Mountain Lake Photograph

for wind ensemble | 2010

Around the time I began writing this piece, I was going through a photo album of a backpacking trip I had gone on in high school with a group from my church. We were hiking in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in New Mexico, and made our primary campsite at the foot of Truchas Peak, which is a beautiful 13,000-foot mountain, far from any signs of civilization. I was looking through the album to find some pictures of a lake that was at the foot of the mountain. The setting there was serene and the view stunning. As I was going through these lake photos, one in particular stood out to me. There was a picture of two of the men who had gone on the trip, standing in front of the lake, both of whom have died in the past two years from cancer, neither of them old by any standard. These were men that I had admired a great deal growing up. They were men who deeply loved their families and friends, and served others selflessly. In this piece I wanted to convey the emotions I was feeling as I perused the photo album and remembered their friendship: the beauty and stillness of a mountain lake, the awe-inspiring grandeur of the mountains, and the mourning of lost friends who lived well and whose memory is treasured by all who knew them. This piece was written in memory of Mike Butler and Bruce Thompson.

The performance below is by the Texas Tech Symphony Band, Benjamin Lorenzo, conductor (live recording).