Cassandra Miller
MIXTUR 2021
Program
Mimicry, Tracing and Transformation.
information
Dr. Cassandra Miller (1976) is a Canadian composer living in London, UK, and is Associate Head of Composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Her notated compositions (About Bach, Duet for Cello and Orchestra, Philip the Wanderer, etc.) explore transcription as a creative process, through which the expressive vocal qualities of pre-existing music are both magnified and transfigured. Her non-notated compositions (So Close, Tracery) take the form of extended collaborations with solo musicians. Using an approach that combines automatic singing and mimicry, Miller creates vulnerable and hospitable spaces for deep listening. Honours include the Jules-Léger Prize for New Chamber Music, Canada’s highest recognition for composition, which she received twice—for Bel Canto in 2011 and About Bach in 2016. Her works are often written with specific performers in mind, involving their intimate participation in the creative process. Her closest collaborators in this fashion have included soprano Juliet Fraser, the Quatuor Bozzini, conductor Ilan Volkov, cellist Charles Curtis, pianist Philip Thomas, among others. Over the last 15 years she has received over 25 professional commissions from soloists, ensembles and orchestras both in Canada and across Europe as the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Oslo Philharmonic, EXAUDI Vocal Ensemble, the London Sinfonietta, I Musici de Montréal, Ensemble Plus-Minus, etc.