Members: Emlyn Johnson (2), Ellen Breakfield, Daniel Ketter

The Music in the American Wild initiative began in 2016 with a commissioning project inspired by a performance tour of American national parks, in honor of the National Park Service centennial. Since those initial tours performing in unconventional venues, from caves to mountaintops, the American Wild Ensemble has continued to celebrate American places, historic figures, and events by commissioning new works and performing them in site-specific and site-inspired locations. Since 2016 the ensemble has commissioned more than 30 new works for 2 to 7 performers, with the support of organisations including the National Endowment for the Arts, Chamber Music America, and Mid-America Arts Alliance, for performances in both traditional and nontraditional venues across the country. American Wild Ensemble emphasises audience engagement both through programming and performance design, aiming to offer a cohesive experience that connects listeners to the spaces around them through music designed with those spaces in mind.
American Wild Ensemble’s first album, Music in the American Wild, collected the original 11 works commissioned to celebrate the National Park Service centennial, featuring the full ensemble septet of winds, strings, and percussion. This second album shares several of the ensemble’s more intimate works written for flute, clarinet, and cello. Each of these works explores unique compositional and textural possibilities for these small ensembles and invites imaginative re?ection on our experience of the natural world.