Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
WASHINGTON — Utah native Matthew Yost won an orchestral composition competition hosted by The Catholic University of America, and his piece debuted at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Yost, a West High School graduate, said his love for sacred choral music began at the Madeleine Choir School in Salt Lake City.
“At the Madeleine Choir School, there is a top-notch musical education,” Yost said. “I think what influenced me the most about that school was that all of that music is done in the context of service. The kids sing for Masses, not just in concerts. … (They sing) for service — like hospitals, old folks homes, things like that — in addition to all of their rigorous academic studies.”
CUA held the contest as part of a yearlong 50th anniversary celebration. The school invited alumni and students to submit entries. The winning piece would then be played by the CUA Symphony Orchestra as the opener of the school’s gala celebration at the Kennedy Center.
Yost said when he started composing for the competition, he wanted to capture the transformation of order into chaos, of triumph of heroism over turbulence.
“I was inspired to write something that emerged from a chaotic place, a Stravinskian place, if you will, the swirling textures and something bold and noble and honorable coming from that,” Yost said. “I wanted to try something that was celebratory, that was exciting, that fit with that program.”
The result was “Ut Sol, Ut Luna,” Latin for “Like the Sun, Like the Moon.”
Yost’s parents, little brother, older sister and other family members were at the performance with him on April 12. Despite their supportive presence, Yost said when he sat in the Kennedy Center and the CUA Symphony Orchestra started playing his piece, he was terrified.
“Man, I was in a little box right on the side of the stage, gosh, for the first maybe three minutes while they were playing my piece, I was just white knuckles, gripping my seat, terrified … just terrified that it wasn’t going to do well,” Yost said. “About two or three minutes in I realized they were doing a really good job, which wasn't a surprise, but it sort of hit me. So then I started to relax and listen to the music and live in the moment a little bit more and it was really nice.”
The performance went well, and the importance of the venue and opportunity were not lost on Yost, and the experience and the Kennedy Center left a “big” impression.
“I said ‘big,’ because of my first impression standing on that stage and looking out and seeing all those people who were there,” Yost said of the sold-out performance. “That’s big in one sense but also (it was also) big in one sense that I've had an orchestral piece played somewhere that has been played by some of the greatest musicians in the world, playing music of some of the greatest composers in the world.”
Yost’s plans for the future are to share his love for music, including starting a choir school of his own and writing musical scores for films. Wherever his path takes him, he will approach it with the same outlook.
“Fundamentally the world is beautiful — it’s structured, it’s designed beautifully. There is beauty that permeates everything we do,” Yost said. “And each of us can be part of that beauty, can participate in that beauty because that beauty is part of us.”
“Ut Sol, Ut Luna” is not yet available to the public. To listen to other work by Yost, visit his website.
Contributing: Pat Duran
Catholic University of America
