Author: sora
250 Word Bio
Sora Jederan-Shpack is an emerging composer, writer, flutist, collaborative artist whose compositions are driven by her passion to engage with and convey story, emotion and experience of people and place. Her compositional style resembles most closely film-scoring with sound-scapes and melodies representing time, place and action, and juxtaposing harmonies of consonance and beauty against unexpected dissonance, and driving rhythms against serene soul-searching meditations.
Sora’s flute compositions reflect her love for the flute and studies in flute performance at Stetson University with Geoffrey Gilbert (1973-1975). Expanding her interests from flutist to composer, she completed a MM Composition at Carnegie Mellon University under Leonardo Balada (2008-2010). While at CMU Sora won first place in both the 2010 string quartet competition with Summer Travels and orchestral competition with All the Walls. She also won the 2009 The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra for All the Walls. All The Walls was received with great enthusiasm here and abroad, the Ramat Rachel Archaeological Project (Tel Aviv University, Israel) wrote, “Congratulations for All The Walls, we do love it! We wish it will be performed many more times – even some day with the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra in Tel Aviv…”
Sora has received commissions from The Park Foundation and The Level Green Foundation for Songs of Many Waters, Montserrat Music Composition Festival for Deuteronomy III, GrassRoots Festival for All the Walls, FingerLakes Flutes for Contemporary Cantata and Crossing the Bar, VOICES Multicultural Chorus for the Islamic oratorio A Mother’s Love, and Ithaca Flute Duo for In Her Own Voice.
Our Troops Return
Our Troops Return
(November 2010) 6 min.
Brass Ensemble: 4 Hns, 4 Tpts, 3 Tbns, 1 B Tbn, 1 Tuba
Hymn of Gratitude
Chant and Hymn of Gratitude
Chant
Yih, Yah, Huu, Hee.
Hymn
I am grateful that I am, I am.
We are grateful that we are, we are.
We are light and energy celestial,
We are one, rejoice with songs of life!
Recognize your wondrous vast potential,
Dancing, singing that we are, we are,
Dancing, singing that I am, I am,
Bring to life gifts, talents and uniqueness!
For your sacred being and for mine,
For all past and future souls divine,
We are grateful that we are, we are,
I am grateful that I am, I am.
[audio:Chant and Hymn of Gratitude_Vocal Choir SATB_Flute Choir SSAB – SCORE.mp3]
Many Waters
The Land of Breath
The Land of Breath
Children’s Song
Text and Music: Sora Jederan-Shpack February 2010
I dreamed I saw a white bird fly
Into my room last night
The white bird said
Climb on my back
And off we’ll soar in flight
On her I lept
And off we went
Across the great blue sky
That soft white bird and I
And where we went
The air was clean
And pure as crystal dew
I breathed that air
So deeply in, as though ‘twas all I knew
Here in this space,
My steady breath
Did in and out it go
And as I watched a quiet sense
That I am safe did grow
And by and by
The white bird said
There’s no more time to roam,
With silent wings upon the wind
Our breathing brought us home.
As I awoke, I looked and saw
A white bird rushing by
Reminding me of the Land of Breath,
Across the great blue sky
A white tern (Gygis alba) takes flight on Midway Island in the South Pacific. The birds nest on coral islands throughout the tropics, and they lay just one egg at a time, typically balanced precariously on a tree branch or rock. WHOI population biologist Hal Caswell has been studying the population dynamics and geographic distribution of several types of birds, with a particular interest in how those species are being affected by climate change. (Photo by Hal Caswell, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) All images are copyright ©Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=10897&i=2462&x=245
The Mirror
THE MIRROR
Text and Music: Sora Jederan-Shpack
Loghan Bazan, mezzo-soprano
Jonghee Kang, pianist
Photography: Nancy Halgren
Door Photography: Sora Jederan-Shpack
Portraits: Michael Clifford Shpack and Sarauv Rana
Jonghee Kang, pianist
Door Photography: Sora Jederan-Shpack
Portraits: Michael Clifford Shpack and Sarauv Rana
Into our dreams, into our dreams
[audio:The Mirror 3 min clip.mp3]
Gliding o’re the waves of time
[audio:The Mirror Clip 2.mp3]
Stepping through … stepping through … 
… stepping through
The door of your mind,
Turn, turn, turn to
Face, face, face the
Mirror, mirror, mirror, mirror
Mirror, mirror, mirror, mirror
Of your soul, your soul,
[audio:The Mirror Clip 3.mp3]
And be joyful
In seeing G-d*
In you and me and all that is.
Copyright June 2010
*Out of respect for the Jewish community, I have chosen to write the word meaning The Omnipotent One as G-d omitting the middle letter.
Summer Travels
Summer Travels
Three movements for String Quartet
Reading: JACK Quartet
Photography: Nancy Halgren
Photography and Art: Saurav Rana
Music: Sora Jederan-Shpack
FLIGHT (Movement 1) clip (1m 20s) (complete is approx. 3m 46s)
JACK Quartet Reading
NEPAL (Movement 2) complete (3m 34s)
JACK Quartet Reading
SPAIN…FLIGHT (Movement 3) complete (3m 11s)
Midi Version
On a Ritual to Read to Each Other
On A Ritual to Read to Each Other
Text by William Stafford*
Music by Sora Jederan-Shpack
Finale Midi Version
Stanza I
[audio:On A Rit Stanza I.mp3]If you don’t know the kind of person I am
and I don’t know the kind of person you are
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world
and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.
Stanza II
For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break
sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood
storming out to play through the broken dyke.
Stanza III
[audio:On A Rit Stanza III.mp3]And as elephants parade holding each elephant’s tail,
but if one wanders the circus won’t find the park,
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.
Stanza IV
And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,
a remote important region in all who talk:
though we could fool each other, we should consider–
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.
Stanza V
For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give–yes or no, or maybe–
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
* Permission for use of text requested and received 2009
Ode to the Days of Transition
Ode to the Days of Transition
Music, text, flutist and voice: Sora Jederan-Shpack
Paintings: Michael Clifford Shpack
Winter Sketches, Eyes Photograph: Saurav Rana
Moons and Flower Photographs: Nancy Halgren
[audio:Ode to the Days Clip 1.mp3]
Approaching the apex of transition, transition,
Time speeds out of control, out of…
Hurling ones being into a vortex of past and future energies,
Colliding, fighting, for dominance!
At once believing yourself secure,
You are now catapulted into the spiral, into the spiral, into,
[audio:Ode to the Days Clip 2.mp3]
Torn! Wrenched! Dismantled!
Left naked, unarmed…
Here, where there is no time,
You float, nowhere, with no one,
Marveling at the peace, at the space,
You are suspended in nothingness.
Past…patterns…melt away…
[audio:Ode to the Days Clip 3.mp3]
Eyes peer into a new reality,
Exiting the days, the days of transition,
Embarking, embarking, on the next phase,
On the next phase of being.
