On 20 June Ilan Volkov and the Brussels Philharmonic premiere Cassandra Miller’s Dad Goes to the Mountain, as part of the two-day Tectonics Festival at Flagey. The 24-minute work was commissioned by Brussels Philharmonic, BBC Radio 3, L'Auditori, Barcelona, Radio France, Festival d’Automne, and Orchestre symphonique de Montréal.
A single-movement work in four chapters, Dad Goes to the Mountain is dedicated to Miller’s late father. She writes,
My Dad was a mathematician, theoretical physicist, and expert conversationalist…In his old age, he developed vascular dementia which impacted his spatial awareness and short-term memory, but which left his personality largely intact. I experienced him in this state as someone becoming more and more himself—he could act only from his deepest instincts which were kind and gentle. When I compare photos of him at 70 and at 80, the older ones show a much lighter person. I feel he was somehow transfigured by the experience.
This transfiguration—and lightness—are the topics of this piece. It is about a general upward ascending, about forgetting (un-knowing), and about the fluidity of time. I imagine a mountain as the goal of my Dad’s transformation, as a symbol for the simplicity of spiritual awareness—and, in quite a leap, I pretend that he is greeted on the mountain by a wind band from the Andean heights of Peru.
This transfiguration—and lightness—are the topics of this piece. It is about a general upward ascending, about forgetting (un-knowing), and about the fluidity of time. I imagine a mountain as the goal of my Dad’s transformation, as a symbol for the simplicity of spiritual awareness—and, in quite a leap, I pretend that he is greeted on the mountain by a wind band from the Andean heights of Peru. A specific recording became the basis for my composition process: “Canchis Tierra Linda” by the Banda San Martin de Sicuani (from the fantastic label El Volcán, which has recently re-released many archival tracks from rural Peru). I wrote around and through this music—as if making fanciful drawings over it on tracing paper. This musical filigree then took on its own life, growing and ageing and forgetting.
It will receive its French premiere on 16 October at the Festival d’Automne, as part of a focus on Miller, conducted by Matthias Pintschner; Tianyi Lu conducts its Canadian debut on 19 November, with Ludovic Morlot – who has previously conducted Miller’s Swim in Barcelona – giving its Spanish premiere in January 2026.
Dad Goes to the Mountain receives its first UK performance from the BBC Philharmonic and John Storgårds, who has previously conducted Miller’s viola concerto I cannot love without trembling and La Donna with the orchestra, on 6 March at Bridgewater Hall. Miller is BBC Philharmonic Composer-in-Residence next season.