An experimental music ensemble made up of high schoolers from Normal has dropped a new LP and is preparing for a concert at the McLean County Museum of History.
The album, A Moment of Yet, is released under the Bloomington-Normal indie label Black Flag Bonsai Club, launched in 2025 by composer/musician/producer Stefen Robinson—who happens to be the group’s faculty advisor.
The Normal Community High School Experimental Ensemble, now in its fifth year, doesn’t operate like a typical band. There’s no sheet music, no conductor. Instead, students build pieces from scratch—starting with loose ideas, experimenting with sound, and shaping compositions together through improvisation.
“It’s kind of like chiseling a statue,” senior Andrea Marinello said. “You start with a big idea and slowly carve it into something that feels right.”
J. Aldeman, also a senior, has been playing the tenor saxophone since fifth grade.
“I really enjoy the instrument, but sometimes concert band is just so—there’s very little musical expression,” said Aldeman, who joined the ensemble two years ago. “You go with the conductor, you play the notes and dynamics on the page.”
Once Aldeman discovered the experimental music ensemble, that dynamic changed.
“I was kind of trying to break free from this cycle of lack of creativity. I found the experimental music ensemble, and this is kind of the opposite of that. So, I really enjoy it and found a home here,” Aldeman said.
Every year, the band fluctuates in members. Instead of hurting the group, they say that helps them.
It's that kind of fluidity which drew many of them in. Some came from traditional band programs and wanted more freedom. Others, like junior Jimmy Niewadomski, had never played instruments in a formal setting at all, instead producing music on computers at home.
Niewadomski’s English teacher, Michelle Hawkins, prompted him to join after submitting songs that were “out there” to a class playlist.
“I never really knew how to play an instrument,” he said. “I didn't know how to read sheet music either.”
In the ensemble, those backgrounds collide.
NCHS junior Rajeeth Ganesan, who plays a kind of tabletop accordion called harmonium in the ensemble, was looking for various ways to play music and joined two years ago.
Before Ganesan knew it, the group became a means of self-expression.
“The more time I spent being in this ensemble, the more I was able to express myself in ways that I didn't really think I could before,” Ganesan said.
Marinello, whose plethora of music making has included euphonium, percussion, radio and turntable work, said their music can often carry pieces of their identities with them.
“There's parts of the songs where I link in bits of music that I have been playing,” Marinello said. “So it's almost like that portion of my life at that very moment, a snapshot, I guess, bleeds into that.”
Marinello said that each of the seven original tracks in A Moment of Yet started with a concept or idea. Marinello was also a creative mastermind behind the title and cover art.
"It's like you're waiting for something to happen, for it to start," they said. "Like you're sitting at a train station waiting for your train to come. It's not a moment of now, but a moment of what is yet to come."
Like high school.
The ensemble’s instrumentation stretches beyond typical high school conventions, incorporating everything from a shakuhachi — a traditional Japanese bamboo flute — to a duduk, an Armenian double-reed woodwind instrument.
“It feels meditative,” Niewadomski said. “Like you can just exist in the sound for a while.”
A Moment of Yet captures that feeling. Recorded over January and February, the album reflects a specific snapshot in time—both musically and personally.
For many, having an actual record makes that moment tangible.
“I can’t wrap my head around it,” Aldeman said. “It’s like, I did that.”
The Normal Community Experimental Ensemble is playing a free concert presented by pt.fwd at 6:30 p.m. on May 9 at the McLean County Museum of History. A Moment of Yet is available for digital download and purchase on vinyl through Black Flag Bonsai Club’s Bandcamp page.
