The high school band held its final concert of the year on May 15, 2025, which featured “Coalescence,” a four-movement composition by student composer Neal Teoh, Director of Bands Chris Hoefflinger said.
Teoh had been working on the piece since last May and has drawn inspiration from his own life, he said.
“Coalescence is a four movement piece, and each movement is meant to represent one year of my high school because I think a lot about legacy and who I am and how I will remember everything that has happened to me and all the people that I’ve met and how I would want them, in turn, to remember me,” Teoh said. “And so each of these four movements is meant to symbolize a different part of my life, a different part of my musical and personal journey.”
Teoh believes that “Coalescence” is a much more involved and musically complex composition compared to “Danse Macabre,” which was his first musical composition for band, he said.
Hoefflinger worked with Teoh to make sure the different instruments gel in the intended manner and to help achieve Teoh’s musical vision for “Coalescence,” Hoefflinger said.
“We mainly rehearsed during class, and so that’ll be taking each movement and working through specific parts of the piece, and really trying to nail down all the specific rhythms, all the specific pitches that need to be played out, and that’s around a three to four week process,” Hoefflinger said. “Included in that is going through and making sure all the extra human elements are nailed down.”
“Coalescence” includes solo parts for five different instruments, including senior Jorel Hernandez on the saxophone, he said. Hernandez originally thought “Coalescence” was challenging but not overly so, he added.
“I could tell Neal had put a lot of effort into this and making each part for every instrument unique on its own, and showed he understood everyone’s skill level, and he challenged us with very difficult rhythms and time signatures, and all of that,” Hernandez said. “I think just playing this piece as a band for a few months really got us as a band to increase our skill level.”
Teoh plans on minoring in music at Cornell University and to continue composing music at the bare minimum, he said. Music holds a very unique and personal role in Teoh’s life, and is something he wants to continue pursuing, even if it is just a hobby, he said.
“I think every creative person has this sense of creative desire; they want to make something that will be seen by other people and that will make a genuine impact or be genuinely remembered by the audience that they show it to,” Teoh said. “Not only did I want to make something that was very memorable and something that I can be truly proud of, but also something that, like everyone else that’s listening, can also appreciate and enjoy.”
Teoh found the entire process from musical composition until concert night to be extremely gratifying, he said.
“Music is a very special form of media because it allows you to share ideas that otherwise could not be expressed through writing, because you can add in a lot more nuances that aren’t present in other forms of art,” Teoh said. “It was a joy to watch as from the first time I handed out the piece to our band, watching them rehearse it and slowly improve, and watching everything coalesce into the cohesive whole that was played at the concert.”