Nadia Sirota

Over the last few years, Nadia Sirota, a 26-year-old violist, has made her presence known in both the classical and indie music worlds. She’s a regular guest with the Meredith Monk and Vocal Ensemble, as well as a founding member of the American Contemporary Music Ensemble and the Wordless Music Orchestra. On the flip side, you can hear the New Yorker bowing on hip recent albums by Grizzly Bear, Ratatat and My Brightest Diamond—a sure sign of musical receptivity and flexibility.

On her popular WNYC midnight radio show, Overnight Music, Sirota champions young composers, so it’s not surprising that she’s commissioned works from three of her peers for her excellent debut, First Things First. Judd Greenstein and Chicago resident Marcos Balter each have two startling arrangements on the record. Sirota’s rendition of Balter’s delicate “Ut” engages her sensitive attention to detail. Greenstein’s fluid and elegiac “The Night Gatherers” is the only arrangement to feature a string section, the Chiara String Quartet, on an otherwise strictly solo album, yet the composer’s “Escape” is the album’s outstanding 14-minute centerpiece. Repetitive motifs are gradually scattered like leaves thrown up by a buoyant gust of wind. Sirota also tackles three pieces by one of the most continually buzzed-about composers, 28-year-old Nico Muhly. His complex “Étude 1A” and “Étude 1” are beautifully handled with an absorbing energy by Sirota, his old school friend at Juilliard. With so many distinctive composers’ voices, the music at times breaks its cohesive spell, but Sirota mostly creates a connection that’s imaginative and often thrilling.—Mia Clarke

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