If Your Mind Wanders (2024) for MIDI controller and stereo live electronics

Composed by Erin C. Blake

When one meditates, especially as a beginner, they will inevitably begin to think other

thoughts besides focusing on their breath or whatever other meditation subject they may have. One of the most common and basic pieces of advice for meditation is “if your mind wanders, gently bring it back,” which encourages self-compassion in an easily frustrated beginner’s mind.

If Your Mind Wanders uses an ostinato to create the effect of breathing in and out. At some points in the piece, this inhale, exhale motion is front and center; at others, it becomes

more of a background to the “wandering.” The sounds all come from the breath; even singing is just abstracted breathing. Overall, the piece is gentle, trying to be compassionate with itself as much as I try to have self-compassion in my own meditation practice and elsewhere.

Erin C. Blake, Launchpad

Composed by Erin C. Blake

Performed on April 22nd, 2025

Auer Hall, Jacobs School of Music, Bloomington, IN

Two-Minute Train came about from the image of a freight train coming along right as you need to cross the tracks. This train is very long, and after waiting for a few seconds, you still can't see the end. You have no idea when it will pass so that you can continue on to your (undoubtedly very important) destination.

Time slows down when we are forced to notice it. By the time the way is clear, two minutes have passed (it was a very long train indeed). In so many other parts of our lives, two minutes is nothing, but two minutes to watch a train go by is an eternity. Two-Minute Train is a gentle expression of taking those two minutes for what they are: the never-ending chance to find calm and connect with the world, embracing what we have without rushing on to what is next.

N.B. Two-Minute Train is not, in fact, a two-minute piece. However, Two-Minute Train has a better ring to it than Four-Minute Train or Five-Minute Train, as well as being a somewhat more realistic title depending on the length and speed of said train. After all, those two minutes are stretched out when made to wait.

Jisoo Choi, Soprano
Aaron Lipsky, clarinet

Recording © 2024 The Trustees of Indiana University