On March 12, Project 21: Music of the 21st Century held a historic student performed and composed concert in cooperation with local nonprofit music organization, El Sistema, titled the Project 21: El Sistema Collaboration, with a record breaking 30-piece concert.
For this concert, Project 21 paired with El Sistema Oklahoma, a 3-12th grade after-school conservatory that teaches composition, instrumental lessons, and ensemble work and gives a place for children to have a creative extracurricular.
The program originated from Venezuela to help keep children off of the street and has since branched across the world.
Kiegan Ryan, an OCU student and El Sistema faculty member explained that, “there’s two branches in Oklahoma, one in Oklahoma City and one in Tulsa, so of course we serve the Oklahoma City area.”
Ryan explained that the roots between El Sistema and OCU run deep, saying, “there’s always been a long sharing of musicians, teachers, and even some students who come here, like one of the teachers at El Sistema was a student at OCU and went to teach at El Sistema.”
“Primarily for this concert the composition team has always been interested in El Sistema and one of the things we study is educational music … so one of the things we wanted to do is have the composition program at El Sistema be able to have a place to perform these works and so it was only natural for OCU,” Ryan said.
Kiegan Ryan explained that the concert contained students throughout 4-12th grade, and said that, “all of the pieces were original works produced by the kids.”
Ryan also explained that the performers were, “a mix of OCU students, El Sistema faculty, people who were both, and then some outside help.”
The El Sistema portion of the concert included songs, “Sweet Moonlight Dream,” “Rosefield,” “The Mischievous Winds,” “Sunny Side Down,” “Pharaoh,” “The REAL Slim Shady,” “Five-Hundred Piece Puzzle,” “The Big BANG!!!,” “I Don’t Know What to Name This Piece,” “By the Train,” “The Moon Dies,” “The Blue Sky,” “Time for the Holidays,” “Mountain Range Ringtone,” “Turnbow,” “The Release,” and “Maladaptive.”
The OCU student portion of the Project 21 was kicked off by junior composition and music education double major Emma Neasby with her composition, “Cocoon” performed by William Aceytuno on piano.
This was followed by freshman musical theatre major Orion Tuner with “Road to Old Man’s Town” performed by Lianna Paglia on voice and Orion Turner on piano, followed by their piece “Death’s Protest” with Jackson Barnes on voice and Orion Turner on piano.
Senior chemistry major Joseph Tillman followed this up with the piece “Fruit Loops” played on the snare drum.
Andrew White, a freshman composition and B.S. Mathematics double major, continued the show with their piece “Suite of Arabian Dances: Taqsim” performed by Christopher Maxwell on clarinet, Andrew White on violin, and Benjamin Rosfeld on cello.
Multiple movement song “Undertones” by sophomore composition major Antonio Gallegos, performed by Emma Gaona on flute, Zoe Bosin on violin, Patrick Acosta on voice, and Christophe Delado followed.
“Period.” by graduate student, composition and performance major Abby White, performed by Andy Chan, Andrew Crawford, Benjamin Rosfeld, Christopher Maxwell, and Emma Stoddard on voice with Abby Metcalf on bassoon continued the show.
This was followed by multiple movement piece “Titan” by freshman composition and music education double major Colin Burdick, performed by Aidan Nunez on oboe, Christopher Maxwell on clarinet, Didi Shufford on alto saxophone, Colin Burdick on bassoon, and Antonio Gallegos on bass clarinet, as well as the piece “Double Cycle” performed by Matthew Voit, Nathan Rainey, Joseph Tillman, Eric Odland, Ahmari Sango, and Antonio Gallegos on marimba, also by Colin Burdick.
Junior musical theatre major Eris Gothreaux continued the show with “Infidel” with Eris Gothreaux on voice, Shawn Echeverria and Andrew Crawford on electric guitar, Orion Turner on piano, Didi Shufford on electric bass, and Matthew Voit on drum set.
Rounding out the concert was junior composition major William Aceytuno with “Our Gods” performed by William Aceytuno on synth and voice, Andrew Crawford on electric guitar, Didi Shufford on electric bass, and Matthew Voit on drum set, as well as “Used Tape” with William Aceytuno on voice, William Aceytuno and Andrew Crawford on electric guitar, Benjamin Rosfeld on synth, Didi Shufford on electric bass, and Matthew Voit on drum set.
The final piece “The Cherub,” also by Aceytuno was performed by the large group of Katie Crim as composer, Jenny Nguyen on piccolo, Katerine White and Carlos Hernandez on flute, Julia Kahnmann and Christopher Maxwell on clarinet, Matthew Voit on the glockenspiel, Nathen Higgins on xylophone, Eric Odland on marimba, Emily Duncan on harp, Christophe Delgado on cello, and Raeslyn Miller and Becca Wallingford adding soprano voices.
Emma Neasby explained the process of Project 21 pieces by saying, “we meet with our lesson teacher Dr. Edward Knight and just show him our progression of the piece as it goes on, so like the start and the finish.”
Neasby explained that, “when it is finished we tell him ‘hey we want to perform this’ and then we set up with the performers, contacting them and making sure that everything looks ok.”
Neasby explained that all pieces that get submitted are played, with pieces being submitted as they get finished.
Emma Neasby also explained that practice occurs every Friday, that the El Sistema concert is annual, and that at the end of shows there’s normally an open performance for anyone to come up and play with others, but that the three-hour concert put them on a time crunch.
Neasby described the Project 21 group as, “a really tight knit family,” explaining that, “it’s an amazing thing that we’re all just super close to each other, and it’s a really cool and amazing thing because we do this by ourselves. We’re run by the students under the supervision of Dr. Knight.”
“It’s a really great experience and I’m very proud to be a part of it,” Neasby said.
I can tell that you could be right about this.