[Press]
“Sarah Kirkland Snider [is]…among the brightest lights to emerge in recent seasons.”
–Time Out New York, April 1, 2011
“…a composer with an enviable knack for crafting moody, strikingly beautiful works.”
–Time Out New York , May 18, 2009
“Snider’s music lives in a netherland between richly orchestrated indie rock and straight chamber music, an increasingly populous inter-genre space that, as of yet, has produced only a few clear, confident voices. Snider is perhaps the most sophisticated of them all.”
–Pitchfork, January 5, 2011
“Uniting pop and classical music, though, doesn’t have to result in a shadow of both worlds… Sarah Kirkland Snider [is] conjoining genres to produce culturally electric new music.”
–The Los Angeles Times, August 22, 2010
“…a gifted composer…”
–The New York Times, January 19, 2011
“Sarah Kirkland Snider belongs to a diminishing margin of composers whose work is as easy on the ears as it is demanding of the mind. ”
–Hotel St. George Press, January 1, 2007
“And never mind the thousands of young composers writing fascinating scores at this very moment — no wait, let’s mention a few: Derek Bermel, Jennifer Higdon, Michel van der Aa, Sarah Kirkland Snider, Philippe Bodin. They must be a bit discouraged when listeners unwittingly telegraph that all good music is at least 100 years old — an odd message to send to any explorer, in any medium. Every era has its great artists, for those willing to make the effort to notice them.”
–Bruce Hodges, Monotonous Forest, January 18, 2007
“[The] works of Sarah Snider could be described as indeterminately elegiac, or just plain lovely.”
–The New Haven Independent, April 28, 2006
NPR The Mix: 100 Composers Under 40, April 17, 2011
Flavorwire, 10 Young Female Composers You Should Know, April 20, 2011
[Penelope]
SOME YEAR-END HONORS FOR PENELOPE
No. 1, Time Out New York Top 10 Classical Albums of 2010
National Public Radio Top 5 Genre-Defying Albums of 2010
No. 3, textura Magazine Top 10 Albums of 2010
No. 16, eMusic Top 80 Albums of 2010
No. 5, WNYC New Sounds (John Schaefer) Top 10 Albums of 2010
Huffington Post, Top 10 Alternative-Art Songs of 2001-2010
Seth Colter Walls (Newsweek and The Awl), Top 50 Albums of 2010
No. 1, Der Schallplattenmann sagt (Germany), Top 10 Albums of 2010
No. 1, The Indie Handbook, Top 13 Albums of 2010
No. 7, Indie Rock Magazine (France), Top 10 Albums of 2010
No. 11, 17 dots, Top 30 Albums of 2010
Chicago Independent Radio Project, Best Songs of 2010
“Newcomer Musician of the Year (Sarah Kirkland Snider),” All About Jazz
“…rapturous…”
–The New York Times, March 10, 2011
“A potent melding of classical poise and alt-pop punch, this dreamy song cycle was the year’s most affecting creation. Accompanied by new-music dream team Signal, vocalist Shara Worden mesmerized.”
–Time Out New York, Best of 2010 Classical and Opera, December 17, 2010
“Penelope is a gorgeous piece of music, but it is more — it is also a hauntingly vivid psychological portrait, one that explores a dark scenario with a light, almost quizzical touch, finding poetic resonances everywhere…No matter what perspective you bring to this album, it bears profound rewards…Beneath the placid surface, you can hear the sound of one woman’s thoughts, rendered with such care and intimacy that you can sense her staring out of the record back at you.” (8.2 out of 10; full review)
–Jayson Greene, Pitchfork, January 5, 2011
“Penelope is such an accomplished and remarkable work, it’s hard to believe that it could possibly be [Snider's] debut album… This year or any year for that matter, one would be hard pressed to hear melodies that are more gorgeous and soul-stirring… Material so powerful places Penelope head and shoulders above much else that was released in 2010.” (Album of the Month and textura Top Ten; read full article)
–textura Magazine, October 27, 2010
“[Penelope] embraces the sort of slow, aching beauty that pours out of Iceland these days: Sigur Rós, Múm, the composers on Valgeir Sigurðsson’s label Bedroom Community. Snider’s songwriting floats though its melody, cycling notes, leading the ear forward without adhering to the relentless A-B-A forms that can clobber similarly gorgeous pop songs.”
–The Believer, Music Issue, July/August 2011
“[Penelope] had an elegiac quality that deftly evoked sensations of abandonment, agitation, grief and reconciliation…ably [demonstrating] the poised elegance of Ms. Snider’s writing.”
–Steve Smith, The New York Times, May 24, 2009
“Brilliant/highbrow.”
–New York Magazine Approval Matrix, April 19, 2010
“[Penelope] is a cycle of haunting art songs…[echoing] the piercing melancholy of a Chopin nocturne and spacious rhythms of minimalism. Snaking out of the pastoral backdrop are instantly hummable pop melodies.” (read full article)
–Kevin Berger, The Los Angeles Times, August 22, 2010
“[Penelope] deftly weaves pop…and classical. Snider’s dark-hued score is inventive and subtle, with a mix of watery, undulating strings, guitars, percussion and electronics that submerges you completely within the story.” (read full article)
–Thomas Huizenga, National Public Radio, “Woman of Constant Sorrow,” October 7, 2010
“arresting…haunting and epic.”
–Flavorwire, April 20, 2011
“With an onslaught of indie bands attempting to combine intellect and musicianship along with a pop sensibility, few have the ability to harness all three in the way Snider has on Penelope. She courageously tackles a dramatic story arc in the vein of a Puccini opera while never losing track of her audience. Dramatic music may still be popular in many different genres but is rarely done with such care and precision.” (read full article)
–Death and Taxes Magazine, “Another Reason Why Classical Music Is Not Dead,” October 25, 2010
“Penelope is not just essential listening; it is a soul-restoring musical balm.” (read full article)
–Daniel Stephen Johnson, The New Haven Advocate, December 14, 2010
“Snider’s musical language includes intricate string writing as well as evocative, post-minimalist shimmers of vibraphone and percussion, and urgent electric guitar and drum kit… alternately melancholic, agitated and poignant… the musical offspring of Britten’s Sea Interludes and Eno’s Music for Airports…[serving] to confirm Snider’s deft command of many different musical languages.” (read full article)
–John Schaefer, eMusic, November 5, 2010 (Editor’s Pick)
“…the journey through Penelope—achingly stark, sparse, swaying, and soaring—begs repeated listening with an attentive ear. The way hints of Radiohead and David Lang materialize and mingle with St. Vincent and Chopin only to be reabsorbed into an aural landscape that is uniquely—ineffably—the voice of Sarah Kirkland Snider, results in what is easily the most beautiful album of the year.” (read full article)
–The Indie Handbook, “Penelope: A Labor of Love,” October 28, 2010
“[Penelope] features a genre-blending style compelling enough to throw categorizations to the wind and revel in its unique dialect.” (read full article)
–Alexandra Gardner, New Music Box, October 19, 2010
“Mesmerizing…lush, evocative, and deeply moving.”
–Time Out New York, October 13, 2010
“To my recollection, Penelope is the most vivid, mesmerizing psychological nightmare set to music I’ve heard… [possessing] an unabashed pop sensibility and a subtle sophistication… The result is a supremely polished yet genuine and spontaneous-sounding album that bursts with maturity.” (read full article)
–Daniel J. Kushner, Post-Post Rock, October 25, 2010
“…truly epic.”
–The Utne Reader, September 1, 2010
“In the last decade or so, a new breed of conservatory-trained musicians has reinvented crossover in unprecedented ways, fusing classical tradition with hip-hop, indie rock and world music and providing new, exciting audience bridges among these forms at the same time. A good example is New York composer Sarah Kirkland Snider’s rock-tinged song cycle “Penelope”, with a score that combines strings and harp with drums, guitars and electronics.”
–Kyle MacMillan, The Denver Post, December 12, 2010
“Snider’s score is the very model of smart, contemporary “music savant”—”knowing music” engaged with the “classical” tradition but unafraid to trot out the tools of “popular” music to suit its purposes… Penelope is, for me, the finest, most indispensable and potentially lasting new work I have heard or am likely to hear this year.” (read full article)
–George Wallace, A Fool in the Forest, November 3, 2010
“Remarkable… a beautiful cycle of songs… limns the boundaries between art song, chamber folk and post-rock.”
–WNYC, John Schaeffer, September 9, 2010
“The overwhelmingly moving concept [of Penelope] is balanced by clear, concentrated and undemonstrative writing…[Snider] reveals it with sympathy and trusts that we will hear and respond, deeply, in our own way…The results are powerfully elegiac but not hopeless. Penelope does not settle on a complete, clichéd resolution, but offers the evidence that proves the possibilities of humanity.” (read full article)
–George Grella, The Big City, “OK Composer,” October 1, 2010
“This must be what going mad feels like.” (read full article)
–Popshifter, October 26, 2010
“Sarah Kirkland Snider has generated a minor critical tsunami this year with Penelope… [we're] abnormally proud to premiere the absolutely stunning video for “The Lotus Eaters”, one of several haunting numbers from Penelope that taunts me for merely saying that it defies description.”
–My Old Kentucky Blog, November 3, 2010
“[A] weary bewilderment threads through [Penelope]… there are many secrets that can’t be unraveled on a first listen… The catchiness of the music, though, draws us to seek out meaning, and repeated listenings don’t disappoint.” (read full article)
–Chris Kompanek, The Avantgardist, Classical TV, November 8, 2010
“subtly explosive…the roar of applause at the end seemed as cathartic as it was genuine.” (read full article)
–Lucid Culture, “Some Auspicious Debuts at le Poisson Rouge,” October 21, 2010
“a dreamy song cycle for the indie rock generation.” (read full clip)
–Marlon Bishop, WNYC Culture, October 18, 2010
“The phrases and the underlying harmonies would sound completely at home on a Radiohead record. For Snider too, Kid A was a record that offered a way out of a strict classical/rock divide, and Penelope is clearly the result. It’s long, narrative arc is dramatic in the manner of Schumann and Schubert, but the understated, ambiguous resolution captures the questioning stance of so much of Radiohead’s material…” (read full article)
–George Grella, Classical TV, “On the Myth of Difficult Music,” 9/20/10
“‘This Is What You’re Like’ is an adroitly constructed composition… however, this is a song that does not forget that it is in fact a song—an impressive accomplishment for a classically trained composer… Snider anchors the intermittently dense proceedings with a recurring, bittersweet melodic refrain that I’d call a chorus except that she plays with it each time so it’s never quite the same twice. It’s a lovely and affecting melody… ” (read full article)
–Jeremy Schlosberg, Fingertips Music, August 24, 2010
“It feels like every day a new [songwriting] talent comes calling to the masses for their praise. Not many stand out and quite often they seem redundant. In the coming months composer Sarah Kirkland Snider shouldn’t have to worry about such trivial matters, at least if her new single “This Is What You’re Like” is any indication of what’s to come.”
–Indie Rock Reviews, March 9, 2010
“…But as a music critic who might “Bah!” and “Arrgh!” at some new [style] of work I can with confidence say that “This Is What You’re Like” is awesome. It’s such a well-crafted song with intense emotion and wonderful instrumentation. The vocals are classic My Brightest Diamond and hearing Worden in a slightly different and unique setting is just thrilling.”
– Knox Road, March 11, 2010, “MP3 of the Day”
“[An] epic debut album…showcasing a breathtaking vocal performance from My Brightest Diamond’s Shara Worden set to a haunting string arrangement.”
–Filter Magazine, September 28, 2010
“["This Is What You're Like"] is both epic and heartbreaking with broad, orchestral movements that push it along.”
–Trend Robot, March 12, 2010, “Track of the Day”
[Daughter of the Waves]
“yMusic’s rich timbral colour comes especially to the fore during Sarah Kirkland Snider’s evocative “Daughter of the Waves” when a luscious weave of strings, horns, flute, and clarinet conjures imagery associated with mythology and—shades of her remarkable 2010 album, Penelope—Homer’s Odyssey. Filled with contrasts of mood, Snider’s standout piece exudes a dream-like flow as it moves through its myriad passages, with a late ruminative episode especially powerful.”
–textura, November 1, 2011
“point-perfect…thoughtful and compelling.”
–Glide Magazine, November 2011
“Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Daughter of the Waves proves to be a compelling exercise in dark liquescence, its initial surface calm disrupted and disturbed by dream-like interjections that border on the hallucinogenic and nightmarish in places. If the rock music element claimed to be integral throughout is at its most elusive here in Snider’s hauntingly wistful and restless fantasy, its absence doesn’t distract from its credentials as an imaginative and rewarding new work for classical chamber ensemble.”
–The Classical Review, November 16, 2011
“Sarah Kirkland Snider, the composer of Penelope, revisits its agitated sound world with “Daughter of the Waves”, a nine-minute swirl of muted anxiety.”
–Pitchfork, December 2, 2011
“…simultaneously anthemic and hypnotic, and also ebbs and goes out gracefully, almost like a ghost.”
–Lucid Culture, September 18, 2011
“[Daughter of the Waves] takes a delicate, almost Impressionist approach, with ebullient cascades of sound along the way.”
–Sequenza 21, October 18, 2011
“… cinematic… In the course of almost 9 minutes, [Daughter of the Waves] actually feels like it goes somewhere and stays there. Featuring undulating melodies that gets passed throughout the ensemble to represent waves, there’s also lush instrumentation on top and swells of emotive action.”
–Middle Class White Noise, October 17, 2011
[Thread and Fray]
“…Thread and Fray, a tautly constructed and poignant work, interweaving short motives with a sensitive intimacy.”
–The Boston Musical Intelligencer, January 17, 2011
“…angular and gracefully expansive…”
–Allan Kozinn, The New York Times, April 1, 2009
“We had a European premiere of Thread And Fray, by the American Sarah Kirkland Snider, and this (for viola, bass clarinet and marimba) was the gem among the rest, with a real melody set against dancing, repetitive accompanying patterns and with a warm, tonal-style harmonic basis. Let’s hope there will be more where that lovely miniature came from.”
–The Manchester Evening News , November 22, 2007
“A highlight was Thread and Fray, Sarah Kirkland Snider’s lyrical trio for viola, bass clarinet and marimba, good music that could have gone on longer.”
–George Grella, The Big City, April 3, 2009 (MATA Festival 2009)
[Shiner]
“Intimacy, in fact, was the hallmark of the concert…to the luminous Romanticism of Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Shiner, in which [Colin] Currie’s delectable marimba playing was garlanded by the soft colours of harp, viola and trombone, with John Kenny’s tenor trombone playing showing the instrument at its most tender, lyrical and avuncular.”
–The Herald Scotland, April 2008
“[Shiner] was my first encounter with Ms. Snider’s music, and this piece is a little gem – effectively a one movement trombone concerto for marimba, viola, harp and trombone…a continually shifting, shimmering texture that weaves through modal relationships, sometimes quite surprising in their juxtaposition, always full of light and shade, whilst the trombone carries the principal melodic lines, evading any notion of Romantic virtuosity, but singing the line and then commenting upon the material…Very sympathetically written for the instrument, this is a most rewarding addition to the solo & chamber repertoire…The depth of texture is astonishing given the tiny forces involved – [the] viola seemed to encapsulate an entire string section, whilst the harp and marimba interlocked to create all necessary rhythmic & harmonic colours to render the piece completely satisfying.”
–John Kenny, Carnyx & Co., May 2, 2008
[The Reserved, The Reticent]
“…a work of impassioned, old-fashioned eloquence.”
–Justin Davidson, New York Magazine, November 14, 2010
[Stanzas in Meditation]
“Over the weekend, the densely populated Look & Listen Festival offered some startling voices new to me, such as…Sarah Kirkland Snider with her graceful Stanzas in Meditation.”
–Bruce Hodges, Monotonous Forest, May 8, 2006
“Sarah Kirkland Snider’s graceful Stanzas in Meditation, with texts by Gertrude Stein, hauntingly sung by Lisa Bielawa and Sadie Rosales with Cloutier on harp…Snider’s deft interweaving of the two voices in close intervals, against a harp part that harked back to Ravel, seemed to complement the slight echo of Stein’s words.”
–MusicWeb-International.com, May 21, 2006
[Disquiet]
“…Snider’s emotional immediacy and sense of narrative were arresting…”
–The Yale Daily News, April 8, 2005
[Ballade]
“Snider’s Ballade was a composition inspired by the 4th Chopin Ballade often employing polyrhythms (such as Chopin used in the last set of three etudes) and romantic musical devices while maintaining a contemporary harmonic palette…interesting and compelling throughout.”
–Sequenza 21, November 10, 2006
[Prelude]
“…masterfully composed. Flowing and impressionistic, rolling waves of sound inspired poetic musings…a very well-written, virtuosic piece that never seemed uneccessarily so.”
–International New Music Consortium, July 6, 1999