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| Lera Auerbach | |
|---|---|
| Name | Lera Auerbach |
| Birth date | 1973 |
| Birth place | Chelyabinsk, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union |
| Occupation | Composer, pianist, poet, visual artist |
| Nationality | Russian-born American |
Lera Auerbach is a Russian-born American composer, pianist, poet, and visual artist noted for a prolific output of concertos, symphonies, chamber works, choral cycles, and solo pieces. She has collaborated with leading orchestras, conductors, soloists, and festivals across Europe, North America, and Asia, and her work spans concert music, opera, ballet, film scores, and literary publications. Auerbach's multidisciplinary practice engages with themes drawn from Jewish liturgy, Russian literature, contemporary philosophy, and visual culture.
Born in Chelyabinsk in the Russian SFSR, she studied piano and composition at the Moscow Conservatory preparatory division and later at the Curtis Institute of Music and the Juilliard School where she worked with teachers associated with the Moscow Conservatory, Reinhold Glière lineage, and the American conservatory tradition. During her formative years she encountered repertoires by Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Prokofiev, Johannes Brahms, Franz Schubert, and Frédéric Chopin while participating in masterclasses linked to institutions such as the Tanglewood Music Center and festivals like the Aldeburgh Festival. Her early mentors and collaborators included figures connected to the Vienna Philharmonic, the American Academy in Berlin, and conservatory networks in New York City and Moscow.
Auerbach's career encompasses commissions and premieres by ensembles such as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Philharmonic-affiliated soloists, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, and chamber groups associated with the Carnegie Hall and Royal Albert Hall. She has worked with conductors from the lineages of Riccardo Muti, Simon Rattle, Valery Gergiev, Zubin Mehta, and Gustavo Dudamel and collaborated with soloists tied to the Berlin Philharmonic, the New York Philharmonic, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and the NHK Symphony Orchestra. Her operatic and theatrical projects have connected her to stages like the Metropolitan Opera, the Teatro alla Scala, the Bolshoi Theatre, and festivals such as the Salzburg Festival and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
Her catalogue includes symphonies, concertos for violin, cello, piano, and chamber works for string quartet, clarinet, and mixed ensembles, reflecting influences from Igor Stravinsky, Arvo Pärt, György Ligeti, Alban Berg, and Olivier Messiaen. Auerbach's harmonic language often engages with modal, tonal, and atonal techniques associated with the Second Viennese School and contemporary currents linked to the International Society for Contemporary Music. She has composed vocal cycles setting texts by Marina Tsvetaeva, Anna Akhmatova, Boris Pasternak, Paul Celan, and William Shakespeare, while drawing structural models from works by Ludwig van Beethoven, Antonín Dvořák, and Gustav Mahler. Her aesthetics intersect with liturgical traditions represented by Ashkenazi prayer forms and with poetic-modernist concerns visible in the oeuvres of T. S. Eliot and Rainer Maria Rilke.
World premieres of her works have been performed at venues including Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Sydney Opera House, and Konzerthaus Berlin by performers associated with the Guarneri Quartet, Juilliard String Quartet, Emerson Quartet, and soloists from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Her recordings appear on labels connected to Deutsche Grammophon, Sony Classical, Naxos Records, Decca Records, and specialized contemporary labels affiliated with the International Classical Music Industry and broadcast networks like the BBC Proms and NPR. Festivals and concert series programming her music have included the Lucerne Festival, Aix-en-Provence Festival, Bergen International Festival, and the New York Philharmonic’s CONTACT! series.
She has received recognitions and commissions from organizations such as the Guggenheim Fellowship, the MacArthur Foundation-adjacent programs, prizes aligned with the Koussevitzky Foundation, grants from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, awards connected to the Tage der Neuen Musik scene, and fellowships tied to the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Honors include competition distinctions comparable to those granted by the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition network, residencies at institutions like the Cité internationale des arts, and laureate mentions from festivals associated with the European Cultural Foundation.
In addition to musical output, she has published poetry collections and essays in journals linked to the Poetry Foundation, The New Yorker-adjacent literary networks, and Russian-language periodicals associated with the Pushkin Museum milieu. Her visual-art projects—drawings, etchings, and installations—have been exhibited at galleries in New York City, Vienna, Moscow, and Berlin and have engaged curators from institutions like the Museum of Modern Art, the Tate Modern, and the Hermitage Museum. Interdisciplinary collaborations have paired her with filmmakers from the Sundance Film Festival circuit and choreographers associated with the Martha Graham Dance Company and the Paris Opera Ballet.
She maintains residences and professional ties in cultural centers including New York City, Vienna, and Moscow, and participates in artist-in-residence programs at institutions such as the Princeton University music department, the Harvard University music and arts initiatives, and the Yale School of Music. Her network includes interactions with composers, performers, and writers linked to the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Lincoln Center, and the Renaissance of contemporary classical music scenes in Europe and North America.
Category:Contemporary classical composers Category:Women composers