In Shifting Borders, the AURA Contemporary Ensemble will perform music that explores physical and psychological boundaries. The ever-changing motion of fire is sonically captured in Charles Peck’s colorful and energetic mixed chamber work “Kindling,” while in “Monarch” UH music scholar Sam Wu explores the epic migration of the North American Monarch butterfly via a quartet of flute, violin, cello, and piano.

In “Velvet Revolution”, a trio for horn, violin, and piano by Elena Kats-Chernin, the composer contemplates the myriad of emotions she felt when living in Berlin in 1989 when the wall fell, which includes feelings of vulnerability, fear, and optimism. The program will conclude with David Biedenbender’s deeply compelling “Shell and Wing”, for soprano and mixed ensemble, which reflects on the conflict all parents face between the desire to protect their child and the acceptance that they will eventually have to send them off into the world on their own.