Meteors — Yuval Medina

About the Work

"…
The doll laughed,
And the bear laughed even more,
Why chase away the darkness
When he's such a good boy?
…"

— from HaBuba Zehava by The High Windows

On its surface, Meteors follows the trajectory of an asteroid. But not as destruction — we follow it like starry-eyed children watching the sky, solar winds brushing past us through overlapping string glissandi. At the moment of impact, time seems to last an infinity, the conductor counting smaller and smaller subdivisions of the beat — like quantum particles breaking apart — before the stupor lifts. The ending feels like a curtain just opening, preparing us to be swept into the world newly revealed.

A Trilogy in Development

Meteors is the prelude to an evening-length orchestral trilogy on creation myths — the forces that shaped us, and the worlds they left behind. Across three chapters, the music rises from earth toward the heavens, becoming ever more ethereal yet no less alive.

The prelude — Meteors

An asteroid's trajectory seen through the eyes of starry-eyed children. Not destruction but wonder; not an ending but a curtain rising on the world to come.

Chapter I — Anchor on Feather Mountain

The Flood. Storms, oceans, and an enchanted mountain breaching the waves — a world washed clean and breathing again, the ocean current carrying us forward. Calamity becomes genesis. Composed in 2025; a solo piano excerpt premiered in April 2026.

Chapter II

Water gives way to the living world. It draws on world-tree mythologies — Yggdrasil, the Mayan ceiba, the cosmic ash — that imagine a single living organism at the center of the universe, branches in the heavens, roots in the underworld. The orchestra becomes a breathing ecosystem of animals, insects, and birds, the wind moving through hidden branches. Day cycles into night.

Chapter III

An ecstatic climb through mythic heavens; an ode to energy, joy, and cosmic wonder. The arc that began with starry-eyed children watching a meteor ends among the stars themselves.

As music, the trilogy is conceived as a single work. Melodic cells and gestures migrate across the chapters — the string glissandi that open Meteors travel from solar wind to ocean current to wind through branches, the same gesture transfigured each time it returns.

Beyond the score, the trilogy is being developed as an evening-length production integrating film, choreography, lighting, and costume — orchestra and stage conceived together, each art form responding to and reshaping the others. A preview is in production now, with release this summer. The full creative team will be announced alongside it.

The Composer

Yuval Medina is a composer and pianist working at the intersection of music with dance, film, and the concert stage. His recent projects include Together Again (2025), a sold-out evening-length multimedia production he composed, produced, and directed; The Long Goodbye (2026), a brass ensemble work commissioned by Manhattan School of Music; and his orchestral rescore of BBC's Frozen Planet II, viewed over 2.8 million times on YouTube. His music was featured by Vanity Fair during the 2025 Oscars in collaboration with photographer Álvaro Colóm. He is co-founder of Ex Corde, a composer-led nonprofit presenting contemporary composers alongside masterpieces from the past, and is currently completing his M.M. at the Manhattan School of Music.

Full bio →

Performance Credits

Composer

Yuval Medina

Conductor

Matt Ward

Orchestra

Manhattan School of Music
Symphony Orchestra

Venue

Neidorff-Karpati Hall
Manhattan School of Music

Date

April 10, 2026

Recording & Video

Manhattan School of Music
Recording & Video Department

Get Involved

The trilogy is in active development with a team across dance, film, and theater. We are seeking presenting partners, co-commissioners, and creative collaborators to help bring the larger work to life.

To learn more or get involved, contact: music@yuvalmedina.com

Follow the project: @yuvalcomposer on Instagram · YouTube