Are You Looking for Me?
Choral Music
chorus with piano, chorus with chamber ensemble
work detail
instrumentation: SATB, piano & percussion
completion date: october 2023
duration: 4 1/2 minutes
texts: On a poem by Kabir (1398-1518)
events
BRAND NEW DAY
Elevation - Arreon Harley-Emerson, artistic director
Delaware Art Museum - Wilmington, DE
6:00 pm
Elevation and Arreon Harley-Emerson close out their first season with audience favorites as well as new works, including my new commissioned work Are You Looking for Me? for chorus, soprano, piano and percussion. More information and tickets here.
commission & dedication
Commissioned by the Delaware Academy of Vocal Arts for Elevation and dedicated to their CEO & Artistic Director Arreon Harley-Emerson.
program note
Are You Looking for Me? is commissioned by the Delaware Academy of Vocal Arts and Elevation and dedicated to their CEO & Artistic Director Arreon Harley-Emerson, who I was overjoyed to finally meet this past summer. Arreon brought to my attention this beautiful text by Kabir, an Indian mystic and poet who influenced Hindu and Sikh thought and scripture. The text reminds us to look for the divine not in the everyday material possessions or rituals of religion, but instead in the elemental life-giving oneness of our humanity. - October, 2023
text
Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat. My shoulder is against yours. You will not find me in the stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals: not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will see me instantly -- you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God? He is the breath inside the breath.
information
events
BRAND NEW DAY
Elevation - Arreon Harley-Emerson, artistic director
Delaware Art Museum - Wilmington, DE
6:00 pm
Elevation and Arreon Harley-Emerson close out their first season with audience favorites as well as new works, including my new commissioned work Are You Looking for Me? for chorus, soprano, piano and percussion. More information and tickets here.
commission & dedication
Commissioned by the Delaware Academy of Vocal Arts for Elevation and dedicated to their CEO & Artistic Director Arreon Harley-Emerson.
program note
Are You Looking for Me? is commissioned by the Delaware Academy of Vocal Arts and Elevation and dedicated to their CEO & Artistic Director Arreon Harley-Emerson, who I was overjoyed to finally meet this past summer. Arreon brought to my attention this beautiful text by Kabir, an Indian mystic and poet who influenced Hindu and Sikh thought and scripture. The text reminds us to look for the divine not in the everyday material possessions or rituals of religion, but instead in the elemental life-giving oneness of our humanity. - October, 2023
text
Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat. My shoulder is against yours. You will not find me in the stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals: not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables.
When you really look for me, you will see me instantly -- you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God? He is the breath inside the breath.
