In 2018, Jen Wang put together a project in which people could commission short pieces by donating to RAICES, an immigrant and refugee advocacy organization. Trombonist William Lang's contribution led to the birth of All we could see from the window was water, which I wrote for him and pianist Anne Rainwater.

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One of the first questions I ask collaborators is what music they’ve been excited about lately. Will mentioned Lana Del Rey and Pet Sounds, and you’ll hear a bit of the former's rich reverberant sound-spaces and the latter’s sense of long-line melody in my piece — as well as the distinctive three-note tag that appears at the end of classic Beach Boys lines like "I know there’s an answer," "I can hear so much in your sighs," and "where did your long hair go?"

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The title refers to a trip I took as a kid to family friend's house on Cape Cod. At this point, all I remember is that from the second story, it looked like we were adrift in the ocean. That image has made a permanent home in my brain, and often shows up in my dreams. (And if that weren't surreal enough, I contacted that family friend a few years after I wrote this piece, and learned that the house had burned down!)

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download score (pdf)