christian park

2026 . for fifteen players . c. 14′ .

Christian Park is about memory, cycles, and reconstructing the way we view the world. The piece takes its name from a park in my hometown of Indianapolis, Indiana. The park is nestled in the middle of the city, with paved sidewalks winding past clusters of forest, over a rickety bridge, and circling an old gazebo set far back in the grass. I went there a lot growing up, and it’s the place where I first learned to ride my bike, my whole family there cheering me on. Since then, my family has changed significantly, and I’m wondering if, by revisiting that memory with the knowledge I have now, I can see the cracks in the pavement already forming, almost as if I can make sense of the way life turns out from that single moment. You can hear birdsong, a bicycle bell, and the creaking wood in the percussion; there are these repeated cycles of swirling melodic figures, these spinning wheels over hills and valleys. When things fall apart, you can hear the percussion representing harsh cracks and granules of gravel and broken pavement. The climax of the piece exists at once in both the past and the present, merging what I knew then with what I know now, still pedaling on. Many thanks to Sam Chen for commissioning this work, and to David Gompper and the Center for New Music musicians at the University of Iowa for their dedication in performing it.

Performed by the University of Iowa Center for New Music, February 22, 2026. David Gompper, director, Samuel Chen, conductor.