A Vision Unfolding
A Vision Unfolding
Kyle Pederson (2023)
Music: SATB, Kyle Pederson
Instrumentation: piano, snare drum, opt violin and trumpet
Spoken Word: Shanelle Gabriel
Texts: Langston Hughes, Walt Whitman, Robert Bode, Shanelle Gabriel, Kyle Pederson
Instrumentation: Piano, with optional snare drum, violin, and trumpet
Commissioned by:
Sponsoring Members
Festival Singers of Florida, directed by Dr. Kevin Fenton
Tennessee Tech University, directed by Dr. Craig Zamer
University of Dayton, directed by Dr. Steven Hankle
Participating Members
VocalEssence, directed by Philip Brunelle and G. Phillip Shoultz, III
University of Mississippi, directed by Dr. Donald Trott
Northwest Missouri State University, directed by Dr. Adam Zrust
Florida State University, directed by Dr. Kevin Fenton
Composer Notes:
In 2021, seven choirs around the country commissioned me to write an extended work, centered broadly around themes of social justice. I didn’t want to write a big work around these themes merely from my own perspective, so I reached out to Shanelle Gabriel, an African American poet, spoken word artist, singer/songwriter from NYC. Our conversations turned to “what sort of vision do we want to cast for the audience and the singers?”
We determined that, at the core, we hoped to re-articulate and explore what our country has stood for in its best moments. In our foundational texts and speeches, we find powerful declarations of a nation rooted in equality, freedom, justice, and inclusion. Shanelle and I wanted this whole work to be invitational—to be reminded of the compelling vision that we live into in our best moments, and to be invited to say “yes” to more of that.
It is my hope that we lean into the invitation that the choir offers—that each of us might reach out beyond our comfort zone and seek to build bridges of care and connection, finding a better way of being in community. That we might stand in solidarity with those whose voices are too often dismissed, regardless of their skin color, sexual orientation, faith background, or other characteristic. That we might not dismiss, disdain, and judge those whose politics are different from ours, but that we might make the uncomfortable effort to see them as people just as worthy of respect and dignity.
I’m grateful to Shanelle Gabriel, whose beautiful and challenging text is threaded throughout this work. You can read more about Shanelle and her work at ShanelleGabriel.com.
Special thanks to Kevin Fenton, who provided the initial vision and encouragement for this project, and who coordinated the consortium of choirs who commissioned this work.
PERFORMANCE NOTES:
Piano underscore for the spoken word narrations is meant to be very rubato (with the exception of the underscore before Beat! Drums!). Optional repeats are included; aim to reach the last measure of the underscore just as the narration ends, allowing you to seamlessly transition to the next movement of the work.
Recordings of Shanelle Gabriel performing the spoken word elements are available at kylepederson.com. These can help guide and inspire your narrator(s) and provide possible approaches to cadence, rhythm, and rhyme.
You are welcome to craft your own spoken word between movements. You may find you wish to use Shanelle Gabriel’s spoken word as inspiration or a jumping off point. Feel free to use existing poetry, fragments of speeches, original text created by your singers, or other means to thread the movements together and tell a compelling story that will resonate with you and your audience.
Audience participation: If you desire the audience to join their voices in singing, a good option is to invite them to join in the reprise of Reach Down, Lord, m. 13–16, page 45 (you may repeat those measures as many times as you’d like). You may also consider adding this element immediately following the conclusion of Movement IV: Light Transforms the Darkness. The pianist can play the accompaniment as written or choose to use the accompaniment found in m. 56–59 of Reach Down, Lord. The choir may sing the unison melody or the SATB harmony found in m. 56–59.
ABOUT EACH PIECE:
Movement I: Reach Down, Lord
The poet is asking God’s spirit to reach down and lift us up—lift us out of the pit, out of the darkness, and lift us to the light...lift us up to wholeness. In the spoken word that precedes this movement, Shanelle Gabriel does something important: the narrator asks not only God to reach down—but the narrator challenges the listener to reach down...to get into the mess with those who are hurting and to lift them up. So when the choir sings the refrain, Reach Down, Lord, we hear not only a cry to God, but also an invitation to all of us, to reach down—and out—to another.
Movement II: Beat! Drums!
This iconic Walt Whitman poem was written during the Civil War. It’s an in-your-face text, exploring how ordinary daily life is impossible during war; everything is disrupted. Whitman is also rallying the listener—at the time his Union countrymen—to join the righteous fight to end slavery, and to preserve the union that was the United States. In the spoken word that precedes this movement, Shanelle sets this poem up beautifully by challenging us to rally around the cause of justice...to make our quest today for justice central to our lives...inviting us to think of this text not as a battle cry to fight against one another with weapons, but to fight for each other, giving all we have to make this vision of wholeness in community a reality. Musically, the beat of the drum, the blow of the bugle, along with meter and rhythm changes, highlight the incessancy of the Whitman text.
Movement III: All of Me
I think we all sense our communities becoming more fractured; we witness individual relationships fraying in our neighborhoods, schools, churches, places of work, and even our families. One of the root causes of this is, I believe, how quick we are to judge others—and hold others in contempt— for their politics, their religion, gender or sexual expression, skin color, class, education level, and a host of other characteristics. This piece is an invitation to lay down our judgments. It’s also an invitation to see those aspects of identity that are important to people...but to see people around us as more than just a collection of isolated characteristics...to see all of them.
Movement IV: Light Transforms the Darkness
Shanelle’s text is a call to action: to live our light and love out into the world—a world that desperately needs light and love. It seemed fitting that this piece includes a section where both spoken word and singing happen simultaneously, joining the two primary artistic expressions of the greater work and allowing all choir members to give voice to the sense of immediacy present in the spoken word.
Movement V: I Dream a World
The work concludes with the iconic Langston Hughes text. The choir and narrator have been casting a vision, and it’s hard to state it better than Hughes; I dream a world where none are scorned, where love will bless the earth and peace its paths adorn. At the end of the movement, the listener will hear earlier melodies reprised as all voices are gradually layered in; and for the first time, all instruments sound together, building to a thunderous conclusion that invites us all to say, “yes...that’s a vision I want to help make real.”