On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Vivian Fung's Violin Concerto grew out of two things happening at once – a friendship with a violinist who wanted to understand where Fung's ideas came from, and a tour of Bali that brought those ideas into sharp focus. The result draws on gamelan sonorities, odd meters, and a cadenza with a single instruction: "play like a rock star." Then: In most concertos, the soloist leads and the orchestra follows. But Dai Fujikura's

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Toru Takemitsu described Dreamtime the way he described dreams themselves–short episodes suspended in seeming incoherency that somehow form a whole. Written for dance in 1981, the piece moves through a shimmering orchestral texture where melodic shapes surface briefly, pass, and dissolve before anything quite resolves. Then: A William Meredith poem about the beautiful randomness of perceived systems–stars, islands, relatio

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Immigration rarely accounts for the emotional cost of leaving–the grief, the inner conflict, the world you build in your mind versus the one you find. Joe Kye's Safe Harbor holds all of it, weaving Korean and American folk music with his own text into a piece that moves from a childhood lullaby to a personal mantra for rooted self-empowerment. Then: Lei Liang first encountered the folk music of Taiwan's aboriginal tribes a

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Nubia Jaime-Donjuan composes from the intersection of two worlds–a cellist and composer raised in Sonora, Mexico, drawn to the cultural and natural textures of her environment. Tyler Kline shares two of her works, including Danza Mestiza, a piece that links Spanish and Mexican musical traditions in a single dance. Then: Conceived in Iceland, Linda Buckley's Friður pairs piano with an electronic track that creates an atmosp

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Love, in Travis LaPlante's String Quartet II, is not a simple feeling: it's a force that keeps expanding throughout the compositional process, from a father's sacrifice to a wedding day promise to starlight and angels and golden ladders. It's music that pushes consonant harmony to its limits before the melodic payoff arrives. Then: In Inuit mythology, the inua is the soul that lives within all things–human beings, animals,

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Faith, doubt, and the will to persevere – Sarah Kirkland Snider's Forward Into Light traces the emotional and psychological terrain of the American women's suffrage movement, built around a musical quote from the movement's own anthem. Then: In theory, there is only one horizon, but in lived experience, there are two: the visible horizon, shaped by everything that surrounds us, and the true horizon, the full unobstructed r

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Allison Loggins-Hull wrote Legacy for The Cleveland Orchestra's community series, partnering with organizations preserving Ukrainian bandura traditions, the Hough neighborhood's history, and Black American theatrical artistry. A recurring vocal theme faces interruptions and reinterpretations but remains recognizable—much like legacy itself. Then: Tyler is joined by Eunmi Ko, president of Contemporary Art Music Project in T

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: What happens when a composer working primarily with electronics takes something electronic and makes it acoustic? Alex Dowling's Inner Orbits reimagines melodies and ideas from a previous electroacoustic work for string quartet—a compositional move from electronic to acoustic forces that he describes as refreshing, the constraints guiding him toward new ways of thinking. Then: The 1996 eruption under Iceland's Vatnajökull

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Learning to be fully present in a fast-paced world inspired Emma O'Halloran to write Only Moments to Live. The piece is structured as a dance between saxophone soloist and ensemble: gestures are picked up and expanded, with improvisational sections where everyone must listen and respond… and every performance will be different. Then: The movement of a spiral is usually depicted going downward, linked to anxiety and negativ

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: It's a reflection on beauty through light and shadow: Daniél Bjarnason wrote A Fragile Hope as a tribute to Jóhann Jóhannsson and the period when Iceland's distinct musical aesthetic was emerging. At the climax, a direct melodic reference to Jóhannsson's breakthrough work Englabörn. Then: Composer Bill Ryan has traveled to stunning landscapes across the United States with the GVSU New Music Ensemble, performing outdoors fo

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Likoo is a traditional song form from Iran's Baluchistan province, performed on bowed lute or paired flutes—music about grief and longing for a loved one. Aftab Darvishi's Likoo draws on that essence, reflecting a deep longing for those lost since the Women, Life, Freedom movement began in Iran in September 2022. The piece explores loss in its various dimensions: mothers, lovers, homeland. Then: After reading Haruki Muraka

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Sophia Jani wanted to break convention in her Woodwind Quintet No. 1: Music as Mirror—distributing the same musical elements equally across all five instruments instead of assigning each a specific role. The piece is built as a pulsating process that changes almost unnoticeably, slowly arriving somewhere completely different from where it began. Then: Unsuk Chin's double concerto for piano, percussion, and ensemble fuses s

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: We perceive inner light through eyes—contrasts of color influenced by emotion, memory, weather, the surrounding world. Ileana Pérez Velázquez's Lights of lives flowing from your eyes traces how light is drawn into the body and shines back out. It's music that moves between reflection and perception, shaped by a line from Matthew's gospel. Then: Repetition as structure and accumulation as gesture form the foundation of Zeyn

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Kimberly R. Osberg's Seek What You Want to Find was written in response to Henk Pander's paintings of Portland's 2020 protests, as well as the 1948 Vanport flood that displaced nearly twenty thousand people. The text by S. Renee Mitchell urges us to look closer, to find hope without dismissing the violence. The piece ends on a thick, ambiguous chord, asking: What do you see? Then: Hilda Paredes wrote Epitafio in memory o

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Four soloists stand where one normally would in Jennifer Higdon's Low Brass Concerto, a work written as a portrait of the Chicago Symphony's legendary low brass section — their majesty, grace, and power. The piece alternates slow and fast sections, moving between solos, duets, and chorales. No special effects, just the challenge of the moving line. Then: The soul of the gamelan was said to live in the lowest gong, used to

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Strength doesn't always announce itself through force. In For Edna, composer Leila Adu-Gilmore writes toward a quieter endurance – perseverance, openness, and the ability to remain connected in the face of strain. Dedicated to a close friend and activist, the piece honors resilience as something lived, sustained, and shared. Then: Memory doesn't arrive all at once – it surfaces in fragments, voices, and the spaces between

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: History can move – not just through words, but through bodies in motion. In A Green Double, composer Anthony R. Green draws on Black history and classical tradition to create a dance suite where protest, reflection, and joy share the same ground. Then: Ideas take root slowly — shaped by care, knowledge, and adaptation – in the String Quartet 2.5 by George Lewis, titled Playing with Seeds. Here, the composer treats the stri

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: Nobody Know by Adolphus Hailstork is a concert aria shaped by perspective – a "song from the other cross." Drawing on spirituals and biblical echoes, the music centers a voice that speaks in the language it has known, asking for recognition and redemption. Then: Imagine music moving with urgency – driven, physical, and full of sharp contrasts, as if tracing a landscape shaped by force and memory. That energy sits at the he

On this edition of Living Classical with Tyler Kline: In Morning Piece , composer Devonté Hynes writes with an uncommon sense of balance – music where, as one listener put it, one note more would be too much, and one less, too little. It’s a work shaped by stillness, patience, and close attention to sound itself. Then: the title alone suggests a place of suspension – stillness, depth, and light held in balance. In …amid still and floating depths , composer Jeffrey Mumford unf

On the next Living Classical with Tyler Kline : Breath is something we rarely notice – until we slow down enough to hear it. In Respiratory Cycle , composer Rob Funkhouser builds large-scale music around that simple motion, shaping sound as something that expands, releases, and returns, opening wide sonic spaces that reveal themselves gradually over time. This hour includes a moment from that cycle, Iris Field , inviting close, patient listening. Then: In portrait RE , compos