Leilehua Lanzilotti
Leilehua Lanzilotti is a Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) musician dedicated to the arts of our time. A "leading composer-performer" (The New York Times), Lanzilotti is the recipient of a 2020 Native Launchpad Artist Award, 2021 McKnight Visiting Composer Residency, and was honored as a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Music for her piece with eyes the color of time. Her “conceptually potent” compositions often deal with unique instrument-objects, such as The Noguchi Museum commissions involving sound sculptures. “Lanzilotti’s score brings us together across the world in remembrance, through the commitment of shared sonic gestures.” (Cities & Health) For a complete bio, please visit: http://leilehualanzilotti.com
Live at The Noguchi Museum, "Sounds of Akari" (2018) Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti, Ashley Jackson, and Alice Teyssier. Photo: Don Stahl
Artist Statement
My artistic practice has a more traditional thread that involves creating traditionally notated scores that use very specific timbral notation, as well as an experimental thread involving text scores and sound installations. As a composer, I am interested in translating sounds from everyday life onto traditional instruments using nontraditional playing methods. While I am trained as a classical violist, I also sometimes perform on sculptures or other percussive objects. My interest in these objects and instruments is the idea of giving voice to things/people which are not usually heard. Unusual timbres such as these recontextualize ordinary instrumental playing, beautiful in its directness or in its subtle intimacy. As an audience member, this means being open to hearing these various sounds in the same body of work, and finding a way to embrace their contradictions and juxtapositions. New sounds force one to be present in the physical world, often sonically making the listener uncomfortable. They also reframe familiar sounds, provoking the listener to hear and consider beauty in a new context.
At Tusen Takk
In residence, Leilehua worked on a new installation piece co-commissioned by the Noguchi Museum and Sō Percussion, inspired by the work of artist Toshiko Takaezu. Working alongside the Takaezu Foundation and the Noguchi Museum, Leilehua developed new works to illuminate Takaezu’s interest in hidden soundscapes through touch and sound.
While here, Leilehua also visited Interlochen Arts Academy for a week, performing in an assembly and working with student string players (pictured) on read-throughs of her work named a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize with eyes the color of time. She also connected with AAPI students, faculty, and alumni, since she herself went to the summer camp years ago!
Lanzilotti at Tusen Takk
Lanzilotti working with string students at Interlochen Arts Academy on a read-through of her piece named a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize, with eyes the color of time.
with eyes the color of time composed by Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti
performed by the String Orchestra of Brooklyn
Press
“The music – two pieces by Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti, one for unaccompanied viola and the other for string orchestra with covert percussion – was alive and vital, the kind you feel in your earbones and your viscera, infused with the specific manner of acoustic alchemy that makes us attend live concerts to begin with.” — Steve Smith, Night After Night
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