Sarah Kirkland Snider

Composer Sarah Kirkland Snider writes music of direct expression and vivid narrative that has been hailed as
“rapturous” (The New York Times), “groundbreaking” (The Boston Globe), and “poignant, deeply personal”
(The New Yorker). Recently named one of the “Top 35 Female Composers in Classical Music” by The Washington Post,
Snider’s works have been commissioned and/or performed by the New York Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, 
the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Birmingham Royal Ballet,
soprano Renée Fleming and baritone Will Liverman, Deutsche Grammophon for mezzo Emily D’Angelo,
vocalist Shara Nova, eighth blackbird, A Far Cry, and Roomful of Teeth, among many others.
The winner of the 2014 Detroit Symphony Orchestra Lebenbom Competition, her upcoming projects include the world premiere of Forward Into Light, an orchestral commission inspired by the American women’s suffrage movement for the New York Philharmonic, and an opera on 12th-century polymath St. Hildegard von Bingen, commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects. Penelope and Unremembered, her first two LP song cycles, earned critical acclaim from The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Gramophone Magazine, and Pitchfork, among others. In fall 2020, Nonesuch Records and New Amsterdam Records released Snider’s third LP: Mass for the Endangered, a Trinity Wall Street-commissioned prayer for the environment performed by English vocal ensemble Gallicantus, to wide critical acclaim. In naming the album to its Best of 2020 list, NPR proclaimed: “Snider must be recognized as one of today's most compelling composers for the human voice." A founding Co-Artistic Director of Brooklyn-based non-profit New Amsterdam Records, Snider has a M.A. and Artist’s Diploma from the Yale School of Music, and a B.A. from Wesleyan University. Her music is published by G. Schirmer.