We Lived Happily During The War (2018)

for soprano, piano, and percussion.

Premiere:

Premiered on June 22nd, 2018 at Frederick Loewe Theater @ NYU. Performed by Daisy Press (soprano), Mila Henry (piano), and John Ferrari (percussion)

Duration:

7 minutes

Program Note:

When I read Ilya Kaminsky’s poem for the first time, the idea of the accompaniment conveying the sounds of warfare against the voice is something that I thought could be effective. Ilya Kaminsky wrote this poem to criticize America's deception when he moved from Ukraine to America. The poem suggests that America causes a lot of destruction around the world while the citizens live without any concern or knowledge of it. This made me think of how America creates a deceptive society through lies and propaganda. Americans are taught that the U.S. is the best country filled with freedom and all foreign policy decisions that America makes are justifiable. Why is it that freedom is the most important thing to Americans but at the same time, we will hinder other countries freedoms for our own personal gain? I wanted to express a deep feeling of guilt and realization with this piece.