Review of This Love Between Us, Los Angeles Times, November 17, 2018
“She is so at home in the different styles. I’m more excited about Reena and her compositional voice than just about anybody that I’ve worked with in recent years. She’s obviously fiercely brilliant and a gifted musician, but what makes her music special is the fact that she’s able to channel this incredible empathy and complex understanding of the human experience into music that’s crystal clear, beautiful, thought-provoking and unlike anything I’ve ever heard before.”
-Grant Gershon, as told to Catherine Womack, Los Angeles Times
Read the full article here.
Review of This Love Between Us, “New England Choirworks,” Hyperion Records, BBC Music Magazine, February 2020
“Reena Esmail’s This love between us ‘Prayers for unity’ is the most substantial work. Reflecting her Indian-American heritage, the seven movements each set a text from one of the religions practised in India, with corresponding variety of musical intent, from mesmerising ululations, via hints of Baroque choruses to driving exuberant exclamations. The only accompanied work, colours are added not only by Juilliard 415, but also the twang of sitar and shimmying tabla rhythms, the naturalness and integrity of Esmail’s music ensuring this is no mere touristic fusion.”
-Christopher Dingle, BBC Music Magazine
Review of The Light is the Same, The Washington Post, January 31, 2019
“Especially compelling was “The Light Is the Same” by the Indian-American composer Reena Esmail. She took as her inspiration lines of the 13th-century Sufi poet Rumi: “Religions are many/ But God is one/ The lamps may be different/ But the light is the same.” With highly ornamented lines reminiscent of Hindustani singing, Esmail wove textures that seemed like the musical equivalent of translucent silk, rustling in a gentle breeze.”
-Patrick Rucker, The Washington Post
Read the full article here.
Review of Meri Sakhi Ki Avaaz, The Daily Gazette, June 3, 2018
“Reena Esmail conceived a beautiful amalgamation in “My Sister’s Voice” with the Hindustani singer Saili Oak and the always impressive soprano Fitz Gibbon. The work’s marvelous lyricism, its superb string writing and equally perfect balances allowed…lush tones to blend and soar. The audience jumped to its feet, cheering and applauding loudly.”
-Geraldine Freedman, The Daily Gazette
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Review of Take What You Need, Los Angeles Times, December 11, 2016
“There weren’t just bits of the “Messiah” but also an engaging new piece by the young Street Symphony composer-in-residence, Reena Esmail, “Take What You Need,” that sounded like Sondheim at his most lyric and without the cynicism.”
-Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times
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Review of Teen Murti, San Francisco Classical Voice, January 8, 2019
“Esmail has scored the work for Western instruments, and parts of the work evoke a 1950s-ish orchestral sound, complete with lugubrious cello melodies and brisk, vital ensemble writing. But she also draws on melodic and rhythmic elements of Hindustani music, which she approximates with glissandi, pizzicato, and other techniques. Much of the work’s charm lies in the ease with which she moves between these styles, particularly in the work’s final bars, which are thoroughly Western but for a brief, final raga allusion.”
-Allan Kozinn, San Francisco Classical Voice
Read the full article here.
Review of The Blue Room, San Mateo Daily Journal, September 2, 2017
“Esmail’s music is often angular, a little like Shostakovich. The soloist plays lyrical melodies over swirling sounds from the orchestra, or interjects its comments between big, jagged, dramatic blocks of sound. Partway into the second and last movement, a staccato theme builds up in the orchestra as the violin darts around it. It then breaks up into fragments that form the basis for most of the rest of the movement. This theme is so catchy that I heard someone whistling it during intermission. When’s the last time that happened at a modern music concert?”
-David Bratman, San Mateo Daily Journal
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Review of Clarinet Concerto, The Daily Gazette, June 4, 2017
“Reena Esmail’s Hindustani-inspired Clarinet Concerto with the estimable clarinetist Shankar Tucker, was a floral summer night with exotic perfumes coupled with a free-flowing fast movement of scales passed around from soloist to orchestra.”
-Geraldine Freedman, The Daily Gazette
Read the full article here.
Review of Dadra in Raga, San Francisco Classical Voice, December 6, 2016
“Grounding the new commissions, Reena Esmail’s arrangement of N. Rajam’s Dadra in Raga Bhairavi, offered a semiclassical Hindustani work with an underwater quality that had Harrington’s violin sounding like the humming of a woman far in the distance.”
-Lou Fancher, San Francisco Classical Voice
Read the full article here.
Review of String Quartet (Ragamala), Santa Fe New Mexican, August 2, 2013
“At that point the character changed to become a vivacious dance with complicated rhythms — a South Asian take on John Adams, perhaps — before the work concluded with a return of the opening drone-based rootedness. I would happily hear the piece again.”
-James M. Keller, Santa Fe New Mexican
Read the full article here.
Review of Dadra in Raga, Seen and Heard International, October 12, 2016
“More compelling, Reena Esmail’s spookily evocative arrangement of the celebrated Hindustani violinist N. Rajam’s Dadra in Raga Bhairavi created an extraordinary seven minutes. To a background track of an oud playing a sustained drone, Harrington’s solo violin’s dark tone relished the twists and turns of the colorful slow-ish raga theme. Yang accompanied with a reasonable facsimile of the sound of a tabla, playing on the body and strings of her cello. (I’m definitely adding this piece to my iTunes rotation.)”
-Harvey Steiman, Seen and Heard International
Read the full article here.
Review of Perhaps, Houston Chronicle, March 5, 2018
“Thankfully, classical music in the 21st century has progressed beyond stolid, middle-aged white guys in tuxes walking out on a stage, performing, then walking off again to restrained applause. “Perhaps,” composer Reena Esmail’s collaboration with filmmaker Heather McCalden, employed the most familiar approach, the bucolic lyricism of Esmail’s music serving as an atmospheric soundtrack to McCalden’s moody seaside meditation.”
-Eric Skelly, Houston Chronicle
Read the full article here.
Review of Black Iris (formerly #metoo), I Care If You Listen, September 12, 2019
“There are moments of agitated, fast gestures that suddenly turn on a dime, transforming into soft and elegant lines. Hard hitting brass chords are followed by moments of guilt cried forth by oboe and clarinet solos. One of the more poignant moments is when all of the women in the orchestra stop playing and, one by one, reenter singing in order of the year they entered the orchestra.”
-Jarrett Goodchild, I Care If You Listen
Read the full article here.
Review of Teen Murti, The Arts Fuse, December 23, 2018
“Teen Murti heads after another direction, drawing on composer Reena Esmail’s Indian heritage and interest in Hindustani music. Alternating three principal ideas, it’s a score that mixes moments shimmering beauty and potent athleticism with grace and intelligence.”
-Jonathan Blumhofer, The Arts Fuse
Read the full article here.
Review of Perhaps, I Care If You Listen, March 14, 2109
“Esmail’s dulcet lines hung song-like over McCalden’s melancholy scenes of cascading waves and grey beaches, infused with life by Segev’s rapt playing.”
-Christian Kriegeskotte, I Care If You Listen
Read the full article here.
Review of String Quartet (Ragamala), Sequenza 21, September 23, 2015
“The use of the western string quartet was a brilliant stroke – traditional Indian instruments can make this music sound so exotic that it can be hard for the uninitiated to absorb. Coming through the familiar lens of violins, viola and cello however, it is clearer to westerners how subtle and sophisticated this music can be.”
-Paul Muller, Sequenza 21
Read the full article here.
Review of Teen Murti, The Peoples Critic, October 2, 2013
“The haunting mystery of its opening passages evolved into pulsing rhythms from opposing sections of the strings. The exciting composition moved on to take many unexpected twists and turns, somber one moment, and full of surprising tempo changes the next.”
-David Dow Bentley III, The People’s Critic
Read the full article here.
Review of Gul-e-Dodi, New Haven Independent, April 21, 2014
“Reena Esmail’s “Gul-e-dodi” (Dark Flower; video of another performance of the composition below) from her Anjuman Songs paid stunning tribute to Nadia Anjuman’s illustrious career, cut short when the poet was murdered by her husband in 2005.”
-Lucy Gellman, New Haven Independent
Read the full article here.
Review of This Love Between Us, Strings Magazine, June 20, 2017
“Sometimes she introduced propulsive, polymetric vamps to accompany the tabla and sitar. In other sections, the Baroque strings provided a transparent wash of ethereal sustained chords as a background for the singers, or for solo moments by the winds.”
-Robert Mealy, Strings Magazine
Read the full article here.
Interviews
In a divided world, composer Reena Esmail finds unity in music, Los Angeles Times, November 17, 2018
“I’m asking Indian and Western musicians to work together. I want them to feel really comfortable,” she said. “It is interesting to be able to show the Western musicians the light and essence of Indian music and vice versa.”
‘Winds of Change’ Blow Through Festival, The East Hampton Star, July 18, 2019
“As composers we’re very isolated, we spend a lot of time at a piano looking at some dots, so if you’re a social person you’re always trying to think about ways you can build a relationship through the music that you write.”
Hats Off Gentlemen, A Genius, Serenade Magazine, May 28, 2017
“When I began my career as a composer in 2001, I never imagined that I would be doing the work that I am doing now. It was well beyond my wildest dream that I would be a connector between the two musical cultures that make up my musical identity, that I would develop close working relationships with some of the most incredible musicians from both cultures and be able to create environments in my music that would allow them to make music together.”
Why are female composers still markedly behind in terms of prominence? The Strad, August 22, 2018
“Do we just want the same audience to accept new composers who are different from what they know? Or are we also trying to attract different audiences? I think that if you want your audience to change and grow, you have to feature composers and people on stage who represent those different demographics.”
Diplomacy Through Music, Span Magazine, October 2017
“The greatest creative challenges are at the broadest level: I am essentially doing the work of cultural diplomacy through music. How do I create a space for two groups of musicians from completely different musical traditions, which not only takes into account their training, but also their musical values? And how can I help them share their values with one another? I start from these questions, and the music that emerges is my attempt to create this resonance between the musicians.”
‘The twain shall meet’ at The Dairy, Boulder Weekly, April 27, 2017
“I worked very deeply within both of these traditions, and the music that I write really aims to combine them and to draw the things that I love from both traditions together,” she says. “In a lot of situations, I’m the bridge from one culture into another, and I take that very seriously.”
Q&A with Reena Esmail, Composer & Luna Lab Mentor, Kaufman Music Center, 2018
“I want to be clear: Women and minorities are fully aware that they are just as capable and creative as the people in the majority. But when they don’t see themselves represented, it just conveys to them that our field is still too biased to accept them – and that perhaps they should take their talents elsewhere. We are simply losing talent by not demonstrating to our youngest creators that we are capable of fostering their voices at all levels.”
5 Questions to Reena Esmail (composer, singer, multi-instrumentalist), I Care if You Listen, November 13, 2018
“In my case, my audiences are often other musicians and classical music lovers, but they are just as often people experiencing homelessness and incarceration in Los Angeles. For me, these political causes are not faceless. I have dear friends who are battling addiction and homelessness, who are immigrants in danger of being deported, whose children have been shot and killed.
My job as a composer is to create environments where people who are experiencing these circumstances firsthand can be heard, where their personal experience can inform others directly, and where the warmth of a personal relationship can be built.”
Reena Esmail’s egalitarian songs, Live Mint, March 3, 2017
“While writing this composition I spent a lot of time with the text from the different religions in India, like Buddhism, Sikhism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Jainism, Hinduism, and Islam. And it was comforting to realize that this strife does not come from the religious teachings themselves. Coming from a multi-religious household, I am constantly aware that there are many paths to spirituality”
A Songbird Speaks, The Red Elephant Foundation, July 14, 2017
“Hindustani and Western music are different in many ways: Hindustani music focuses deeply on melody and rhythm, and has a degree of complexity in these two areas that is not idiomatic to Western classical music (due to the structure of the Western notation system). However, because of this very notation system, harmony and counterpoint are possible in Western music in a way that is impossible in pure Hindustani music. But after years of study in both Hindustani and Western music, I see that these two traditions, because they are so different, don’t step on one another’s feet. They can occupy different areas of the same musical space, and coexist beautifully – they can overlap without detracting from one another.”
Orchestra Underground: Eastern Wind Composer Spotlight-Reena Esmail, Sound Advice, March 25, 2016
“Strengthening the relationship between Indian and Western music, and through it, Indian and Western culture, is one of the most important aspects of my career. For me, it is deeply personal – I am from two cultures that are literally on opposite sides of the world. Wherever I am, there is always a part of me that longs for the other place. If it is physically impossible for me to be in both places at once, I’m able to create that world through my music.”
RADIO & VIDEO
Composer Reena Esmail Talks About Her World Premiere with the Richmond Symphony, NPR, April 13, 2019
Bridging Cultures With the SDSO, SDPB Radio, January 30, 2019
Composer Reena Esmail Interview on Classical WMHT-FM, May 3, 2017
Reena Esmail on Finding Your Niche, The Portfolio Composer, February 18, 2016
Albany Symphony Opening Night Gala Concert, WAMC, September 23, 2016
PC Does What: How to Use Your PC to Make Music, October 2015
Reena Esmail Composers Now Interview, 2014
Reena Esmail at TEDx Skid Row, 2013
Reena Esmail Composers Now Interview, 2014
Reena Esmail, Cultivate Fellow Interview, 2013
Reena Esmail Interview with the Oral History of American Music at Yale University, 2012
