Artistic Innovation
Shelter Music Boston creates innovative programming centered around collaborative composition projects and amplifying the voices of diverse composers and identities.
2023 Julie Leven Artistic Project:
Songs of Life
Songs of Life is a series of arrangements and commissioned compositions for string quartet based upon songs of significant importance to our audiences, related to their identity, stories and emotions. SMB musicians gathered stories and selections from partner site listeners, and four area composers created new works based on these discussions. The new works were then premiered for our listeners and community in September of 2023.
Part 1: Listener Feedback
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In January 2023, a quartet of SMB musicians presented a program of music based on four emotions - PEACE, SADNESS, HOPE, AND JOY. Each musician curated musical selections based on an assigned emotion, and asked listeners what their choices would have been. Using dialogue and ideas from listeners, SMB then commissioned new works based on the pieces audiences chose as their "Songs of Life."
Part 2: Four New Works
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Four composers listened to dialogue from the January concerts, analyzed songs that were suggested, and read comments from our audiences. They created new works inspired by these conversations and ideas.
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A Snug Glove, by Anthony Green
Inspired by Can I Kick It? by A Tribe Called Quest
Tiger Eye, by Francine Trester
Inspired by Eye of the Tiger, by Survivor
I like you, by Che Buford
Inspired by Eu gosto de voce
Inspired by Happiness, by Dead Prez
Part 3: Public Concert
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The last stage of the project was to premiere the new works for our program audiences and perform a public concert in September 2023. The concert was featured on WGBH radio and in the Boston Globe.
2022 Julie Leven Artistic Project:
Voices of Hope
Voices of Hope is a series of short musical compositions based upon poems written by individuals experiencing homelessness in Boston, set to music by local composers, and performed by Shelter Music Boston musicians in collaboration with the Black Seed Writers Group.
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​Every Tuesday since 2011, homeless, transitional or recently housed people meet at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul for an hour and 15 minutes of free-writing. They are the Black Seed Writers Group. The writers' works are published in the literary magazine The Pilgrim and performed at readings at Brookline Booksmith.
The Poetry
Laurel Lee Lambert
James Augustus Foy
Denin J. Simon