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Championing New Music for Future Generations
This August, Cedille Records proudly releases The American Concerto, Volume One, the first installment in an ambitious new recording series from violinist Jennifer Koh.
Throughout her career, Jenny has been a passionate advocate for living composers, commissioning and premiering dozens of new works while expanding the violin repertoire for future generations. Cedille Records has been a proud partner in her artistic vision for over two decades. This latest project continues that commitment, pairing her artistry with groundbreaking concerto works by contemporary composers and preserving these important musical voices through world-premiere recordings.
What makes The American Concerto project especially meaningful, in addition to its goal of addressing contemporary socio-cultural topics through the form of the violin concerto, is the selection of orchestras with which Jenny is recording. In addition to collaborating with leading composers, Jenny has invited student musicians from some of the nation’s most distinguished conservatories to participate in the recording process. These young artists gain firsthand experience preparing, performing, and recording new works at the highest professional level — an opportunity very few musicians encounter during their formal training.
Volume One features Vijay Iyer’s Trouble and the world premiere recording of Courtney Bryan’s Syzygy, performed with the Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble conducted by Timothy Weiss. Iyer’s work is featured in The Cool Blue Wind, a photographic collage and permanent installation at the Obama Presidential Center. Cedille just had the honor of releasing, as an exclusive YouTube single, Trouble’s rousing final movement, titled “Assembly,” in conjunction with the Center’s grand opening.
Support for this series enables the creation of definitive, world-premiere recordings of important contemporary works and helps provide invaluable educational experiences for emerging musicians as they learn from one of today’s most renowned champions of new music. Volume One is generously supported by Patricia A. Kenney and Gregory J. O’Leary. Volume Two, featuring works by Missy Mazzoli and Philip Glass, will be recorded in early-2027 with musicians from the Cleveland Institute of Music conducted by Tito Muñoz. Please contact Julie Polanski if you’d like more information about how you can support this or subsequent volumes.
This project’s impact extends far beyond a single recording (or even a series of recordings). Cedille’s partnership with Jennifer Koh allows a visionary artist to realize a long-held artistic mission, provides student musicians with transformative professional experiences, and gives contemporary composers a lasting platform for their work. Together, these efforts ensure that today’s most compelling musical voices are heard, preserved, and shared with audiences for generations to come.
Recommended
Cedille’s newest digital single, Mischa Zupko: Harpsichord Concerto is available to stream everywhere. Scored for harpsichord and string quartet, the concerto exhibits highly idiomatic harpsichord writing, brought brilliantly into the present by Zupko’s ingenious reshaping of older musical styles into a thoroughly modern expression.
From Chicago-based composter Stacy Garrop comes INVICTUS, Latin for “unconquered.” The work unfolds across four movements and an interlude, moving between lyrical introspection, fierce determination, and triumphant resolve, with Grammy-nominated pianist Marta Aznavoorian and the Chicago Philharmonic under the direction of Artistic Director Scott Speck. Available 5/8.
Haymarket Opera Company presents early-18th-century master Leonardo Vinci’s rare operatic gem, Artaserse (1730). A prominent figure of the Neapolitan School of opera, whose work influenced composers such as Johann Adolph Hasse and Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, Vinci’s three-act opera seria centers on the Persian prince, Artaserse, who must bring his father’s murderer to justice amidst betrayal, deceit, and mistaken identity.
In celebration of the June 12 digital single release of Mischa Zupko:Harpsichord Concerto, this month’s playlist features that very instrument and its many personalities. There’s delicacy in Lully’s Passacaille contrasted by Soler’s muscular Keyboard Sonata No. 81 in G Minor. Appearing both accompanied and unaccompanied, the harpsichord takes center stage this month.
Enjoy Cedille’s Weekly Featured Release.