Miller Theatre to Present a Composer Portrait of Lisa Bielawa

Miller Theatre at Columbia University School of the Arts will continue its 2025–26 Composer Portraits series with Lisa Bielawa. In its Miller debut, Contemporaneous joins forces with the Rome Prize–winning composer and vocalist for a world premiere Miller Theatre commission.

The performance takes place on Thursday, February 26 at 7:30 PM at Miller Theatre, located at 2960 Broadway at 116th Street. Tickets start at $20, with student tickets available for $10 with valid ID.

Lisa Bielawa (b. 1965)

Composer and vocalist Lisa Bielawa—a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow and Rome Prize winner— draws inspiration from literary sources and close artistic collaborations, and often incorporates community-building as a central part of her artistic vision. The dynamic Contemporaneous ensemble makes its Miller Theatre debut performing alongside the composer.

Program

Balloon Variations (2026) — World premiere, Miller Theatre commission

Incessabili Voce (2023)

Graffiti dell’amante (2010)

Artists

Lisa Bielawa, vocalist

Contemporaneous

David Bloom, conductor

About the Artists
Lisa Bielawa, vocalist (b. 1965)

Composer, producer, and vocalist Lisa Bielawa is a Guggenheim Fellow and Rome Prize winner whose work is inspired by literary sources and close artistic collaborations. She has received awards and fellowships from the Koussevitzky Foundation, the American Academy of Arts & Letters, OPERA America, the American Antiquarian Society, and the Loghaven Artist Residency, and was part of the inaugural Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps. Bielawa also received a Los Angeles Area Emmy nomination for her made-for-TV-and-online opera Vireo: The Spiritual Biography of a Witch’s Accuser.

Her music has been premiered at the NY Phil Biennial, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, the SHIFT Festival, Washington National Cathedral, the Opéra de Rouen Normandie, the MAXXI Museum in Rome, and Helsinki Music Centre, among others. Orchestras that have championed her work include The Knights, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, ROCO, and the Orlando Philharmonic.

Bielawa’s work has been commissioned and presented by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Brooklyn Rider, Seattle Chamber Music Society, Radio France, Yerevan Concert Hall in Armenia, the Venice Architectural Biennale, American Music Week in Salzburg, and the INFANT Festival in Novi Sad, Serbia, among others.

Community-building is a consistent element of Bielawa’s artistic vision. She has created music for public spaces in Lower Manhattan; a bridge over the Ohio River in Louisville, Kentucky; the banks of the Tiber River in Rome; former airfields in Berlin and San Francisco; and events marking the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. During the pandemic, she cultivated a global virtual community through Broadcast from Home, incorporating submitted testimonies and recorded voices from six continents. The work is now archived by the Library of Congress.