Ensemble For These Times Reveals Winners From 2025 Call For Scores With Luna Composition Lab Alums

Award-winning SF contemporary chamber group Ensemble for These Times (E4TT) has announced a second two-year Call for Scores collaboration with Luna Composition Labs, part of Luna Lab's 10th Anniversary celebration. For the first phase, E4TT will perform "Divide and Concur" for piano trio by 2025 Call for Scores winner Elisa Kain Johnson in January 2026, and for the second, the group will premiere three new works by commission winners Peyton Nelesen, Ilaria Hawley, Èbùn Ogutola in January 2027. The three commissioned composers will receive individual mentoring with one of three California woman composers: Vivian Fung, Carla Lucero, and Kay Rhie. Additionally, all four Call for Scores winners have been invited to appear on E4TT's podcast of interviews with BIPOC and women composers, "For Good Measure."

"It is an important part of our mission to support underrepresented compositional voices," E4TT co-founder and Senior Artistic Advisor David Garner said, "and much as in our first collaboration with Luna Composition Lab, we were greatly impressed by the breadth, skill, and imagination these composers displayed in their music."

E4TT will perform the winning score by Elisa Kain Johnson on Sunday, January 25, 2026 at 5 p.m., on the latest edition of E4TT's annual program of music by women and nonbinary composers, at the Piedmont Piano Company in Oakland.

E4TT's 2025/26 season is sponsored, in part, by grants from the Ross McKee Foundation, SF Arts Commission, SF Grants for the Arts. "For Good Measure" is supported in part by the California Arts Council, a state agency. 

ABOUT THE 2025 CALL FOR SCORES

E4TT's second two-year collaboration between Ensemble for These Times (E4TT) and Luna Composition Lab is part of the LCL's Tenth Anniversary and consists of two phases: 1) E4TT held a Call for Scores to Luna Composition Lab alums in the spring of 2025, choosing "Divide and Concur" for piano trio by Elisa Kain Johnson as the winning work, to be performed on E4TT's concert of new music by women and nonbinary composers on January 25, 2026 at the Piedmont Piano Company in Oakland; 2) E4TT has commissioned three of the composers from the Call to write for the group, for premieres on the group's 2027 concert of new music by women composers. The three commissioned composers will receive mentoring from one of a trio of respected California women composers, and all four winners will be featured on E4TT'S podcast, "For Good Measure." E4TT's first collaboration with Luna Composition Lab yielded six works and three commissioned composers, who were chosen from the 2023 Call for Scores and performed on E4TT's annual series of music by women and nonbinary composers, "Quest," on January 21, 2024, and "Midnight Serenades," on January 25, 2025, both at the Center for New Music in San Francisco. In addition, E4TT performed the commissions on "Midnight Serenades," with one commission delayed at the composer's request.

ABOUT THE COMMISSIONS

For the second phase of the two-year collaboration, E4TT has commissioned three works for performance on the group's annual series of music by women and nonbinary composers, the eighth edition of which will take place in January 2027. The three commissions will be as follows:

• Peyton Nelesen: duo for violin and cello
• Ilaria Hawley: piano trio
• Èbùn Ogutola: piano trio

FOUR OUTSTANDING EMERGING COMPOSERS

ELISA KAIN JOHNSON (b. 2004) is a composer, pianist, and singer-songwriter from Seattle, Washington whose music often explores elements of social justice and identity. Her music has been performed by both professional and student musicians, including the Seattle Symphony, Northwest Girlchoir, the New England Music Camp Chamber Choir and Chorale, The Overlake School Chamber and Concert Choirs, The Overlake School String Orchestra, the Thomas More University Chorale, and the ensemble loadbang. Elisa has been honored to receive awards from The American Prize, the Washington State Music Teachers Association, the National Federation of Music Clubs, and The Metropolitan Youth Orchestra of New York. A junior at Northwestern University, Elisa currently studies with Alexandra Rinn and is majoring in Music Composition and Biology.

PEYTON NELESON (b. 2007) is a composer and pianist based in New York City and Connecticut. She has been honored by ASCAP three times in the Herb Alpert and Morton Gould Young Composer Awards. Her recent work was premiered by the Kronos Quartet in 2024. Equally facile in jazz, concert music and other genres, Peyton has scored many student films. Working with her mentor, Grammy-nominated producer, Randy Emata, she has had her music recorded by Grammy winning and nominated musicians. She studies composition with John Syzygy and studied piano with Penka Rodeva and the late Amonte Parsons. Peyton attends Northwestern University, pursuing dual degrees in Music Composition at The Bienen School of Music and Radio/TV/Film at The School of Communications.

ILARIA HAWLEY (b. 2009) is a New York City-based flutist and composer attending the Special Music School. She has performed at The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Columbia University's Miller Theater, The Kitchen and Le Poisson Rouge, and she received a New York Flute Club award and the inaugural Pnea Foundation's Young Flutist Award. Ilaria's music has been performed by the New York Philharmonic, the Kronos Quartet (through a 2023-2024 Luna Composition Lab Fellowship), members of the New York Youth Symphony, Greenwood Music Camp, and Face the Music. Ilaria is the recipient of a Composers Now First Commissions Prize and an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award. She studies flute with Laura Cocks and composition with Nina Shekhar.

ÈBÙN OGUNTOLA (b. 2005) is an award-winning composer, conductor, producer, and singer-songwriter studying at Harvard and Berklee College of Music's Joint Studies program for Film Scoring. At the age of 14, she was commissioned by GRAMMY-winner Johnny Gandelsman for a solo violin work, performed in Carnegie Music Hall and The Met Museum. Her piece appeared on This is America: An Anthology 2020-2021, which hit No. 2 on Billboard's Traditional Classical Chart. She has written for ensembles like New Thread Quartet and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and was featured on NPR's From the Top with Pentatonix's Kevin Olusola. Her songwriting has also been recognized by GRAMMY-nominated songwriter, Tayla Parx, who co-wrote Ariana Grande's hit "thank you, next."