About Derek

Short Biography (250 Words)

Musician/Educator/Wearer-of-Many Hats Derek J. Weagle (they/them) is a Brooklyn-based artist and healer working in the medium of sound. Seeking the deepest joy in all things, they are invested in the disruption of cultural barriers around music-making, preserving it as a vital act of humanness. With a practice rooted in syncretism, Derek’s musical and teaching styles draw from a wide breadth of experience, modality, and tradition. They are passionate about the fusion of these approaches as a means of authentic connection and collective healing.

Derek holds a M.M. with Academic Honors in Composition with a minor in Choral Conducting from the New England Conservatory and a B.M. in Music Education from the University of Massachusetts Lowell, certificates in Sound Healing from the Sage Academy of Sound in Woodstock, NY, and Biosonic Sound Repattering with Dr. John Beaulieu. They will receive an Artist Diploma in Composition as a member of the Gabriela Ortiz Composing Studio at the OAcademy Music Conservatory in June 2025.

Derek’s current engagements include work as a Sound Practitioner at Official Ritual, Founding Artistic Director of Bloom Sound Collective, Associate Conductor of the Queer Urban Orchestra, Music Director of the Adelphi Vocal Ensemble and the Adelphi Symphony Orchestra, Core Member of The Why Collective, Resident Music Director and Composer with Lucada Mélange, and the Refugee Orchestra Project Board of Directors. Their work as a composer has received recognition both nationally and internationally, including the American Prize in Composition, the International Horn Society, and in the International Composition Competition Harelbeke.

Artist Statement

Like most millenial artists, I lean into the “wearer-of-many-hats” trope. While my artistic practice centers around the medium of sound, my engagement with that medium is hyperplural. My work as a composer, conductor, sound healer, educator, and performer are inextricably linked and are all necessary sources of personal nourishment. I approach everything I do through my principal value: joy.

I believe that my fundamental “superpower” is finding the connective thread between even the most disparate things. With a practice practice rooted in the concept of syncretism, I draw on a wide breadth of inspiration transcendent of boundaries in culture, genre, or medium, and unite these things into a single experience. I’ve found time and again that this fusion is the most effective and impactful means of creating an access point, achieving authentic connection and collective healing. Sound as a means of relation and restoration is not a novel idea, but endures in contemporary society as a revolutionary one. Being an artist requires a holistic understanding of one another and the world around us. The notion that ritual is an essential part of the human experience is another core aspect of my approach to musicking. I believe that all of my work — whether it be a composition, a sound ceremony, or time leading a classroom — is designed as a container for a shared experience, a journey from one state of being to another. This type of shared space allows for a mutual and meaningful examination of our ties and our distinctions.

Sound’s limitless possibility invokes my most profound excitement. My work is sometimes messy, sometimes fantastical, but always deeply emotive. I strive to leave as much space for humanity as possible when creating new work — embracing and even employing imperfection and seemingly unanswerable questions as a means of storytelling. I love to explore unconventional beauty through the interplay of tension and release, and texture and melody. As a synesthete, my compositional approach often centers unique confluences of shape, color, and image. It’s not uncommon to find sonic representations of birds, water, queerness, botanicals, or liminal spaces in my music.

About Derek

Short Biography (250 Words)

Artist Statement

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