beautiful out here (SATB) (2021)
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In the first year of the pandemic, many people experienced a renewed love of the outdoors via national parks, public green spaces, and even our own backyards. This piece depicts a moment of peace and admiration of these respites we build for ourselves with the help of our loved ones and mother nature herself.
Commissioned by Opus Vocal Ensemble for LA-ACDA 2021
Premiered by Opus Vocal Ensemble at LA-ACDA, New Orleans, LA— 10/28/2022
Program Notes
beautiful out here uses text from a 2021 Facebook post. In the first year of the pandemic, many people experienced a renewed love of the outdoors via national parks, public green spaces, and even our own backyards. This piece depicts a moment of peace and admiration of these respites we build for ourselves with the help of our loved ones and mother nature herself.
Something More Pressing
It is important to note that at this time, places like national parks, public green spaces, and even backyards are inequitably inaccessible in the United States. In addition to National Parks having very limited facilities to accommodate those with disabilities, the country's 419 national park sites host predominantly white visitors and are managed by one of the least diverse agencies in the federal government (the National Park Service). As for backyards and community green spaces, not only is homeownership growing more disproportionately inaccessible but there is a clear correlation between a neighborhood’s soil fertility and socio-economic status. Here in New Orleans, for example, the Gordon Plaza housing development built by the city for low-income residents in the 60s was built on toxic soil (federal, state, and independent toxicology studies have found high levels of over 140 toxic substances including 49 known carcinogens in the soil and water surrounding the community). In addition to the everyday struggles of dealing with toxic sludge and hazardous material surfacing in their yards, residents of Gordon Plaza are struggling with ongoing toxin-related illness and death. The Louisiana Tumor Registry found that cancer rates between 2001- 2015 within the census tract that includes Gordon Plaza had the second-highest sustained rates of cancer in the state of Louisiana. The residents of Gordon Plaza are still fighting for a fully funded relocation.
Learn more at www.gordonplaza.com.
In our continued fight for equity, it is important to advocate for all people to have access to nature and life unhindered by pollutive poisoning.
