Aurora Borealis
Aurora Borealis was founded by Tiffany Du Mouchelle and Stephen Solook in 2004, while students at Mannes College of Music in New York City. Since that time, they have performed throughout the US as well as Egypt, Cameroon, and Papua New Guinea. Aurora Borealis has premiered over 30 works by composers from around the world. Their commissioned works focus on expanding the repertoire of voice and percussion composition, and specifically try to explore new dimensions within the relationship between these two instruments. They have worked with or premiered pieces by composers including: Bruce Adolphe, Carolyn Chen, Chen-Hui Jen, Tania Leon, Ignacio Baca Lobera, Lewis Nielson, Roger Reynolds, Katharina Rosenberger, Roberto Sierra, Stuart Saunders Smith, along with an upcoming premiere by Christian Wolff.
About the Performance Piece
Lewis Nielson – Tres Canciones de la Otra America – Mvt.I Alta Hora de la Noche
The three poets were all Marxists, all revolutionaries who never lost their faith in the triumph of the workers over the international corporate interests that were threatening the national interest of their countries and, indeed, all of Latin America. South and Central America are that “other America” to which the title refers. The United States has alternately exploited or ignored our southern neighbors, rarely if ever showing any interest in the democratic interests of the people or the stability of their governments, except in the case of military dictatorships, substantially funded and politically supported by the US. … I wrote this for two outstanding performers but also as a plea for understanding. Corporate greed has severely wounded our psyche; only reason and respect, of ourselves but especially for people we have exploited now for centuries, can bring us back to peaceful change within and constructive aid without. – Lewis Nielson