it now. I know the spirit is good. The real spirit is good. I get a chance to evoke it every opportunity I get.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s what keeps her as excited about the harp today as she was when she got her first one on layaway 30 years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "'Always Looking Up and Looking Out': This Young LA Composer's Music Is Guided by the Cosmos",
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"content": "\u003cp>When Derrick Skye began the process of composing his piece “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps,” he was watching YouTube videos about Jupiter. He was captivated by the way the planet’s stripes and swirls move at different speeds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s almost like there’s a river going at one speed, and something is floating over the top of the river at a different rate,” said the Los Angeles-based composer. He wanted to somehow capture this idea in the new piece, so he created a flute solo melody that sounds like it’s detached from the rhythm underneath.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That rhythm is based on a bell pattern from traditional Ewe music; the Ewe people are an ethnic group living in Ghana and Togo. But instead of being played on a bell or a drum, Skye decided that the strings would play the challenging pattern. “That particular rhythm is a little bit tricky to get into the body,” said Skye. “But that’s fine with me: I think we all have to want to go on an adventure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once he had the rhythm and the melody down, Skye used those as a framework to improvise and find the other parts of the piece. “I like to set up parameters, and then discover on top of those,” he said. The basses and cellos perform a rhythm that’s based on a traditional Ewe piece called Adzogbo, which is usually played on a lead drum called atsimevu.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” is a work in three parts. The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra performed the first part back in 2015, and the second in 2018. The third part premiered in April this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCVLScWOdsY\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The meaning behind ‘Prisms, Cycles, Leaps’ actually goes back to the meaning of all my work,” Skye explained. “[Which is that] I love struggling to create holistic music … where you can have a total embrace of every style of music equally, and [explore] what kind of music can come out when you value every genre and every approach.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a Southern California native, Skye aims to create a musical language that reflects the way the state embraces people. “This place really feels a lot like what I go through when I’m writing my music,” he said. “There are people from all over the world in this state. Everybody’s here, trying to figure out how to work together, grow together, and excel together. There’s frustrations. But somehow, we manage to press on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye has always been drawn to music, even as a child. “I remember being at church and seeing the drum set,” he said. “I just thought that was super cool, and it felt good when I heard it. So I was like, I wonder how I can make those sounds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998279\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998279\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1708\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1020x681.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-2048x1367.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1920x1281.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Derrick Skye conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London, April 2024. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Madison Phipps)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>His other passion was space: Skye has always been fascinated by the cosmos. “For the majority of my younger years, I wanted to be an astronaut.” But this lofty dream went on the back burner, and Skye pursued music: he played the trombone in music class at school. “I practiced really, really hard. I always want to be the best I can be at something when I put my mind to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye continued playing the trombone when he went to study at UCLA. He was heading home after practice one night, when he heard West African music drifting from a concert hall. He went inside to check it out, and was hooked. This fascination led him to explore Indian classical music too, and then music from the Balkans. Those three cultures form the building blocks of Skye’s work today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I always wanted to hear an orchestra play these types of things, and I just could never hear it. So I started writing it,” Skye said. “The most interesting stuff to me comes out of when things merge together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Part of the reason Derrick resonates with so many different musical traditions is because he has a really diverse ancestry: He has Nigerian, Ghanaian, Congolese British, Irish and Indigenous American heritage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After graduating, Derrick worked as a teaching artist for the LA Philharmonic, and assistant conductor for the Santa Clarita Valley Youth Orchestra — alongside composing his music. He decided to submit “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” to the LA Chamber Orchestra through a new music program. “I assumed that it was highly likely that I could end up just being a one hit wonder in classical music, and I just refused to go out like that,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998283\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998283\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Derrick Skye conducting the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra at Walt Disney Concert Hall. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Jasmine Sefaeian)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skye decided to take matters into his own hands. He gathered a group of musician friends together to record a CD of the piece, which is unusual in classical music. He then released it at the same time as the orchestra premiered the piece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was selling the CD there in person. People walked out of the hall and they were like, ‘wow, I wish I could hear that again.’ I was like, ‘Oh, guess what, you can!’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Word spread, and Skye’s career began to take off. “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” was played by orchestras in Canada, the UK and the Netherlands. Then new commissions started rolling in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was over the moon,” he said. “I thought, I just might make this work. I might be able to have this highly sought after job in the classical world where someone says, ‘well what do you do?’, and you say, ‘I write orchestra music for concerts.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye has collaborated with the LA Chamber Orchestra for almost 10 years, and serves as one of its artistic advisors. Executive director Ben Cadwallader said Skye is “one of those artists where if you give him a boundary or a genre, he doesn’t just push outside it, he redefines it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998285\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2400px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998285\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2400\" height=\"1597\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago.jpg 2400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Skye with the San Francisco Symphony and vocalist Ellie Goulding in November 2023. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Nicole Mago)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“He has this obsession with creating new forms of expression. I don’t know of a composer, I don’t know of an artist, who accomplishes this with more elegance and artistry, and authenticity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Part of the way Skye achieves this authenticity is through learning. He considers himself a lifelong student, and regularly takes classes with expert teachers. Skye is aware that there can be questions over who is entitled to make music from different traditions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People have this idea of cultural appropriation,” he said. “What I always do is tell the truth. I don’t know absolutely everything there is to know about West African music. But I don’t need to know everything there is to know about West African music for it to be a part of my life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[It’s about saying] ‘I was inspired by this legacy of music and these people in that legacy.’ And that has to be enough. Because if that’s not enough, then we’re going to go back to segregation, where only the people from West Africa can play West African music. And I’m not doing that. I don’t think anybody wants that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You just need to be honest with where your knowledge ends, and how you’ve incorporated these things in your art. Because ultimately, everybody borrows from everyone, forever.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye doesn’t only draw from different cultures; he blends genres and forms too. In a new piece released last year, called “God of the Gaps,” he brought Persian classical music together with electronic music. His starting point was a sample of tar, a Persian stringed instrument, played by his teacher Pirayeh Pourafar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAug5xuOY2Y\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye is a musician who refuses to conform to convention; it’s an approach he takes to his own identity too. In the summer of 2021, he changed his last name from Spiva — which was the name given to his enslaved ancestors — to Skye. “I just don’t like accepting things for the way they are because that’s the way it is,” he said.\u003cbr>\nHe chose the name Skye as a nod to his love of astronomy. “I felt like that best described the essence of my being, is always looking up and looking out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Initially Skye was apprehensive, primarily about his family’s reaction, but they’ve been supportive. “I just felt empowered,” he said. “I got to change my name. And I got to make sure that the state called me what I wanted to be called. And this is the same state with the history of erasing people’s names and culture. I was able to get them [to acknowledge] … ‘this is what I’m going to be called’ and have them say it. And they did that. And I was happy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This idea of being recognized and feeling valued is actually what Skye wants his audience to feel. So if you’re sitting in a concert hall listening to a Derrick Skye piece, you might hear something of yourself — no matter where you come from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998286\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2400px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998286\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2400\" height=\"1597\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1.jpg 2400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Skye with the San Francisco Symphony at Davis Symphony Hall in November 2023. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Nicole Mago)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Derrick Skye's fascination with the cosmos is threaded into all his music — including his latest composition 'Prisms, Cycles, Leaps,' which premiered this spring. The LA-based composer explains how he brings his otherworldly ideas to life.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>When Derrick Skye began the process of composing his piece “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps,” he was watching YouTube videos about Jupiter. He was captivated by the way the planet’s stripes and swirls move at different speeds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s almost like there’s a river going at one speed, and something is floating over the top of the river at a different rate,” said the Los Angeles-based composer. He wanted to somehow capture this idea in the new piece, so he created a flute solo melody that sounds like it’s detached from the rhythm underneath.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That rhythm is based on a bell pattern from traditional Ewe music; the Ewe people are an ethnic group living in Ghana and Togo. But instead of being played on a bell or a drum, Skye decided that the strings would play the challenging pattern. “That particular rhythm is a little bit tricky to get into the body,” said Skye. “But that’s fine with me: I think we all have to want to go on an adventure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once he had the rhythm and the melody down, Skye used those as a framework to improvise and find the other parts of the piece. “I like to set up parameters, and then discover on top of those,” he said. The basses and cellos perform a rhythm that’s based on a traditional Ewe piece called Adzogbo, which is usually played on a lead drum called atsimevu.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” is a work in three parts. The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra performed the first part back in 2015, and the second in 2018. The third part premiered in April this year.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/FCVLScWOdsY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/FCVLScWOdsY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“The meaning behind ‘Prisms, Cycles, Leaps’ actually goes back to the meaning of all my work,” Skye explained. “[Which is that] I love struggling to create holistic music … where you can have a total embrace of every style of music equally, and [explore] what kind of music can come out when you value every genre and every approach.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a Southern California native, Skye aims to create a musical language that reflects the way the state embraces people. “This place really feels a lot like what I go through when I’m writing my music,” he said. “There are people from all over the world in this state. Everybody’s here, trying to figure out how to work together, grow together, and excel together. There’s frustrations. But somehow, we manage to press on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye has always been drawn to music, even as a child. “I remember being at church and seeing the drum set,” he said. “I just thought that was super cool, and it felt good when I heard it. So I was like, I wonder how I can make those sounds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998279\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998279\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1708\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1020x681.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-2048x1367.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/L1054055-Crediting-Madison-Phipps-1920x1281.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Derrick Skye conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London, April 2024. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Madison Phipps)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>His other passion was space: Skye has always been fascinated by the cosmos. “For the majority of my younger years, I wanted to be an astronaut.” But this lofty dream went on the back burner, and Skye pursued music: he played the trombone in music class at school. “I practiced really, really hard. I always want to be the best I can be at something when I put my mind to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye continued playing the trombone when he went to study at UCLA. He was heading home after practice one night, when he heard West African music drifting from a concert hall. He went inside to check it out, and was hooked. This fascination led him to explore Indian classical music too, and then music from the Balkans. Those three cultures form the building blocks of Skye’s work today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I always wanted to hear an orchestra play these types of things, and I just could never hear it. So I started writing it,” Skye said. “The most interesting stuff to me comes out of when things merge together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Part of the reason Derrick resonates with so many different musical traditions is because he has a really diverse ancestry: He has Nigerian, Ghanaian, Congolese British, Irish and Indigenous American heritage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After graduating, Derrick worked as a teaching artist for the LA Philharmonic, and assistant conductor for the Santa Clarita Valley Youth Orchestra — alongside composing his music. He decided to submit “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” to the LA Chamber Orchestra through a new music program. “I assumed that it was highly likely that I could end up just being a one hit wonder in classical music, and I just refused to go out like that,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998283\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998283\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/YASI6727-Crediting-Yasi-aka-Jasmine-Safaeian-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Derrick Skye conducting the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra at Walt Disney Concert Hall. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Jasmine Sefaeian)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skye decided to take matters into his own hands. He gathered a group of musician friends together to record a CD of the piece, which is unusual in classical music. He then released it at the same time as the orchestra premiered the piece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was selling the CD there in person. People walked out of the hall and they were like, ‘wow, I wish I could hear that again.’ I was like, ‘Oh, guess what, you can!’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Word spread, and Skye’s career began to take off. “Prisms, Cycles, Leaps” was played by orchestras in Canada, the UK and the Netherlands. Then new commissions started rolling in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was over the moon,” he said. “I thought, I just might make this work. I might be able to have this highly sought after job in the classical world where someone says, ‘well what do you do?’, and you say, ‘I write orchestra music for concerts.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye has collaborated with the LA Chamber Orchestra for almost 10 years, and serves as one of its artistic advisors. Executive director Ben Cadwallader said Skye is “one of those artists where if you give him a boundary or a genre, he doesn’t just push outside it, he redefines it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998285\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2400px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998285\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2400\" height=\"1597\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago.jpg 2400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-11-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Skye with the San Francisco Symphony and vocalist Ellie Goulding in November 2023. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Nicole Mago)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“He has this obsession with creating new forms of expression. I don’t know of a composer, I don’t know of an artist, who accomplishes this with more elegance and artistry, and authenticity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Part of the way Skye achieves this authenticity is through learning. He considers himself a lifelong student, and regularly takes classes with expert teachers. Skye is aware that there can be questions over who is entitled to make music from different traditions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People have this idea of cultural appropriation,” he said. “What I always do is tell the truth. I don’t know absolutely everything there is to know about West African music. But I don’t need to know everything there is to know about West African music for it to be a part of my life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[It’s about saying] ‘I was inspired by this legacy of music and these people in that legacy.’ And that has to be enough. Because if that’s not enough, then we’re going to go back to segregation, where only the people from West Africa can play West African music. And I’m not doing that. I don’t think anybody wants that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You just need to be honest with where your knowledge ends, and how you’ve incorporated these things in your art. Because ultimately, everybody borrows from everyone, forever.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skye doesn’t only draw from different cultures; he blends genres and forms too. In a new piece released last year, called “God of the Gaps,” he brought Persian classical music together with electronic music. His starting point was a sample of tar, a Persian stringed instrument, played by his teacher Pirayeh Pourafar.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/QAug5xuOY2Y'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/QAug5xuOY2Y'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Skye is a musician who refuses to conform to convention; it’s an approach he takes to his own identity too. In the summer of 2021, he changed his last name from Spiva — which was the name given to his enslaved ancestors — to Skye. “I just don’t like accepting things for the way they are because that’s the way it is,” he said.\u003cbr>\nHe chose the name Skye as a nod to his love of astronomy. “I felt like that best described the essence of my being, is always looking up and looking out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Initially Skye was apprehensive, primarily about his family’s reaction, but they’ve been supportive. “I just felt empowered,” he said. “I got to change my name. And I got to make sure that the state called me what I wanted to be called. And this is the same state with the history of erasing people’s names and culture. I was able to get them [to acknowledge] … ‘this is what I’m going to be called’ and have them say it. And they did that. And I was happy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This idea of being recognized and feeling valued is actually what Skye wants his audience to feel. So if you’re sitting in a concert hall listening to a Derrick Skye piece, you might hear something of yourself — no matter where you come from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11998286\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2400px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11998286\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2400\" height=\"1597\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1.jpg 2400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/08/EG-SF-16-Crediting-Nicole-Mago-1-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Skye with the San Francisco Symphony at Davis Symphony Hall in November 2023. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Nicole Mago)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "heavy-classical-how-composer-jens-ibsen-is-shaking-up-the-classical-music-world",
"title": "Metal Symphony: How Bay Area Composer Jens Ibsen Is Shaking up the Classical Music World",
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"headTitle": "Metal Symphony: How Bay Area Composer Jens Ibsen Is Shaking up the Classical Music World | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>When Bay Area composer Jens Ibsen made his debut with the Sacalifornia composers Francisco Symphony last year, he wanted to do something different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, for his symphony piece, titled “Drowned in Light,” he took inspiration from one of his less traditional passions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted the piece to sound really metal, and I feel like I got to do that,” Ibsen, 28, says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece melds thrilling electric guitar solos and a pounding drum kit with the cinematic strings of the symphony. Ibsen’s goal was to bring together the intellectual stimulation of classical music with the physically stimulating aspects of rock. And his distinctive approach has lately garnered much attention.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975829\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975829\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A choir group sits in a semicircle, each in front of a music stand, facing a conductor\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen (with face mask) works with the professional San Francisco choir Volti during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Drowned in Light,” which premiered last November, was the result of a $15,000 commission from the San Francisco Symphony and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And since then, the commissions have kept coming. Ibsen recently premiered a work with the professional San Francisco choir \u003ca href=\"http://voltisf.org/\">Volti\u003c/a> in late February, and he’s currently working on a children’s opera that will debut at the Glimmerglass Festival in New York in August. This blending of styles comes from his almost life-long study of music, but it’s also an inherent part of his being.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen was born in Ghana to a Ghanaian mother and an American father.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Music is kind of the reason why I’m around,” he says. His father developed a passion for the drums and traveled to Ghana to learn more from the source. “To make an extremely long story short, he met my mother and came back with a whole new family.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen’s parents moved to the Bay Area when he and his twin sister were 10 months old. For the most part, the soundtrack to their early life was not in English. Rather, they absorbed African music, like Ghanaian highlife and Brazilian Samba and Candomble.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975831\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975831\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man sits in front of a laptop that has musical notation on the screen.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen works with the professional San Francisco choir Volti on one of his original compositions during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ibsen’s classical career began in elementary school at the suggestion of his music teacher, who sent him home one day with a flier to audition for the Grammy-award-winning \u003ca href=\"https://ragazzi.org/\">Ragazzi Boys Chorus \u003c/a>in Silicon Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, ‘Well, if I become a singer, then I’ll be cool. If I’m cool, that means girls will like me,” Ibsen says with a laugh. “And that’s all the motivation I needed as an 8-year-old.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a kid who had struggled to fit in socially, Ibsen soon found that the choir was one of the few outlets where he could be himself and feel good about it. It also helped that he was very good at it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11989226\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 503px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11989226\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"503\" height=\"671\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg 1500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-800x1066.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-1020x1359.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-1153x1536.jpg 1153w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 503px) 100vw, 503px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jens Ibsen plays piano at his childhood home in Pacifica on Jan. 26, 2024. \u003ccite>(Jessica Kariisa/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Several years later, at the age of 11, he got the opportunity to audition for the world-renowned Vienna Boys Choir.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think I’ve ever been more nervous in my life,” he remembers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He didn’t have any reason to be. Ibsen’s training with Ragazzi, not to mention his natural talent, prepared him well, and he was immediately offered a spot in the choir, becoming its first African-born member.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He packed up and moved to a palace in Austria, where the boys in the choir lived, went to school, and sang. Ibsen was excited and nervous about this big change in life, but he didn’t anticipate what he would encounter when he arrived.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never experienced more overt racism than I did when I lived in Austria,” he says. “Everything I did was seen as alien and foreign. I was hazed the entire time I was there. So that was really, really difficult.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After two and a half years with the choir, Ibsen came back to the Bay Area to start school at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfusd.edu/school/ruth-asawa-san-francisco-school-arts\">Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts\u003c/a>. Having heard a student was coming from a famous boys choir, incoming students started friending him on Facebook over the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike in Austria, he says, they were appreciative of what Ibsen would contribute to the school. It was a welcome change from the isolation he experienced in Vienna, and it was there that he first started composing music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>His first piece was for piano, one inspired by the Japanese video game Kingdom Hearts and its piano-forward score by composer Yoko Shimomura.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/QlQsZqXgD90?si=jelFTBup0pY6fhLu\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen’s path to metal music came by way of Japan as well. He grew up watching anime, and the ending theme of one of his favorite shows, Hunter x Hunter, was a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyIoNt2m1Gw\">song by the Japanese power metal band Galneryus\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hearing that, along with music from other Japanese metal bands like Dir En Grey, was transformative, Ibsen says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Discovering them was sort of a moment like, ‘Oh, music can be like this,’ ” he says. “It also made me experiment as a vocalist more with my range because you have these metal guys singing notes that you never hear in opera.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/o8-iem35c-E\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When it comes to writing music, Ibsen says he doesn’t wait for inspiration to strike. He likens the process to a daily routine, like remembering to turn off the stove at night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very disciplined about writing. I sit down, and I set a chunk of time, and I just do it, and I revise it later until it’s perfect,” he says. “If you have something down, you can decide how you feel. But if you have nothing, you’ve got nothing, right?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen has composed for ensembles as grand as a symphony and as stripped down as piano and voice. But these days, he says, almost every idea starts the same way — on his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll often make voice notes or text notes or both. If you even read one of these notes, you’re not going to have any idea what it’s going to sound like,” he says. “It’s just enough for me to be able to recall what I’ve stored internally. So it’s more like I’m creating these verbal triggers for myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975836\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975836\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A young Black man with a black face mask speaks to an older white man, with a stage curtain behind them.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen speaks with conductor Robert Geary after a practice session with the professional San Francisco choir Volti at the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>From there, he’ll transfer the ideas into notation software on his laptop where he’ll finesse the compositions until they are complete.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The material has to sort of live in my head for a while. And then the material tells me where it’s supposed to go,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2022, Jens won the second annual\u003ca href=\"https://sfcm.edu/discover/initiatives/emerging-black-composers-project\"> Emerging Black Composers\u003c/a> award. The prize was the commission that ended up becoming “Drowned In Light.” He says that after experiencing such blatant racism in the Vienna Boys Choir, receiving this distinguished award years later, based in part on his race, elicited a complicated set of emotions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975828\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975828\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A document titled 'How god comes to the soul,' sits on someone's lap,\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A composition by composer Jens Ibsen, ‘How god comes to the soul,’ sits on the lap of an attendee during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“For a while, I felt cynical because it felt like I’ve been good this whole time. Why now?” he says. “But I look back on the cynicism and I have a little more empathy for myself because I can see that these people like me because they believe in my art.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen says he hopes his experience can inspire musical institutions to continue to support the work of other artists pushing the boundaries of music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to keep this energy for composers of all kinds of marginalized backgrounds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story has been updated to correct a mis-identification of the professional San Francisco choir Volti.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Ibsen is pushing the limits of classical music by infusing his compositions with prog rock and metal — a bold, nontraditional approach that is garnering the attention of major institutions, like the San Francisco Symphony. ",
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"title": "Metal Symphony: How Bay Area Composer Jens Ibsen Is Shaking up the Classical Music World | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>When Bay Area composer Jens Ibsen made his debut with the Sacalifornia composers Francisco Symphony last year, he wanted to do something different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, for his symphony piece, titled “Drowned in Light,” he took inspiration from one of his less traditional passions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted the piece to sound really metal, and I feel like I got to do that,” Ibsen, 28, says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece melds thrilling electric guitar solos and a pounding drum kit with the cinematic strings of the symphony. Ibsen’s goal was to bring together the intellectual stimulation of classical music with the physically stimulating aspects of rock. And his distinctive approach has lately garnered much attention.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975829\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975829\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A choir group sits in a semicircle, each in front of a music stand, facing a conductor\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-18-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen (with face mask) works with the professional San Francisco choir Volti during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Drowned in Light,” which premiered last November, was the result of a $15,000 commission from the San Francisco Symphony and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And since then, the commissions have kept coming. Ibsen recently premiered a work with the professional San Francisco choir \u003ca href=\"http://voltisf.org/\">Volti\u003c/a> in late February, and he’s currently working on a children’s opera that will debut at the Glimmerglass Festival in New York in August. This blending of styles comes from his almost life-long study of music, but it’s also an inherent part of his being.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen was born in Ghana to a Ghanaian mother and an American father.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Music is kind of the reason why I’m around,” he says. His father developed a passion for the drums and traveled to Ghana to learn more from the source. “To make an extremely long story short, he met my mother and came back with a whole new family.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen’s parents moved to the Bay Area when he and his twin sister were 10 months old. For the most part, the soundtrack to their early life was not in English. Rather, they absorbed African music, like Ghanaian highlife and Brazilian Samba and Candomble.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975831\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975831\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A man sits in front of a laptop that has musical notation on the screen.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-26-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen works with the professional San Francisco choir Volti on one of his original compositions during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ibsen’s classical career began in elementary school at the suggestion of his music teacher, who sent him home one day with a flier to audition for the Grammy-award-winning \u003ca href=\"https://ragazzi.org/\">Ragazzi Boys Chorus \u003c/a>in Silicon Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was like, ‘Well, if I become a singer, then I’ll be cool. If I’m cool, that means girls will like me,” Ibsen says with a laugh. “And that’s all the motivation I needed as an 8-year-old.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a kid who had struggled to fit in socially, Ibsen soon found that the choir was one of the few outlets where he could be himself and feel good about it. It also helped that he was very good at it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11989226\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 503px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11989226\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"503\" height=\"671\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1.jpg 1500w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-800x1066.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-1020x1359.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/image1-1153x1536.jpg 1153w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 503px) 100vw, 503px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jens Ibsen plays piano at his childhood home in Pacifica on Jan. 26, 2024. \u003ccite>(Jessica Kariisa/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Several years later, at the age of 11, he got the opportunity to audition for the world-renowned Vienna Boys Choir.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think I’ve ever been more nervous in my life,” he remembers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He didn’t have any reason to be. Ibsen’s training with Ragazzi, not to mention his natural talent, prepared him well, and he was immediately offered a spot in the choir, becoming its first African-born member.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He packed up and moved to a palace in Austria, where the boys in the choir lived, went to school, and sang. Ibsen was excited and nervous about this big change in life, but he didn’t anticipate what he would encounter when he arrived.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never experienced more overt racism than I did when I lived in Austria,” he says. “Everything I did was seen as alien and foreign. I was hazed the entire time I was there. So that was really, really difficult.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After two and a half years with the choir, Ibsen came back to the Bay Area to start school at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfusd.edu/school/ruth-asawa-san-francisco-school-arts\">Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts\u003c/a>. Having heard a student was coming from a famous boys choir, incoming students started friending him on Facebook over the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike in Austria, he says, they were appreciative of what Ibsen would contribute to the school. It was a welcome change from the isolation he experienced in Vienna, and it was there that he first started composing music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>His first piece was for piano, one inspired by the Japanese video game Kingdom Hearts and its piano-forward score by composer Yoko Shimomura.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/QlQsZqXgD90'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/QlQsZqXgD90'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Ibsen’s path to metal music came by way of Japan as well. He grew up watching anime, and the ending theme of one of his favorite shows, Hunter x Hunter, was a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyIoNt2m1Gw\">song by the Japanese power metal band Galneryus\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hearing that, along with music from other Japanese metal bands like Dir En Grey, was transformative, Ibsen says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Discovering them was sort of a moment like, ‘Oh, music can be like this,’ ” he says. “It also made me experiment as a vocalist more with my range because you have these metal guys singing notes that you never hear in opera.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/o8-iem35c-E'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/o8-iem35c-E'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>When it comes to writing music, Ibsen says he doesn’t wait for inspiration to strike. He likens the process to a daily routine, like remembering to turn off the stove at night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very disciplined about writing. I sit down, and I set a chunk of time, and I just do it, and I revise it later until it’s perfect,” he says. “If you have something down, you can decide how you feel. But if you have nothing, you’ve got nothing, right?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen has composed for ensembles as grand as a symphony and as stripped down as piano and voice. But these days, he says, almost every idea starts the same way — on his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll often make voice notes or text notes or both. If you even read one of these notes, you’re not going to have any idea what it’s going to sound like,” he says. “It’s just enough for me to be able to recall what I’ve stored internally. So it’s more like I’m creating these verbal triggers for myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975836\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975836\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A young Black man with a black face mask speaks to an older white man, with a stage curtain behind them.\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-40-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Composer Jens Ibsen speaks with conductor Robert Geary after a practice session with the professional San Francisco choir Volti at the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>From there, he’ll transfer the ideas into notation software on his laptop where he’ll finesse the compositions until they are complete.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The material has to sort of live in my head for a while. And then the material tells me where it’s supposed to go,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2022, Jens won the second annual\u003ca href=\"https://sfcm.edu/discover/initiatives/emerging-black-composers-project\"> Emerging Black Composers\u003c/a> award. The prize was the commission that ended up becoming “Drowned In Light.” He says that after experiencing such blatant racism in the Vienna Boys Choir, receiving this distinguished award years later, based in part on his race, elicited a complicated set of emotions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11975828\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003ca href=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11975828\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"A document titled 'How god comes to the soul,' sits on someone's lap,\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240207-JENSIBSEN-01-BL-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A composition by composer Jens Ibsen, ‘How god comes to the soul,’ sits on the lap of an attendee during a practice session in the basement of the First Unitarian Church in San Francisco on Feb. 7. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“For a while, I felt cynical because it felt like I’ve been good this whole time. Why now?” he says. “But I look back on the cynicism and I have a little more empathy for myself because I can see that these people like me because they believe in my art.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ibsen says he hopes his experience can inspire musical institutions to continue to support the work of other artists pushing the boundaries of music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to keep this energy for composers of all kinds of marginalized backgrounds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story has been updated to correct a mis-identification of the professional San Francisco choir Volti.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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