Nubia Jaime-Donjuan (b. 1984) is a composer and cellist from Sonora, Mexico. She studied composition at the University of Sonora, where Arturo Márquez was among her teachers. In 2021, she was the first woman to win the Arturo Márquez Composition Contest for Chamber Orchestra. Her music has been performed by ensembles in Mexico and the United States, and it features prominently in the Mexican Repertoire Initiative at Dartmouth College. She also founded the Sonora Philharmonic Orchestra, where she continues to serve as co-principal cellist. She has a page on the Wind Repertory Project, Valley Winds Publishing, and Randall Standridge Publications, as well as her own Facebook and SoundCloud pages.
Jaime-Donjuan wrote Monarch Migration in 2023 for a consortium of 41 American bands. It inspired by the children’s book Monarch Butterflies: Explore the Life Journey of One of the Winged Wonders of the World by Ann Hobbie, with illustrations by Olga Baumert, which tells the remarkable story of the annual migration of the monarch butterfly. Jaime-Donjuan elaborates in her detailed program note in the score:
I have always loved animals. Since I was a child, I have felt a lot of respect and admiration for native species. I feel that we are the “invaders”.
While we were feeding our bunny “Fleur”, my daughter Violetta told me: “animals are amazing beings full of mystery, and human beings will never have the ability to fully understand them”.
When Matthew Oyen commissioned this work from me, reading the project I immediately fell in love with the possibility of creating music that could truly describe the journeys of this majestic species. As I entered the pages of Ann Hobbie’s book, I started to cry as I was imagining how the action of flight or the complicity and organization of the species could “sound”, it made me shudder.
Our generations have grown up with the investigations of Monarchs and their migration. We have lived with the campaigns to protect the species, some of us have had the wonderful opportunity to go out into our backyard and see one or two of these queens.
As a Mexican composer and lover of nature, I tried to portray them from their conception, birth and the arrival of physical maturity, and then I put all my effort to capture them from the beginning of their flight, from the southeast of Canada and the northeast of United States until they reached Mexico, also portraying predators and the climate changes that attack them. In short, everything went hand in hand with Ann’s book, her texts are so descriptive and poetic, as are the illustrations by Olga Baumert.
The monarch butterfly, as well as its music, will return home. Monarch Migration is in ABCBA form. My great friend Brian Messier, who helped connect me to this project, suggested this approach to form. This composition presents us with an “A” theme – beginning of life and development -“B”- flying over the United States – “C” – Michoacán, México – “B”- return – “A”- end and the beginning of a new cycle.
From the bottom of my heart, I thank the Monarch Butterflies Consortium for having commissioned this work that I will love forever.
The Wind Repertory Project features another long program note. Also check out Valley Winds Publishing and Storey Publishing for more. Here is the piece with the composer conducting:
And here’s a news feature about monarch migration: