MusicSpoke | Artist Owned Sheet Music™

About the Score

In my setting of Paul Laurence Dunbar's poem Invitation to Love, I wanted to reflect on the text through the eyes of an immigrant. For many of immigrants in the United States, getting a pathway to permanent residency and eventual citizenship is an on-going goal. The warmth, joy, and relief of achieving that goal are emotions that I wish to explore and convey in this piece. As a side note, it was very meaningful for me to set poetry by a BIPOC writer who might have been underappreciated and not afforded the opportunities to reach his full potential during his lifetime.

As of this writing, Invitation to Love concludes the set Songs of Welcome, my personal and continuing musical reflections on being an immigrant in this country. Other pieces in the set include Welcome Table, The New Colossus, and Give You Rest.

This piece also received a special jury commendation from The King's Singers New Music Prize.

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