Hello! Thank you for taking the time to view my work submitted for the 2025 Artists at Work Program. On this page you will find work primarily from 2024 and 2025, going into areas of classical music composition, performance, instrument building, installation art, and other areas.
Music Composition:
2024 and 2025 have been exceptionally busy for me in terms of classical music composition. All in all, I’ve had twelve pieces premiered since January of 2024, with several more in progress. With classical composition, as with all of my other media, about 60% of this work tends to be volunteered for specific community events. Below I have three videos of some of the larger pieces from this period.
Where Is Your Reason Now for Orchestra and Glass Organ
Where Is Your Reason Now? was written for the Sound Ecologies event Orchestramania which took place in October of 2024. This piece was the realization of a lifelong dream to play an instrument I invented alongside a professional orchestra. In this piece you’re hear my instrument, the glass organ, gluing the orchestra together through tones that weave in and out of the harmonies before leading to a climax that I hope leaves the listener with a bit of yearning. This piece in particular was written in the middle of a large life change as I transitioned from serving as the Education Manager for the Percussive Arts Society to striking out as a full-time freelance artist. Orchestramania was attended by close to 400 people in a free community event held at the University of Indianapolis.
Feather and Stone for Orchestra and Gravity Harp
Feather and Stone is a piece that I wrote for the Sound Ecologies Chamber Orchestra that builds a conversation between an instrument I invented, the Gravity Harp, and the rest of the orchestra. Starting off with very simple gestures, the piece moves into a gentler section of breezy melodies before reaching a climax where the instrument and ensemble are working as one. The Gravity Harp was originally built for my 2022 solo exhibition, Study in Place.
Sharing Sacred Space for Chamber Quartet
Sharing Sacred Space was commissioned by Classical Music Indy as part of their City Sounds series, which highlights places around Indianapolis by having composers respond with music written specifically for the space. In writing this piece, I really tried to reflect on the purpose of museums and large art collections that are held in the public trust. In that sense, the music follows a narrative of reflection and transformation that to me parallels the purpose of large art institutions: to preserve and share a record of human creativity, and to give future generations a chance to be transformed by it.
Installation Art:
Sound Field:
Sound Field is an installation that I designed and built with the help of Justin Cooper and Landon Caldwell. The show was comprised of three sound sculptures that created an immersive listening environment at the Guichelaar Gallery on the Big Car campus in Garfield Park. Each Sculpture was built of a fully articulating wooden lattice that was wired to project sound directly from the wooden panels themselves. The largest sculpture, featured in the video, was about 18 feet long, and featured 48 individual channels of audio playing music that was composed specifically for the system. For me, this project was an attempt to convey some of my favorite things about art: wonder, mystery, and simplicity. Though the form looks simple enough, once you get close and hear it in the room, the listener is invited to wonder how the sound is being transmitted and how exactly it is working. The video above walks through the exhibit. Feel free to skip around to the different parts as you see fit.
A House is Alive with Sound – Monument Circle
A House Is Alive with Sound is an installation designed by Landon Caldwell and me that was adapted from a show we ran in 2023 of the same name. The work in this show was about unexpected interactions with sound. For this version, which was designed specifically to be shown during Spark Monument Circle, we used electronics to create a touchable instrument out of mirrors on the walls of the space. In this piece Caldwell and I were reflecting on some of the sounds we take for granted in domestic life and how our personal universes are generated one small event at a time. On monument circle this installation allowed audiences to come out of the sun into a more intimate space built for meditative exploration that encouraged interaction without forcing it.t
Frank n’ Steam
Frank n’ Steam is the product of a long collaboration I have had running with local musician and culinary artist Clockwork Janz. It is a hotdog cart with an integrated musical system that creates opportunities to blend the sounds of cooking with the sounds of music, and for the audience to discover sonic surprises when ordering food or choosing condiments. The ideas driving this piece are a tribute to the Calliope, which was invented in Indiana. In thinking of this, we wanted to create something truly ridiculous in a way that might inspire others to inject wonder into otherwise mundane circumstances. This project was funded as part of the inaugural round of the Creative Risk Fund, and is soon to be launched as a food and entertainment option for community events and festivals. The documentation below is from an interview Clockwork and I completed during the build process.
Community Outreach Events:
Spark Monument Circle
In addition to the installation shown above, I also worked to create a partnership between the Percussive Arts Society and Spark to facilitate a series of community drum circles throughout the summers of 2023-2024. These allowed people an opportunity to engage in a little music education, or to simply work out some feelings on the drums with me to help guide them through the experience. The video below is a short excerpt of a community drum circle I led in 2024.
Instrument Design:
The Glass Organ
The Glass Organ has been my personal ship of Theseus for the past four or so years. It is an instrument played by rubbing wet hands on a keyboard of glass rods to produce uniquely pure, otherworldly tones. This project has been ongoing for years and is one of my primary performance instruments. Having a relationship to an object that feels almost living has been a meditative practice as well as a technical challenge. To my knowledge, I am one of three or so people in the world who is currently able to build instruments like this, and my take on the design is unique to its origins in a Garfield Park basement. The video below was taken a few years ago from when I had this instrument in its first stable state, and explains everything I knew about it at the time.
Other Instruments:
I have created a lot of instruments over the years and many of them can be found on the Builds Page of this website. Click here for more info.
Recorded Music
Over the last couple of years I have also maintained a steady recorded output in addition to the pieces shown above. My favorite recorded project from 2024 can be found here: