Michi Wiancko

MICHI WIANCKO is a violinist and composer whose creative work encompasses a wide spectrum of new composition, collaboration, and interpretation.

After receiving the 2018 Opera America Commissioning Grant for Female Composers, Michi Wiancko’s first opera, Murasaki’s Moon, was premiered to critical acclaim (and to more than 15,000 livestream views) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in May 2019. This work was created in collaboration with librettist Deborah Brevoort and director Eric Einhorn, and co-commissioned by Met Live Arts, OnSite Opera, and American Lyric Theater.

Michi’s current and upcoming commissions include new works for Boston Chamber Music Society, NOW Ensemble, Jupiter String Quartet, Cavani String Quartet, violinist Anne Akiko Meyers with guitarist Jason Vieaux, cellist Andrew Yee, and violinist Mark Fewer. Highlights from past commissioning projects include works for the The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Camerata Bern with Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Anna Prohaska, Liquid Music, Aizuri Quartet, Enso Quartet, Sybarite5, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, Metropolis Ensemble and Ecstatic Music Festival. She also composes music for short and feature-length films, commercials, and for her own band, Kono Michi.

A passionate interpreter of contemporary music, Michi has been fortunate enough to work closely with a wide array of her favorite living composers including Gabriela Lena Frank, Missy Mazzoli, Vijay Iyer, Judd Greenstein, David T. Little, PaviElle French, Steve Reich, Laurie Anderson and, of course, the composers featured on this album: William Brittelle, Paula Matthusen, Mark Dancigers, Jessie Montgomery, and Christopher Adler. She has also arranged for and performed with countless non-classical artists, most notably Emily Wells, Jen Wasner and Wye Oak, PaviElle French, and El Vy with Matt Berninger from The National. Michi has toured with International Contemporary Ensemble, The Knights, A Far Cry, Alarm Will Sound, Mark Morris Dance Group, Yo-Yo Ma and Silkroad, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Musicians from Marlboro, and many others.

Michi gave her violin solo debuts with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, performed her recital debut in Weill Hall, and released a solo album of works by Émile Sauret on Naxos. In recent years, she recorded two different projects for Nonesuch Records: a string quartet composed by Laurie Anderson, and “Pulse” by Steve Reich with the International Contemporary Ensemble, which they performed in Carnegie Hall as part of Steve Reich’s 80th birthday celebration in 2016. Her mentors include Donald Weilerstein and the late violinist and composer Robert Mann, with whom she studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music and Juilliard, respectively.

In addition to her composition and performing career, Michi is director and curator of Antenna Cloud Farm, a music festival, arts retreat, and community organization based in western Massachusetts that has been on the Boston Globe’s Top 10 Must-See summer list two years in a row. She also teaches a course on 21st century musicianship and creativity at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee.