Recordings
The Lion of Maurya is a piece written for full orchestra that depicts a snapshot from Indian history. It follows the story of an violent and bloodthirsty Indian king named Ashoka in the 3rd century, BCE, who ruled over the Mauryan Empire. The piece depicts a moment in which Ashoka realizes his wrongdoings, and has a massive moment of transformation where he converts to Buddhism, and becomes one of the most successful pacifist kings in history. The Lion of Maurya was written for the Greenwood Music Camp Senior Orchestra, and was performed on August 3rd, 2025 in Cummington, MA
Ruhan Iyer's second piano trio is an arrangement of a work by Iyer for Piano, Cello, Indian Classical voice, violin, and percussion. It explores an excerpt from a poetry collection called "Gitanjali", by Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore.
"Where the mind is without fear
And the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
by narrow domestic walls"
Piano Trio II "Where the Mind is Without Fear" explores a mixing of modal perspectives, with much of the piece set to the Carnatic Ragam Vagadheeswari, and the rest using the half whole octatonic scale.
Piano Trio II “Where the Mind is Without Fear” was premiered at Greenwood Music Camp on August 1st 2025.
Where the Mind is Without Fear is a piece by Ruhan Iyer commissioned by Newton Cultural Alliance for Piano, Cello, Carnatic Violin, Carnatic Voice, and Mridangam. It is written about an excerpt from Rabindranath Tagore's "Gitanjali".
"Where the mind is without fear
And the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
by narrow domestic walls"
This piece embraces two similar but quite distinct modes: the half whole octatonic scale, as well as the Carnatic Raga Vagadheeswari. The piece alternates between sections highlighting the Octatonic scale in the Cello and Piano and sections set to Vagadheeswari highlighting the Carnatic musicians. Over the course of the piece the two distinct sound worlds slowly amalgamate, resulting in an offspring of both music styles.
The piece also features a round robin style improv section in between a reoccurring phrase, inspired by a feature of Carnatic Music called Kalpana Swaras.
Performed on April 6th, 2025, at Nathaniel Allen Center for the Arts, Newton MA.
"Fanfare for an Unparalleled Preparatory School" is a celebratory fanfare written by Ruhan Iyer. It was commissioned by the New England Conservatory Preparatory School and was commissioned as the opening work for the NEC Prep's 75th anniversary concert on November 15th, 2025. It was premiered by the Massachusetts Youth Wind Ensemble, conducted by Michael Mucci.
The piece is scored for the Brass and Percussion sections of a standard full Orchestra(4+4+3+1, T+3).
The title of the piece, "Fanfare for an Unparalleled Preparatory School," comes from a play on words of several fanfares that loosely inspired the piece. Following a trend that appears in fanfares like Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" and Joan Tower's "Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman", the piece's title replaces words like "Common" or "Uncommon" with "Unparalleled", and words like "Man" or "Woman" with "Preparatory School." The piece takes some inspiration from these previous fanfares and is scored for the same instrumentation.
"Fanfare for an Unparalleled Preparatory School" is dedicated to the 75th anniversary of the New England Conservatory Preparatory School, and its ability to make "unparalleled" education accessible to everyone.