On 8 October Ryan Bancroft conducts the Swedish premiere of Cassandra Miller’s La Donna with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra.
The 15-minute work is inspired by the Genoese tradition of Trallalero singing. Typically, the all-male groups are made up of nine singers - five basses, two mimicking guitars, and one singing the melody while leading the group, with highest voice (the titular ‘la donna;) singing in a florid falsetto. Miller’s work celebrates the extravagant vibrato and bright, vibrant resonances of this singing, realised through a creative transcription and elaboration of La Partenza da Parigi as recorded by Alan Lomax in 1954.
In 2025 the world premiere recording of the piece was released by the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra and Benjamin Shwartz – stream here. It has been performed by Otto Tausk and the Vancouver Symphony, by the BBC Philharmonic as part of Miller’s residency at the Aldeburgh Festival, and by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Finnegan Downie Dear. It was commissioned for the Barcelona Symphony, who premiered it with Ruth Reinhardt. The orchestra have since recorded Miller’s Swim (a work in dialogue with Schumann’s Symphony No.3); Ryan Bancroft previously conducted the Finnish premiere of the work in 2024 with the Tapiola Sinfonietta.
Autumn 2026 sees Miller begin her tenure as BBC Philharmonic Composer-in-Association with a performance of Swim at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall, conducted by John Storgårds, on 24 October; in 2027 they will be joined by Sean Shibe for her guitar concerto Chanter and the UK premiere of Dad Goes to the Mountain – a co-commission from the Brussels Philharmonic, BBC Radio 3, L'Auditori, Barcelona, Radio France, Festival d’Automne, and Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. The 24-minute work is a tribute to her late father.
Miller will also be in focus at the Festival d’Automne in Paris, which includes the French premiere of Dad Goes to the Mountain with Matthias Pintscher and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France on 16 October. The festival also sees the French debut of Three Songs on 14 December, her latest work for Quatuor Bozzini, and based on French and Italian folk and campfire songs, as well as performances of Thanksong (with Juliet Fraser) and Traveller Song from L'instant Donné.