YEAR: March 2023

DURATION: 3’00’’

INSTRUMENTATION: (3[1.2.3/pic] 3[1.2.3/Eh] 3[1.2.3/B.Cl] 3, - 6.3.3.1 – Timp+2, Hp, ST,)

ARRANGEMENTS: Alternative version (3[1.2.3/pic] 2. 2. 2, - 4.2.3.1 – Timp+2, Hp, ST,)

PERFORMANCES: Mar. 19, 2023, Seven Hills Symphony Orchestra, Conducted by Dr. Aik Khai Pung Walnut Hills High School, Cincinnati, OH. (Premiere)

DEDICATION: Dr. Aik Khai Pung

I was asked to compose The Island of Life for this Seven Hills Symphony concert celebrating the 150th anniversary of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s birth, which features Rachmaninoff's symphonic poem Isle of the Dead, inspired by Swiss symbolist artist Arnold Böcklin's oil painting of the same name.

In 1888, Böcklin painted another version of the "Island," free of despair and terror. The Island of Life (Die Lebensinsel) shows a utopian world full of joy and happiness.

As a tribute to the great Rachmaninoff, I took influence from his and Tchaikovsky's lyricism, which I studied under Dr. Aik Khai Pung, and combined it with the jolly spirit of the painting. To combat the gloomy atmosphere of Isle of the Dead, which ends in A minor, The Island of Life ends in A major.