Amy Beth Kirsten

Amy Beth Kirsten, composition (New Haven, CT), embodies contemporary musical theatre. Her work combines popular idioms with fierce expressionism and often requires musicians to play, vocalize, act, and move simultaneously. A composer, librettist, and vocalist, Kirsten premieres her newest evening-length piece, QUIXOTE this season at Peak Performances in Montclair, NJ. In 2014 the multi-Grammy-winning eighth blackbird toured with Colombine’s Paradise Theatre, which required them to play, vocalize, and move as they portrayed the characters of the commedia dell’arte. The Washington Post described it as a “tour de force… complex and multilayered, rich in allusions, and often extraordinarily beautiful” with “a beguiling element of the grotesque throughout.” Tommasini at the New York Times found it “dark, wild and engrossing” with a “wondrously eclectic score, which combines spiky modernism, breezy pop, hints of Indian music, percussion wildness and more.” Kirsten recently made her Carnegie Hall debut with strange pilgrims, a concert work for chorus, orchestra, and film. She has been recognized with artist fellowships from the John S. Guggenheim Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. Kirsten is presently on the composition faculty at Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University. She also teaches privately and at the HighSCORE summer festival in Pavia, Italy.