At the Rothko Chapel, Tyshawn Sorey explores sound — and silence

Fifty years ago, composer Morton Feldman wrote music to commemorate the opening of the Rothko Chapel in Houston. A half-century later, composer, conductor, multi-instrumentalist and MacArthur "genius" Tyshawn Sorey was asked to write a new piece for this nondenominational space. Sorey's Monochromatic Light (Afterlife) debuted Feb. 19 at the Rothko Chapel.

The Rothko Chapel is a mysterious space, one that invites deep contemplation. David Leslie is the chapel's executive director. He says that as soon as you walk in from a bright, sunny Houston day, through a series of doors into this hushed, dark place, your mind and your body are both forced to shift into a very different, holy space.

"Then you walk into the sanctuary, the inner sanctum, and suddenly what you're struck by is not a large space," Leslie observes, "but this real sense of lightness of being."

The dome of the chapel is a skylight