Sofia Gubaidulina, composer
Photo Credit: Peter Hundert Photography
On March 13, 2025 composer Sofia Gubaidulina died from cancer at her home in Appen, Germany. She was 93 years old. The composer is best known for her apparently contradictory music style, balancing broad scopes and philosophical ideas with intimate and spiritual details that she seemed to conjure from the orchestra. A devout member of the Russian Orthodox Church and a mystic artist in interviews as well as in her writing, Gubaidulina has kept spirituality as a constant theme in her work. Her Offertorium (1981, a concerto for violin and orchestra) was the piece that made her an international sensation, gaining recognition and acclaim in the West.
Her music studies and early career were an exercise in navigating the late Soviet Union from the 1950s to the 90s. Her formal music studies (piano and composition) began at the conservatory in Kazan (1954), and she later enrolled in the Moscow Conservatory. In 1959 she met Dmitri Shostakovich, who heard her perform a piano reduction of the symphony she’d written for her final exam. He reportedly told her that “My wish for you is that you should continue on your own incorrect path.” (A morale boost to any young composer.) Like Shostakovich, Gubaidulina relied on composing for film scores during the Soviet era for something like a regular living. In the 1970s she co-founded and actively performed with the improvisation group Astrea, which allowed her to explore her father’s ancestors’ Asian (Tatar) roots and experiment with Asian instruments. In 1979 she was one of seven composers blacklisted at the Sixth Congress of the Union of Soviet Composers for writing music that was insufficiently innovative, “noisy mud,” and unconnected with real life. Both her aesthetic and the Union of Soviet Composers’ reaction to it are unsurprising to anyone who knows that Gubaidulina saw music as an escape from the socio-political atmosphere of the U.S.S.R. After the fall of the Soviet Union, she moved to Appen, Germany in 1992.
Below is an audio-only recording of Gubaidulina’s Offertorium (Concerto for Violin and Orchestra), performed by Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin) and the NDR Elbphilharmonieorchester in 2015, conducted by Thomas Hengelbrock.
The National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland has announced the participants for its 2025 Composers Lab. Composers Solfa Carlile, Elis Czerniak, Bianca Gannon, and Caterina Schembri will have opportunities to develop works for symphony orchestra. The program includes one-on-one mentorship with composer David Fennessy (Royal Conservatory of Scotland), instrumental workshops with NSO section principals, and a combined public performance and live broadcast of their works by the RTÉ concert orchestra conducted by Gavin Maloney. Composer lab is a partnership between the Contemporary Music Center of Ireland, the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, the National Concert Hall, and RTÉ Lyric FM. The initiative is designed to create opportunities to write for orchestra for composers who have not otherwise had such opportunities, particularly with a performance and broadcast guaranteed. Opportunities like these are particularly important for bringing fresh ideas into the orchestral composition landscape, and also for making composing music for large orchestra more accessible. We are looking forward to hearing what the 2025 participants come up with!
The New York based artist management company Young Concert Artists (YCA) has announced Hannah Ishizaki as its Composer-in-Residence for 2025-2027. Ishizaki will collaborate with the current YCA Jacobs Fellows—early-career musicians participating in YCA’s three-year program of career support, which includes networking and performance opportunities—as well as write three new works on commission. The first two commissions will be for a current YCA artist (to be determined), and composer and player will collaborate closely during the process. The third commission will be for a YCA alumnus. All three pieces will be premiered as part of the appointment, and a further 1–3 performances beyond the premiere will be scheduled with YCA oversight.
Below is a recording of Ishizaki’s Fractured Transformations for Orchestra (2022), performed by the Julliard Orchestra as the winning piece of Julliard’s orchestral composition competition.
On April 11, 2025 the University of the Philippines Orchestra will perform their program “By Her Hand,” a concert celebrating the work and artistry of women composers, under the baton of Noemi Binag. The program will feature works by composers Lucrecia Kasilag, Amy Beach, Florence Price, WPA favorite Joan Tower, Katz Trangco, and Cécile Chaminade. The concert is offered as a tribute not only to the excellent music but to the remarkable women who created it.
You can follow the UP Orchestra on their YouTube channel, where they post live recordings and online blended performances.
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