Cellist, composer, improviser, and former Talent Trust scholarship recipient, India Gailey, is releasing a new solo cello album called to you through on Redshift Records on May 13. It features works by Fjóla Evans, Philip Glass, Michael Gordon, Yaz Lancaster, and Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti.
The album can be pre-ordered here.
And there is a release concert on May 13, 8pm at St. George's Round Church.
Tickets for that are available here.
About India (from her website):
India Yeshe Gailey (she/they) is an American Canadian cellist, composer, and improviser currently based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Pinned as “a young musician to watch” (Scotia Festival), she draws from many eras and genres to craft poetic narratives of sound, most often performing in the realms of classical and experimental music. She frequently works with living composers, musicians outside of the Western Classical tradition, and the intersection of standard and obscure. She has toured across Canada, The United States, and Germany as a soloist, chamber musician, and collaborator. India is also a member of the award-winning environmental quartet New Hermitage, which recently released their fifth recording, Unearth, to critical acclaim.
India recently completed her Master of Music degree at McGill’s Schulich School of Music under the tutelage of Matt Haimovitz. Since then, she has worked with several much-admired composers of our time, including Philip Glass, Yaz Lancaster, Amy Brandon, Michael Harrison, Anne Lanzilotti, Nicole Lizée, and Andrew Noseworthy. India’s most recent work has been presented by organizations such as the Canadian Music Centre (TO), Government House (NS), International Contemporary Ensemble (NY), Metropolis Ensemble (NY), and Upstream Music (NS). India released her debut album, Lucid, a collaboration with three other emerging Canadian composers, in 2017. 2022 will bring the release of her new solo cello album to you through on Redshift Records, a recording of Lizée’s “Bookburners,” ft. NYC-based turntablist DJ P-Love, as well as a series of commissioned works written especially for India by Canadian composers.
India holds numerous honours, including awards from the Nova Scotia Talent Trust, the Canada Council for the Arts, Acadia University, and McGill University. In 2021, she was bestowed an “Emerging Artist Recognition Award” from Arts Nova Scotia. Venues at which she has performed or held residencies include the Canadian Music Centre, Domaine Forget, Garth Newel Music Center, Green Lake Festival, Halifax Jazz Festival, OBEY Convention, Open Waters Festival, Scotia Festival of Music, Tuckamore Festival, and other various halls, galleries, homes, bars, gardens, and castles. She can also be heard regularly on CBC and CKDU radio stations.
India received her Bachelor of Music degree from Acadia University, where she studied with Norman Adams and Christoph Both. Over the years, she has played in masterclasses for renowned cellists such as Emmanuelle Bertrand, Colin Carr, Denise Djokic, Blair Lofgren, Antonio Lysy, Philippe Müller, and Shauna Rolston. Chamber music mentors include Denise Lupien, Ilya Poletaev, members of the Daedalus, Kronos, and Shanghai string quartets, Garth Newel Piano Quartet, Apple Hill Chamber Players, and Gryphon Trio. She studied improvisation with Jerry Granelli and Javanese Gamelan with Ken Shorley.
As a composer, India is inspired by interdisciplinary interaction, and her compositions often explore environmentalism, magical realism, or minimalism. In addition to her musical studies, she has studied visual art at NSCAD University, and as a child studied ballet and contemporary dance, these other disciplines informing her compositional work. She has written music for Ear Camera, Keep Good (Theatre) Company, The Acadia Gamelan Ensemble, New Hermitage, and for various combos of musicians and dancers. She is currently working on a new body of work for solo cello. When not creating music, India enjoys making visual art, writing poetry, facilitating social meditation, and being with the trees, rocks, sky, and earth.
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