American Composers Orchestra Announces Spring 2025 EarShot Readings and New Partnership with BMI Foundation
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American Composers Orchestra Announces
Spring 2025 EarShot Readings and New Partnership with BMI Foundation
American Composers Orchestra EarShot Readings | June 5–6, 2025
Manhattan School of Music
Mentor Composers: Vijay Iyer, Nkeiru Okoye, Curtis Stewart
Selected Composers: Lavell Blackwell, Arjan Singh Dogra, Marie Douglas, Shawn Johnson, Cheng Jin Koh, Grace Ann Lee
“an expansive vision of orchestral composition” – Represent Classical
New York, NY (April 9, 2025) – Hailed as an “essential organization” (The New York Times), the American Composers Orchestra (ACO) announces details of its own EarShot Readings in New York City from June 5, 2025 at 10:30AM and June 6, 2025 at 7:30PM at Manhattan School of Music. Selected composers Lavell Blackwell, Arjan Singh Dogra, Marie Douglas, Shawn Johnson, Cheng Jin Koh, and Grace Ann Lee will have the unique opportunity to collaborate with mentors Vijay Iyer, Nkeiru Okoye, and Curtis Stewart, composers ingrained in the NYC music scene who are redefining and expanding the orchestral music genre. The selected composers’ music will be workshopped by the ACO, conducted by Rei Hotoda.
In addition, ACO has announced a new four-year partnership with BMI Foundation, Inc. BMI Foundation will work with award-winning organizations ACO and International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) to present works receiving honors at the BMI Composer Awards. Each year, one chamber work and one orchestral work will be performed in an ICE concert and an ACO EarShot Reading respectively, as permitted by each ensemble’s schedule.
Grace Ann Lee’s In Crystallized Time aims to recreate the sound of a carillon as a clock tower within the orchestra. The tubular bells, paired with the bass drum, emphasize the carillon bells' sound and the melodies in the woodwinds, strings, and keyboard percussion, feature a recurring clock motif representing ‘Frozen Time.’
Marie Douglas’ The People Could Fly is based on an African American folk story that depicts enslaved Africans flying away from their sufferings on the plantation. This work aims to shed light on the artistic potential of spirituals especially while being manipulated and fused with other stylistic approaches.
Cheng Jin Koh’s Midnight Visions is an attempt to document the contrasting states of subconsciousness and ultra consciousness, extreme vulnerability and extraordinary resolve, and peaceful calmness and nightmarish
conjurations found in the strange, mystical hour of midnight.
Lavell Blackwell’s Toccata for Orchestra is loosely inspired by Sergey Prokofiev’s Toccata in D minor, op. 11. This work is one that takes the sheer kinetic energy of Prokofiev’s short masterpiece and transplants it to a larger work for a much larger ensemble.
Shawn Johnson’s The Cardinal Takes Flight tracks the journey of a beautiful cardinal throughout its day; the bird travels on its path through twilight where it is seen resting before sunrise, the morning when we hear its bird calls, the daytime when its journey begins, and the evening when it withstands a violent thunderstorm.
Arjan Singh Dogra’s Live Salmon is an exploration of different colors and textures that weave in and out of each other, held together by a simple melody that is constantly being squeezed, stretched, and permutated. The piece evokes the imagery of ocean currents and various waterways that meander and wash through each other, and of the salmon that bravely swim upstream against these currents to spawn. Singh is a 2024 BMI Composer Award Winner. His participation is made possible with the generous support of the BMI Foundation, Inc.
EarShot is the first ongoing, systematic program for cultivating relationships between composers and orchestras on the national level, developed by the American Composers Orchestra to ensure a vibrant future for new American orchestral music. Over the last 25 years, these readings have provided more than 250 composers with vital artistic and technical resources, as well as career-accelerating public exposure. EarShot alumni have won every composition award, including the Pulitzer, GRAMMY, Grawemeyer, American Academy of Arts & Letters, and Rome Prizes, to name a few. Critically, composer-orchestra relationships extend beyond the EarShot Readings themselves. Since 2009, more than 25 works have been commissioned by partner orchestras from EarShot participants, and more than half of selected EarShot composers report receiving a commission directly resulting from their participation.
Program Information:
Thursday, June 5, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Friday, June 6, 2025 at 7:30 PM
American Composers Orchestra EarShot Readings
Manhattan School of Music | New York City, NY
Links: www.americancomposers.org/performances-events/earshot-readings-american-composers-orchestra2025 and
www.americancomposers.org/performances-events/earshot-readings-american-composers-orchestra-2025
Rei Hotoda, Conductor
Featured Artists and Works
Grace Ann Lee, In Crystallized Time
Marie Douglas, The People Could Fly
Cheng Jin Koh, Midnight Visions
Lavell Blackwell, Toccata for Orchestra
Shawn Johnson, The Cardinal Takes Flight
Arjan Singh Dogra, Live Salmon
About American Composers Orchestra
In 1977, a collective of fearless New York City musicians came together to form the American Composers Orchestra (ACO), an ensemble dedicated to the creation, celebration, performance, and promotion of orchestral music by American composers. Over more than 40 years committed to artistry, creativity, community and equity, ACO has blossomed into an international institution that not only cultivates and develops the careers of living composers, but also provides composers a direct pipeline to partnerships with orchestras from across the Americas.
In addition to its annual season, presented by Carnegie Hall since 1987, the ACO serves as a New York City hub where the most forward-thinking experimental American musicians come together to hone and realize new art by developing talent, established composers, and underrepresented voices, increasing the regional, national, and international awareness of the infinite variety of American orchestral music.
ACO produces national educational programs for all ages, and composer advancement programs to foster a community of creators, audience, performers, collaborators, and funders – all dedicated to American composition.
To date, ACO has performed music by 800 American composers, including over 350 world premieres and newly commissioned works. Recent and notable commissioned composers include John Luther Adams, Andy Akiho, Clarice Assad, Carlos Bandera, Courtney Bryan, Valerie Coleman, Dai Wei, Du Yun, inti figgis-vizueta, Marcus Gilmore, Vijay Iyer, Yvette Janine Jackson, Joan La Barbara, Steve Lehman, Tania León, Paula Matthusen, Trevor New, Mendi + Keith Obadike, Ellen Reid, Daniel Bernard Roumain, Carlos Simon, Henry Threadgill, and many more.
Now encompassing all of ACO’s composer advancement initiatives, EarShot is the first ongoing, systematic program for developing relationships between composers and orchestras. Through orchestral readings, CoLABoratory fellowships, consortium commissions, publishing and professional development, EarShot ensures a vibrant musical future by investing in creativity today. Serving over 350 composers since inception, ACO Readings in NYC began in 1991, and since 2008, Readings have been offered in partnership with orchestras across the Americas in collaboration with the League of American Orchestras, New Music USA, and American Composers Forum. EarShot Readings composers have gone on to win every major composition award, including the Pulitzer, Grammy, Grawemeyer, American Academy of Arts and Letters, and Rome Prizes.
ACO has received numerous awards for its work, including those from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and from BMI, recognizing the orchestra’s outstanding contribution to American music. ASCAP has awarded ACO its annual prize for adventurous programming 35 times, singling out ACO as “the orchestra that has done the most for new American music in the United States.” ACO received the inaugural MetLife Award for Excellence in Audience Engagement, and a proclamation from the New York City Council. Learn more at www.americancomposers.org.
*Pictured: Headshots of featured artists Lavell Blackwell, Arjan Singh Dogra, Marie Douglas, Shawn Johnson, Cheng Jin Koh, Grace Ann Lee.
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EarShot is a program of American Composers Orchestra completed in partnership with American Composers Forum, the League of American Orchestras, and New Music USA. The program is made possible with lead support from Altman Foundation, Elizabeth and Justus Schlichting, Mellon Foundation, The Sorel Organization, Hearst Foundation, Sphinx Venture Fund, TD Charitable Foundation, Fromm Foundation, Ford Good Neighbor Committee, The New York Community Trust Van Lier Fellowships, Jerome Foundation, and Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation; additional support is provided by the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Charitable Foundation, BMI Foundation, Inc., Steven R. Gerber Trust, Wise Foundation (G. Schirmer) and the League of American Orchestras with support of the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation.
Public funds are provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Lead support for EarShot CoLABoratory is generously provided by TD Charitable Foundation and Altman Foundation.
EarShot: Advancing Equity through Publishing & Repertoire Development is supported by the Sphinx Venture Fund.
