The Choice is Yours
The Choice is Yours is an online choose-your-own-adventure musical performance that explores our relationships with personal autonomy, human intimacy, and body positivity. Created by composer/storyteller Benjamin Stevenson in collaboration with technologist Brian Ellis, its character-driven journey blurs the boundaries between audience, composer, performer, and the digital world. Visit thechoiceisyours.density512.org to experience it today!
for a sneak peek, watch the videos below:
Benjamin Stevenson (b. 1995) writes with the goal of inviting audiences to evaluate their understanding of the world, whether related to deeply held beliefs or simple experiences in our daily lives. His music has been showcased by groups including the UT New Music Ensemble, Density512, the Cohen New Works Festival, and the Sound in Sculpture series. Stevenson has a wide variety of artistic interests, often creating works alongside poetry, visual artists, choreographers, and film creators. He has been recognized with awards including the George H. Mitchell Award and the Prix Nadia Boulanger from the Écoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau. He received his master’s degree in music composition and oboe performance at Peabody Conservatory, studying in the oboe studio of Jane Marvine and the composition studios of Du Yun and Kevin Puts.He received his Bachelor of Music degree in Music Composition from the University of Texas at Austin, where his teachers included Donald Grantham and Yevgeniy Sharlat. Stevenson studied oboe under Andrew Parker and Rebecca Henderson, and now frequently premiering new works and performing works from the standard repertoire
Brian Ellis is a composer, web-based creator, and guitarist. His musical drive lies in using code to realize his larger compositional vision:
technology should be used toward divesting musical agency from the composer to the environment, the performer, and ultimately, the listener.
Brian is a recent graduate of the University of Texas, where he earned his double major in Music and Computer Science Honors. He studied with Nina C. Young, Chris Ozley, and Celil Refik Kaya, among others. Brian currently studies composition with David Coll. He has presented his work at numerous events, including ICMC, ROCC, SEAMUS, SPLICE Festival, SoSI, Ears Eyes and Feet Collaborative Concert, the Good House Collective's "Time Warp", as well as in numerous student concerts and house concerts at the University of Texas.
As a professional software engineer, Brian has worked for Facebook on Assistant and Spark AR Player as well as forAmazon on Audible.com. He additionally spent time in Dr. Howard Ochman's Microbial Evolution Lab, where he was co author of a paper in the Journal Bioinformatics, which discusses classifying prokaryotic species based on gene flow.