MusicSpoke | Artist Owned Sheet Music™

About the Score

When I received this commission from CAI, I thought of telling stories from my home country in an effort to continue the dialogue of cultural exchange in my works. I initially wanted to focus on seeking light through the lens of darkness and strife, most especially the story of Typhoon Yolanda and how it left parts of our country completely wrecked and powerless. Though it is a compelling story to tell, the idea grew meaningless as the political climate in the US changed. The decision on immigration and travel bans shook me to my core. I am an immigrant and the developments truly terrified me. I decided to use this opportunity to ponder on migration and what it means to move. I asked my partner Mike to craft a poem about seeking light in a foreign land and I Follow the Sparrow was the result of that.

The poem looks to nature as the ultimate evidence that impeding migration is a fool’s errand. Light, no matter how bright or dark the environment, is always an indicator of direction: East and West marked by sunrise and sunset, or the North Star in the darkness. In the poem, any attempts to banish these light sources still cannot stop the innate compulsion toward movement embedded within both nature and the human being. To say I Follow the Sparrow is to say the drive to migrate precedes us; in fact, it practically seems as if it were the story of everything.

Featured on the Choral Arts Initiative ICON Series.

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