In 2000 Jean Pierre Schmitt, director of the French American Conservatory and the French American Orchestra asked her to compose a piece for orchestra and piano jazz trio to be performed at the 10th anniversary Gala concert of the School. The piece Paysages Mouvants (Moving Landscapes), debuted to an enthusiastic audience in Florence Gould Hall at the New York French Institute Alliance Française. March 19th, 2000.
Program notes:
" Paysages Mouvants (Moving Landscapes) takes the audience on a journey to discover my itinerary as a musician and composer from the " old continent", living in New York city. The piece creates a dialogue between the trio and the orchestra using the two main languages of my musical expression: classical and jazz. Yet the music should resonate of echoes of other lands within me. Have a bon voyage!"
The Florence Gould Foundation then commissioned her to create another orchestral piece: Ombres et Miroirs (Shadows and Reflections), for strings, piano and percussion, premiered February 6th, 2002 at Weill Recital Hall, Carnegie Hall, New York.
Program notes:
Orchestral Works
"Ombres et Miroirs (Shadows and Reflections) is yet another opportunity to reflect upon the themes of musical identity, unfolding throughout the piece as many interweaving facets of the self. The piano, solitary in the overture, haunted by shadows and memories of other lands and times, is slowly joined by the orchestra. Together they reach a new place punctuated by the percussion, leading us to where the sound rebounds like light in a game of mirrors. The piece concludes resolving its conflicting influences and remembering its initial mood-solitude- but where the piano was once alone, all the instruments now embrace in a peaceful conversation bathed in the resonance of the ocean drum."
