Ralph Lewis: Composer

In a special treat, after getting to stage “DuoTube” many times, I finally had the opportunity to present it in concert with flutist Robin Meiksins, my collaborator on the piece. Such a special thank you to Roosevelt University for making this possible!

A collaboration that began with violinist Sicong Chen has grown with collaborations with a number of violinists and opportunities for performance. Dante Freund performed the work in Charleston, Illinois as part of Eastern Illinois University’s Napoleon Festival in February. Dr. Ben Fuhrman performed at Montana State University as part of a concert of electroacoustic works, and Sicong and I teamed up again at SEAMUS National Conference at Purdue University in Indiana. I’m very grateful for the ongoing interest in this compressed, tense piece.

I’m grateful to cellists briar darling and Freya Schack-Arnott for performing cello and electronics solo “Can’t Take You Anywhere” throughout 2024. darling performed it at Ball State University’s Festival of New Music, as well as at the Splice Institute Alumni Concert at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. Schack-Arnott performed it at the Australasian Computer Music Conference at AIM Sydney.

We received an Urbana Arts and Culture Grant for a new program called All Score Urbana: Music and Dance. We offered open to the public collaboration sessions in the fall at the co-sponsor Urbana-Champaign Independent Music Center. This led to a final performance at co-sponsor Rose Bowl Tavern of participant works by teaching artists Jacob Henss, Kerrith Livengood, Brant Roberts, and Peter Tijerina.

Starting in August 2023 (the start of this academic year), I have had the privilege of serving as Adjunct Instructor of Music Composition at Millikin University. I am teaching composition lessons, a beginning composition class, and a studio class that hosted special guest composer Dr. Kerrith Livengood yesterday.

I deeply love helping people navigate creative pathways and working in this capacity at Millikin feels like a continuation of the composition teaching I began with All Score Urbana back in 2016. I continue to work to balance individual enrichment and creating strong community-based and collaborative ties in these learning situations and am very proud of the effort and creativity I am seeing from my students.

Earlier this month, trombonist Peter Tijerina, cellist briar darling, and I presented a concert of All Score Urbana participants’ works at Urbana’s Rose Bowl Tavern. It was an afternoon of many premieres, with works by local and regional participant composers, as well as remote participant composers. It also featured a performance by local singer/songwriter Paul Kotheimer accompanied by Peter and briar.

This Friday August 25th and Saturday September 2nd, works I composed or co-composed will be presented on air from Radiophrenia Glasgow. You can listen locally in the Glasgow area on 87.9fm or at a streaming link on Radiophrenia Glasgow’s website here: https://radiophrenia.scot/listen/

On Friday August 25th, untitled (I am noel o) is a collaborative composition as shan-uh-kees, a duo with Dr. Dave O Mahony. It is a tribute to the creative practices of sculptor Leo Amino and O Mahony’s uncle Noel who first introduced him to ham radio.

On September 2nd, Abandoned Ship will receive its world premiere. It is a 14 minute fixed media work I designed as an installation, created with the support of cellist Helen Newby.

One of the things I have been looking forward to most is now right around the corner–New Music Gathering. On Friday June 23rd, Abby Williams Chin and Brant Roberts will perform a half hour program entitled “Memorial and Memory in Experimental Music and Dance” that will feature choreography by Sara Hook and Abby with music composed by Dave O Mahony and me. Pete Martin, who I have collaborated with before, plans to do a multi-camera recording of the performance.

The piece of mine included in this program “Another Chance So Suite” is one of those compositions you have hopes and dreams about when creating it. It centers around my interests in historical and current approaches to experimental music (and related creativity). During my research for my dissertation, I learned about how Merce Cunningham’s first aleatoric dance work was premiered where I was attending school, in a building I would walk by most days. I envisioned it as a travel piece that my colleague percussionist Dr. Mike Minarcek could take on the road–which he eventually did, performing it at College Music Society Great Lakes and Southern Conferences with Kayt MacMaster and Abby Williams Chin.

I had also hoped when writing the piece that I could join together with a choreographer to not simply tribute Cunningham only but to build something special that looked back but also looked ahead. It very much feels like this happened when Sara Hook and I began collaborating together. Throughout the rehearsals, previews, and performances in the last year and a half, it’s meant so much to be work with so many inspiring artists with different creative skills.

One fantastic little part of being a composer is finding out after the fact that someone has gone ahead and programmed your work. Such is the case with Christopher Newport University’s Electronic Music Ensemble performing “MoxTube” back in the Fall. I deeply appreciate them programming this work and embracing the “ensemble performs from the audience” approach you can take when presenting the work in a concert space.

Click this to open DuoTube in your browser window.

(While people can find DuoTube on YouTube pretty easily, perhaps some people will find this easier to open it during the presentation Ron Meiksins and I are giving).