Dyadic was commissioned by Troy Jones for the 2025 Wilfrid Laurier/Ontario Band Association Honour Band. It is co-composed by Dan Austin and Wesley Cheang. The writing process was an interesting one. Dan and Wes established a few rhythmic and melodic themes before starting to write. They proceeded to interpret these themes in surprisingly different ways. Wesley’s half can be heard from bars 1-37 and Dan’s half is bars 38 to the end.

The piece is entitled Dyadic (defined as the interaction between two things) to describe how their individual compositional voices are present despite starting from common themes.

Troy asked that the piece reflect the experiences of music students through the COVID-19 pandemic. Some instrument sections play alone to mimic the solitary experiences of students as they learned music on their own in their homes. Bars 38-45 get confusing, abstract and dark but the piece ends triumphantly as COVID-19 restrictions get lifted and music returns to schools with more enthusiasm than ever!