Kurt Rohde is a faculty composer at UC Davis and a composer-in-residence with Southwest Chamber Music (SCM) in Pasadena, California. In March 2010, SCM is participating in the Ascending Dragon cultural-exchange program, sponsored by the U.S. State Department. As part of this program, Rohde will spend three weeks in Vietnam, teaching music composition and analysis at top music schools in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

Ascending Dragon is the first cultural-exchange project of its kind, wherein student and professional musicians from both Vietnam and the United States work together to prepare performances of music by living composers from both of their countries. Rohde, along with SCM composer-in-residence Alexandra duBois, will have a number of their works performed in Vietnam and Los Angeles throughout March and April. In addition, Rohde and duBois each have composed a new work to be performed in both countries. Rohde’s new piece for large ensemble, still distant, still here, reflects the character of a threnody or memorial piece. It is based on the poem of the same name by Paul Mann.