Snow
The endless tumble of white brings back musical memories...
Northeastern Ohio has been a virtual snow globe for the past two weeks. The snowfall swirls beautifully around our home, and last night moonlight reflected off of the fresh sheets of frozen white in the most astounding ways. It offers brief moments of refreshing contemplation amidst an unreasonably hectic schedule.
Recently, a former classmate of mine from graduate school in Colorado sent me a picture of himself smoking a pipe in what was a far less common snowfall in his part of the country. We shared dreams and conversations back then which would lead to a lifetime of friendship and a number of collaborations, and this naturally sent my mind back into recollection.
My graduate school years at the University of Colorado, Boulder, were especially formative. Although I originally hail from Chicago, it was Colorado that felt like the bigger world to me—not just because of the accomplishment and challenge of navigating a large, well-established university program. For a flatlander, the towering peaks of the mythical western horizon awakened something entirely unexpected in my soul. At the time, I was only beginning to explore the idea of a vocation in music composition. The concepts that now shape my daily life were then nothing more than blurred edges, always seeming just out of reach. If anything, the breathtaking natural landscape lifted my thoughts higher, toward God, as John Paul II once observed. This spiritual elevation helped me endure the persistent gap between moving in what felt like the right direction in life and yet continually falling short in the vocational tasks I set for myself.
As a student and artist, this was also the first time I had a faculty member attack me for my faith and politics, while the vigorous defense a brilliant violinist friend helped me craft resulted in two things: a newfound love of philosophical argumentation, and a lifelong friend. Later, when I ran afoul of an administrator for reasons I today still cannot understand, the professor who originally attacked me came to my defense. It was a textbook case of earning respect by standing up for yourself and telling the truth, while remaining the easiest person to deal with in any room. (And yes, it seems from this paragraph that I am trouble-maker, but I assure you that is not the case. This Dean was a troublesome personality who would later be dismissed for sexual harassment, and this would not be the last time I’d attract the ire of such a compromised bully.)
This was also my first brush with a western forest fire: I still remember the fall night where the entire western horizon of Boulder glowed orange, and yet the locals seemed entirely nonplussed. Recent scenes from Los Angeles also bring this memory vigorously back to me.
It was also a time where I continued to prayerfully discern whether or not to become a composer, something which involved an often painful reaching towards ideas that seemed like they could be mine, and yet often eluded me. It is good that I lived alone at this time, as there is something monastic about this daily searching self-abasement, this regular alternation between intense searching work and contemplative reflection.
There was finally a Pierrot piece that came through which seemed to have “it” somehow, and which my professors recognized as such. And then one evening, as I was sitting on my balcony, the entire world seemed to go silent as a beautiful snowfall began. It was a brief moment of transcendence, and I spontaneously wrote this short poem as I sat there:
In the night
I still my breathing
In the night and stillness
In the night I hear the snow falling
Gently coming to rest on virgin fields of white
It is the whisper of God
As He stoops to kiss the earth
lovingly, and for a moment
making it pure and whole
In the night
I didn’t think it would win any awards for poetry, but it certainly captured the moment for me, while the words came immediately with music in tow. This ultimately lead to my first premiered choral composition, a piece for SSAA women’s choir titled “Snow.” I include a nicer recording later done by Vox Musica of Sacramento. It’s an interesting piece for me to listen to today, as the tonal language is rather different from that which I came to develop, and reveals perhaps an early infatuation with composers like Eric Whitacre. I think it mostly works, though I remain tempted to go back and tinker the ending (should works from 20 years ago be revised?)
Later in Boulder I would have the experience - thanks to “Saint” Nadia Boulanger - that would seal my creative vocation, but that is a story to tell another time. For now, I leave you with “Snow”.