“Most times in trauma, there is no exit,” composer Sarah Genevieve Burghart Rice writes in her album introduction. “Yet every once in a while, a door is ajar and we are left to wonder if we really could leave. All the music of Yet revolves around suffering in captivity juxtaposed with the possibility of liberation.” Yet is a powerfully imaginative and intimate collection of contemporary classical music that navigates the stark – sometimes Surreal and satirical – landscapes of trauma and hope.
Described as writing “evocative” and “surreal” music “to bewilder, amuse, and provoke,” Sarah Gen’s work has won an ASCAP Morton Gould Award and inspired intense debate. She is the director of the Gender and Voice Inquiry Lab at Penn State’s School of Music. Yet is a testament to her artistic vision, referencing a wide range of cultural artefacts from Machaut and Maxwell Davies to Finnegans Wake. Yet brings together Penn State students alongside acclaimed performers like Grammy-nominated mezzo-soprano Thea Lobo, countertenor Jordan Rutter-Covatto, and the renowned Duo Cortona (Rachel Calloway and Ari Streisfeld).