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Lisa Illean, Oliver Leith and Cassandra Miller Join Faber Music

Oct. 01, 2021

Faber Music is delighted to announce the signing of exclusive publishing agreements with Lisa Illean, Oliver Leith, and Cassandra Miller. 

Lisa Illean is a composer of acoustic and acousmatic music, based in the UK. Her music has been described as “exquisitely quiet shadows shaded with microtunings” (The Sydney Morning Herald) and has been presented around the globe, including at Festival Présences (Paris), Taiwan International Festival of Arts, BBC Proms, Unerhörte Musik (Berlin), Angelica Festival (Bologna), the Elbphilharmonie (Hamburg), and Metropolis New Music Festival (Melbourne). 

Many compositions arise out of working with non-tempered tuning systems, playing close attention to sonority, subtly unfolding harmonic forms, auditory phenomena and perspective. Premiered in 2017 by members of the Philharmonia, Januaries for ensemble has since been programmed by six other ensembles in the UK, US and Australia. Land’s End, premiered by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and David Robertson, has been taken up by both the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the orchestra of the Australian National Academy of Music. Cantor for soprano and ensemble was named Instrumental Work of the Year at the 2018 Australian Art Music Awards. A through-grown earth for soprano with pre-recorded sound was premiered and recorded by Juliet Fraser.

This autumn new pieces will be presented at Donaueschinger Musiktage (Trio Accanto/Experimentalstudio des SWR), and at Transit Festival and November Music (Juliet Fraser/Explore Ensemble). Future performances are scheduled with Ensemble 10/10, London Sinfonietta, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Juliet Fraser, and musicians at the Royal Academy of Music, where Lisa is Composer-in-Residence for 2021-22, alongside teaching at the University of Cambridge.

Oliver Leith is a composer and artist based in London. His “curiously addictive” music (The Guardian) has been performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Trio Catch, members of the Philharmonia Orchestra, Ives Ensemble, Apartment House and Royal Northern Sinfonia. Pieces have been heard at the Liszt Academy (Budapest), Festival d’Aix en Provence, the Darmstädter Ferienkurse, Heidelberg Festival and Leeds Lieder.

Commissioned and recorded by 12 Ensemble, Leith’s Honey Siren for twelve strings (2020) was lauded as "expertly constructed… mesmeric" by Gramophone and went on to win an Ivor Novello Award. Large-scale pieces include Taxa (composed in 2013 and recently revived by the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Ilan Volkov), and Dream Horse for soprano, bass, and chamber orchestra (a commission from the 2018 Tanglewood Festival). 

Balloon for ensemble of nine players was premiered in 2018 by the London Sinfonietta and features on an all-Leith release from Another Timbre, with Richard Baker conducting Explore Ensemble. good day good day bad day bad day, a 45-minute work for keyboards and percussion composed in 2018 for George Barton and Siwan Rhys, is also available on Another Timbre. Other recordings include Hand Coloured with Loré Lixenberg and the London Sinfonietta (NMC), Aisha Orazbayeva playing Blurry Wake Song (SN Variations) and Uh huh, Yeah – described as a ‘miniature masterpiece’ by The Times – with the Hermes Experiment (Delphian).

Autumn will see Me Hollywood presented at Transit Festival and November Music, a performance of Honey Siren by Royal Welsh String Soloists and Manchester Collective, as well as the world premiere of The Big House with the Ruisi Quartet at Wigmore Hall. Leith is currently the Guildhall School of Music & Drama’s Doctoral Composer-in-Residence at the Royal Opera House.

Cassandra Miller is a Canadian composer living in London. Described by The Observer as "generous, engaging and unlike anything else", her music – which often explores transcription and mimicry as a creative process – has been performed by the Oslo Philharmonic, EXAUDI, Ensemble Resonanz, London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Plus-Minus, Apartment House, La Nuova Musica, and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. Works have been presented at Wigmore Hall, Archipel Festival (Geneva), TIME:SPANS (New York), Klangspuren Schwaz, Transit Festival (Leuven), Music on Main (Vancouver), and the Warsaw Autumn Festival. During 2020 and 2021 she is Guest Composer at l’Auditori, Barcelona.

Premiered at the 2015 Tectonics Festival by Charles Curtis with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and Ilan Volkov, Miller’s Duet for Cello and Orchestra was hailed as one of the "best classical music works of the 21st century" by The Guardian. Round, composed for the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and André de Ridder, was premiered in 2016. Miller enjoys a particularly close relationship with Quatuor Bozzini for whom she wrote several pieces including Warblework and About Bach. The latter was awarded the 2016 Jules-Léger Prize for New Chamber Music. Other prizes include one of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation’s 2021 Awards for Artists. 

Miller has collaborated with Juliet Fraser on the Tracery project, parts of which feature on an all-Miller disc "Songs about Singing" on the all that dust label. Two portrait discs from Another Timbre have received wide acclaim, including being featured on The New Yorker’s "Ten Notable Recordings of 2018".

Highlights of the current season include further performances of Perfect Offering (2020) by the Ives Ensemble, the UK premiere of La Donna (2021) by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Finnegan Downie Dear, and a new project with Silvia Tarozzi and the Israel Contemporary Players. Miller is currently writing a Viola Concerto for Lawrence Power.

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