After more than two years in the making, the new My Brightest Diamond album is just being finished, but before we unleash the recording, Shara Nova and drummer Aaron Steele are taking the new songs out for a test drive. For a few special shows over the next few months, the duo will be bringing the songs to live audiences for the first time. There might be a few bumps here and there on the road, but we hope to see you so that together we can expel, breathe, laugh and sweat it out on the dance floor.
Shara also recently composed music for The Blue Hour with Rachel Grimes, Caroline Shaw, Angélica Negron and Sarah Kirkland Snider. Commissioned by Boston-based A Far Cry orchestra, The Blue Hour is a song cycle written in collaboration between the five leading composers and features Grammy winning singer and songwriter Luciana Souza. The song cycle's libretto takes from the poem "On Earth" by Carolyn Forché, winner of the 2017 Windham-Campbell Prize. The project aims for immersive collaboration, collecting the efforts of the composers, performers and the orchestra in order to fully capture each artist's creative experience. In the project's mission statement, The Blue Hour seeks to enhance empathy through the perspective of a single human, in hopes that listeners will see our war-torn and poverty stricken world with greater clarity. To listen to some songs that influenced Shara's writing, check out her playlist on Spotify.
