Program Note
Migrations is a three-movement work for bass-baritone and Pierrot ensemble with percussion, setting original poetry that traces a deeply personal migration story. Written in 2018, the piece weaves the composer’s own journey from Sydney to New York to Austin into a broader meditation on exile, survival, and the search for belonging—anchored by the generational memory of Holocaust survival and the ongoing plight of global refugees. The first movement, Exodus, evokes the lapping waters of Sydney Harbour—once home, now a charged landscape layered with colonial violence and buried grief. The harbour becomes a metaphor for the body, carrying the silence of trauma and suppressed history. Transit, the second movement, transports us to Brooklyn’s concrete sprawl, capturing the alienation and psychological breakdown that marked the composer’s early years in the U.S. Here, the music seethes with noise and density, reflecting both personal and communal struggle. The final movement, Homecoming, offers a quiet resolution. Inspired by the oak-lined streets of Austin and the calm of domestic life, it embraces the contradictions of memory, grounding the earlier chaos in a fragile but luminous serenity. The piece ultimately articulates a hard-won transcendence—the quiet spirituality born from the act of surviving.
"I had to sit in silence for ten minutes after performing it. Something had moved through me."
Audio
Perusal Score
Premiere
Premiered in 2018 at Jessen Hall, Austin, TX.
Licensing & Inquiries
To inquire about performance rights, licensing, or to commission new work, please contact my agent:
owen@summersartistservices.com
Summers Artist Services