So sorry, I always forget that I try to make the homepage of this site a blog with some updates about what I’m doing compositionally. I’ll try to make this blog page a little more active, but if you are wanting more immediate updates, I share news and recordings pretty often on my Instagram page.

Anyway, I’ve been unbelievably honored and grateful to have received some great news regarding a few competitions from this last year!

1. Julie Giroux selected my grade 4 band composition Teal Fusion as the winner of her Call for Closers, where she’ll be conducting this at the American Bandmaster’s College and several All-State Honors Bands across the country.
2. The US Naval Academy Band recognized my brass trio Black Diamond as the winner of their Call for Scores. The piece will be performed by a trio of members from the Naval Academy Band.
3. I was fortunate to have compositions selected for both the International Trumpet Guild Conference’s New Works Recital and the International Trombone Festival’s Composer’s Workshop. I unfortunately wasn’t able to travel to ITG to hear Colorado State University’s performance of Thermal Whiplash, but I’m travelling to ITF to hear UT-RGV’s rendition of Through the Vaulting Skies.

To say I’m excited is an understatement! I’m honestly incredibly surprised and humbled to see these various compositions recognized in such amazing ways, and continue to feel overly lucky to get to write music that speaks to me!

I’m super excited to be writing a grade 4 concert band version of my newest saxophone quartet piece, ‘Level Up!’!

I originally wrote this three movement suite for saxophone quartet a movement at a time from Fall 2022-Spring 2024 starting with the closer, ‘Final Boss’. If it’s not immediately apparent, this whole suite is inspired by my love of video games and their iconic soundtracks, ranging from The Legend of Zelda to Final Fantasy to Ori and the Blind Forest to Stardew Valley and so many more!!

This was just a blast of a project to work on. I mean, I originally intended on Final Boss being a standalone piece, but kept feeling inspiration to write more in this style. I later added a companion movement entitled ‘Moonlit Village’, acting as a peaceful haven before that vigorous boss fight . But then after some further reflection, it felt silly to essentially have a middle and end to this gaming narrative with no clear beginning, so I wrote the intro movement ‘Adventure Awaits’ to kick off the saga through an energetic and inspiring tribute to game’s main title themes.

Well now I think it’s time to orchestrate the full suite for concert band! There are so many little brass fanfares, woodwind flourishes, or percussion textures that I hear in the music and would love to express with a few more colors (no offense, sax quartets! I definitely think the original version still holds up just great). This grade 4 band piece will be in its original three movement structure and should be around 11’00” total with each movement around 3’30”. 

Entry Form

Cost: $250
(Save $50 if you join by January 31 or were a part of the original sax quartet consortia!)
Deadline to Join: April 31, 2025
Anticipated Completion: September 15, 2025
Duration: 11 minutes
Difficulty: Grade 4
Benefits to Consortium Members:

• Names of consortium members included on the title page of the score
• Exclusive performance and recording rights for all of 2026
  • Jason Boyden and the Mona Shores HS Wind Ensemble will be the Consortium Director and premiere the piece in Fall 2025
• Input on musical material
• Opportunity to work with composer in person or via Zoom/Google Meet

Feel free to email me at cehass11@gmail.com if you have any questions about the project! Here are recordings of the original sax quartet version of the piece:

Baby’s first published piece 😭

I can’t express how excited I am to share that my string orchestra piece ‘Iridescence’ has joined the esteemed Randall Standridge Music catalog for this upcoming school year! To non-musicians not in the know, Randall Standridge has become one of the premiere names in composition – it seems like every ensemble I work with is playing at least one of his unique and engaging pieces and they’re always a delight to rehearse with students. It’s truly an honor to work with one of my composition idols!

Katie LaBrie (the catalog’s editor and another extraordinary composer) has been a beacon of light in this transition, providing so much valuable insight into how to best write for strings. Some of the tweaks that Katie suggested really helped make this piece soar, and it was great to know that most of my bowings already made sense!

And I’d be remised if I didn’t mention how appreciative I am of Kyrstin Jensen, Albin Rose, and the Royal Oak Middle School orchestras for asking me to write this piece in the first place. ‘Iridescence’ was written in memory of a 7th grade viola player at Royal Oak who unexpectedly passed away a few years ago. I truly hope this music will help Sarah Klaus’ memory live on.

New consortium opportunity!

The slow section of my bass trombone solo ‘Violent Shadows’ has always been one of my wife Jasmine’s favorite things that I’ve written, so I’ve been wanting to expand these melodies to a more colorful young band setting. Now that I’m on paternity leave and not actively working on a new piece for once, I suddenly had a million thoughts for how I could orchestrate this piece and knew I wanted to take on this project sooner than later. I think that the sophisticated harmonies will sound gorgeous with the colors of a full concert band while giving younger players an opportunity to work on lyrical playing in an exciting context.

Entry Form

Cost: $100 (or discounted $80 if you’ve been a part of one of my previous consortia or commissions!)
Deadline to Join: April 30, 2024
Anticipated Completion: September 1, 2024
Duration: 2’00”-3’00” minutes
Difficulty: Grade 2
Benefits to Consortium Members:

• Names of consortium members included on the title page of the score
• Exclusive performance and recording rights for the 2024-25 school year
• Input on musical material
• Opportunity to work with composer in person or via Zoom/Google Meet

Feel free to email me at cehass11@gmail.com if you have any questions about the project!