The music of Arlene Sierra (b. 1970) has begun to make waves on both sides of the Atlantic. With recent commissions by the New York Philharmonic, the Royal Opera House and the New York City Opera, the British-based young American composer has found devoted advocates among many leading performers of our time. UK performances of her work have includes a Showcase concert at the Crush Room, Royal Opera House in 2007 and she will have a work performed at this year’s Cheltenham Music Festival.
The American Academy of Arts and Letters wrote of Sierra recently: “Intriguing, passionate, mysterious, her recent work, Cicada Shell, confidently announces the arrival of a significant composer.” This recording marks the first CD devoted to Sierra's music.
14th July 2011
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“her work has its own character, in which historical and contemporary influences are fused into a highly flexible and distinctive style as well as incorporating a wide range of extra-musical ideas, including game theory, Darwinian evolution and military strategy. The opening section of the ensemble piece, Cicada Shell, is powered along by Stravinskyan motor rhythms, and there's an acerbic tang of the same composer in the sextet, Surrounded Ground.”
