Zippy was commissioned by The National Flute Association, for their 2024 High School Soloist Competition at their annual convention. I was thrilled to receive the commission, knowing that I was going to hear many great players interpret the piece. The fact that they were all doing it in competition with each other was a first for me. I suppose the go-to for a commission like this is to pull out all of the stops and use all of the flute’s bells and whistles to show off the player’s chops - so who was I to argue with that tradition?! In my piece, I wanted to write a Presto movement to show off the agility of the player, and to also use some of my favourite colours and moods of the instrument. Zippy is a synonym for Presto, of course. But it’s also the name of a stuffed animal I had as a child - a chimpanzee named Zippy who never left my side.