Betelgeuse

The Renova New Music Ensemble is a CU Boulder ensemble that performs new music written by CU-affiliated composers. They performed my first choral piece, "Betelgeuse", at their Fall 2025 concert: "These Darkening Skies". This piece was inspired by the eventual death of the star by the same name, and explores the feelings of disbelief, anger, and resignation that often accompany grief.

Download Sheet Music: Stephens_Betelgeuse.zip

When the Sun Burns Red, Think of Me

Released on December 25th, 2023, "When the Sun Burns Red, Think of Me" was recorded as a Christmas gift for my father. It includes several piano pieces that I wrote during undergrad, and I wanted to share them with him in a way that would be easy to access. Each song was written for a specific person who had a significant impact on my life.

Tranquil Haze

As I was learning to animate, I decided to make a video for one of my songs. "Tranquil Haze" was my first attempt at this, and it took an entire day to render on my computer! This may be one of my favorites I've rendered to date, and I hope to create trippier animations in the future.

What I Hope To See

"What I Hope To See" was my second attempt at animating a video for my music, and it took even longer to render. I was still new to Blender and did a horrible job optimizing the rendering process. The final animation took many days and warmed up my bedroom in the process. Now, I make sure to run my renders while I am out of the house...