A Journey of Becoming

No recording… yet!

L-R: AJ Harbison, Tyler Wigglesworth, Melanie Penn

AJ, Melanie and Tyler with the West Covina High School Choral Department following the performance of “Who Am I Going To Be” from A Journey of Becoming at Carnegie Hall

Perusal scores are downloadable and viewable but not printable.

Instrumentation: Solo voice, guitar and SATB chorus

Duration: ca. 25 minutes

Movements:
I. Who Am I Going To Be
II. The Sun
III. The City
IV. The River
V. The Same Song

Text: “A Journey of Becoming” by Melanie Penn

Year composed: 2018

Place composed: Kansas City, Missouri

Dedication: Composed for Tyler R. Wigglesworth and the West Covina High School Choral Department

Performances: Premiered by Melanie Penn and the West Covina High School Choral Department, Tyler R. Wigglesworth, conductor, West Covina, CA, March 2018; “Who Am I Going To Be” performed by Melanie Penn and the West Covina High School Choral Department, Tyler R. Wigglesworth, conductor, New York, NY, April 2018

Program Notes:
Tyler, AJ and I had only known each other a couple of days when Tyler said, “Hey, why don’t we collaborate on something? Let’s write a piece for my West Covina choirs.” We were together in Scotland for a music festival. Somehow, over the course of the next year AJ, Tyler and I managed to collaborate on this piece of music, sending voice memos back and forth. I wrote the melodies and lyrics and AJ arranged them.

While I wrote these songs, I tried to envision young singers joining their voices with their friends in a choir. Modern life has become so complicated and full — young modern lives especially. There are so many signals to receive and so much information to sort through. Because life is complex, I tried to give them something simple to sing.

But even though melodies can feel simple, the topic of this song cycle is not. Who am I going to be? Where am I going to go? How can I find out? I’m a grown woman and I’m still asking.

I don’t have much guidance for young singers who may sing this piece, or for you. Except to keep singing along the way, and to keep asking the question. Who am I going to be? Maybe being a singer is a good place to start. That’s what I did.

Travel safe on the journey,
Melanie Penn
New York City | January 2018

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A high school choir director from Southern California, a singer/songwriter from New York City, and a composer from Kansas City walk into a music festival in Cumnock, Scotland….

As we hatched a plan for the three of us to collaborate, I was intrigued by the idea of a piece for “singer/songwriter and chorus” from the very beginning. We decided that Melanie would write a cycle of songs for her voice and guitar, I would write the music for the chorus, and Tyler’s high school singers would premiere the piece with Melanie.

The chorus in A Journey of Becoming, far from being a large group of backup singers, is an integral part of the musical and conceptual fabric of the piece. It is the chorus that is on the journey, with the soloist serving partly as a guide, and partly as a fellow sojourner, a little further along the same path.

A Journey of Becoming was composed for Tyler R. Wigglesworth and the West Covina High School Choral Department, who premiered the piece on March 22, 2018 in West Covina, California, and April 5, 2018 in New York City.

AJ Harbison
Kansas City | January 2018