Composer and violinist MICHI WIANCKO has been commissioned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, American Lyric Theater, On Site Opera, Ecstatic Music Festival, Liquid Music, Aizuri Quartet, Cristina Pato and Mazz Swift, Enso Quartet, Sybarite5, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, and Metropolis Ensemble. Current projects include new works for the Jupiter Quartet, NOW Ensemble, and Silkroad, plus reimaginings of existing works for Bern Camerata, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Anna Prohaska, Anne Akiko Meyers, and The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. Michi also composes music for short and feature-length films, commercials, and for her own band, Kono Michi. A recipient of the 2018 Opera America Commissioning Grant for Female Composers, Michi’s first opera, Murasaki’s Moon, was premiered to critical acclaim at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in May 2019. This work was created in collaboration with librettist Deborah Brevoort and director Eric Einhorn from OnSite Opera. A passionate collaborator and performer, Michi has been fortunate to work with performers and composers across a vast musical spectrum including William Brittelle, Steve Reich, Yo-Yo Ma, Wye Oak, Emily Wells, Missy Mazzoli, Laurie Anderson, Judd Greenstein, Emanuel Ax, EL VY (with Matt Berninger from The National), Mitsuko Uchida, and Vijay Iyer, among many others. She has toured as a guest with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), The Knights, A Far Cry, Alarm Will Sound, Mark Morris Dance Group, and is a member of Silkroad and the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, which she co-founded. Michi released the complete solo violin works of Emile Sauret on Naxos, has toured with Musicians from Marlboro, and gave her violin solo debuts with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Her past teachers include Donald Weilerstein and the late Robert Mann with whom she studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music and Juilliard, respectively. In addition to her composition and performing career, Michi is director and curator of Antenna Cloud Farm, a music festival, artists’ retreat, and outreach organization based in western Massachusetts, and teaches a course at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee called Silkroad Creativity Lab.
