Everything that Rises Must Converge: For Piano and Orchestra

Abstract

Everything That Rises Must Converge is a work for piano and orchestra in one movement. It is structured in three main sections preceded by an introduction, which resembles a traditional three-movement concerto reduced to one movement. Since all of the sections explore a common musical thread, it has a feeling of "stream-ofconsciousness" and free association that suggest genres such as the rhapsody and symphonic tone poem. The thematic motto that begins the piece returns only at points of important formal delineations and is not presented by the piano itself until the work's final moments. The composition also utilizes a foreshadowing technique wherein secondary material in one section is revealed as primary in later sections. The piece is titled after a short story by Flannery O'Connor and reflects its evocative imagery through the frequent use of ascending gestures as well as its final convergence of thematic ideas and musical forces.