SAY YOUR NAME
Librettist, Rebecca Gayle Howell
Composer, Reena Esmail
Say Your Name is a voting-rights cantata composed by Reena Esmail and written by Rebecca Gayle Howell. Here is the resilient story of a woman named Democracy, a woman battered by gaslighting and confusion. As she finds the courage to remember who she is, she learns what we all must: that to guard our thoughts is to guard our nation.
Say Your Name will be premiered on the West Coast on April 27, 2024 by the Kirkland Choral Society and Philharmonia Northwest in Seattle, WA, featuring soloists Stacey Mastrian and Danielle Reutter-Harrah and introduced by Charles Douglas III, Executive Director of Common Power.
Originally commissioned by Amherst College Choir and Orchestra and premiered on the East Coast on November 5, 2022 at Amherst College, Amherst MA by Sherezade Panthaki, soprano; Alice Rogers, soprano; Amherst Choir and orchestra, Arianne Abela, conductor.
Published by A Piece of Sky Music (ASCAP).
“To vote is to pray / Not to the One you cannot see / But for the Many you can.” from Trust the Ballot, the chorus from Say Your Name.
We say the word “suffrage” when discussing voting rights, but do we know what it means? The word has roots in late Middle English and Latin, meaning “intercessory prayer,” the kind of prayer one offers on behalf of another. Trust the Ballot explores this connection, understanding that when we vote we don’t just voice our own opinion. We join our neighbors in a sacred act that is both solitary and communal, together praying to our larger democratic will for human rights and a prosperous commonwealth. “Suffrage” means: it is to each other we belong.
Now available from A Piece of Sky Music (ASCAP) for individual performances.
A WINTER BREVIARY
Librettist, Rebecca Gayle Howell
Composer, Reena Esmail
A Winter Breviary is a set of three interfaith carols that trace a journey through the dark woods on solstice, in search of the light. The poems follow the Christian canonical hours and the music maps onto Hindustani raags for those same hours.
Performed by choirs like the The Sixteen,
The Yale Ensemble, Kathmandu Chorale, Voces8,
& the National Symphonic Chorus at Carnegie Hall
Premiered in the US by the LA Master Chorale
Premiered in the UK by the BBC Singers
Featured on BBC 3
Featured in Carols for Choirs 6
Featured on Choral Music from Oxford
with the Gesualdo Six (2022)
Featured as the title tracks for
A Winter Breviary: Choral Works for Christmas
with St. Martin’s Voices (2023)
Published by Oxford University Press
INTERGLOW
Poet, Rebecca Gayle Howell
Composer, Reena Esmail
Interglow is a call-and-response community meditation, written for the COVID-19 quarantine. Commissioned by Salistina Los Angeles and premiered on February 12, 2021. Published by A Piece of Sky Music (ASCAP).
Interglow is written for audience participation. Want to contribute your voices to Interglow? Find out more here.