Program Notes:

When I started writing this piece for the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, I was particularly inspired by the size of their orchestra - perhaps the largest group of instrumentalists that I've ever had the opportunity to write for. I was therefore very interested in exploring the massiveness of this ensemble when writing Under Sea, Above Sky. The piece was ultimately written as an ode to planet Earth. On one hand, Earth is massive, majestic and wild. On the other, it is incredibly fragile as climate change continues to wreak havoc upon it. Under Sea, Above Sky aims to capture this duality by contrasting passages of thundering resonance and textures of frail, ethereal tranquility. Ultimately, this piece serves not as an elegy for planet Earth but rather, as a reminder of both its beauty and its vulnerability. 

Composed in the Spring of 2019, Under Sea, Above Sky was commissioned by the National Youth Orchestra of Canada for their Summer 2019 season, and would not have been made possible without the generous support of the SOCAN Foundation. -JM

Recorded by the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, July 2019
Conducted by Michael Francis
Sound Mixing and Engineering by Martha DeFrancisco

Under Sea, Above Sky

Described as a “rising star” by MusicWorks magazine, JUNO-Nominated composer Jared Miller’s eclectic music is “playful” (New York Times), “hypnotic” (Sequenza 21), “phantasmagorical” (Lucid Culture) and “highly personal” (CBC Radio.) He has worked in collaboration with many ensembles both in North America and internationally including the American Composers Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Victoria Symphony, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, the symphony orchestras of Vancouver, Toronto, and Edmonton, the Juilliard Orchestra, Cleveland’s Contemporary Youth Orchestra, the Sneak Peek Orchestra, The Attacca Quartet, Latitude 49 Ensemble, the New York City Ballet’s Choreographic Institute, the Emily Carr String Quartet, Standing Wave Ensemble and a long list of soloists that include pianists Sara Davis Buechner, Jani Parsons, Robert Fleitz and Imri Talgam, and violinist Francisco Fullana. His music has been featured and recognized in the New York Philharmonic’s Biennial (2014), the ISCM World Music Days (2017 & 2019), Vancouver’s Queer Arts Festival (2010, 2015 & 2019) and the Vancouver and Victoria Symphony’s New Music Festivals (2015-2019.)

Upcoming and recent highlights include the US premiere of Ricochet – Reverb – Repeat with the Nashville Symphony, performances of Luster with the Coastal Symphony of Georgia and the Alabama Symphony Youth Orchestra, the premiere of a newly commissioned work for the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, which will be toured throughout Canada and Spain in the summer of 2019, and the premiere of Miller’s first piano concerto, Shattered Night, which was commissioned by the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and pianist Sara Davis Buechner.

Miller has won numerous awards for composition that include a 2012 ASCAP Morton Gould Award, the 2011/12 Juilliard Orchestra Competition and three SOCAN awards for young composers (2011, 2015 and 2019.) His orchestral work Under Sea, Above Sky, which was recorded by the National Youth Orchestra of Canada was nominated for a JUNO Award in 2020 for Classical Composition of the Year. He has also been featured as an artist-in-residence at I-Park’s International Artist-in-Residence Program, the Banff Centre, and the Avaloch Farm Music Institute. An active pianist, Miller has performed at a variety of venues including Carnegie Hall’s Weill Hall, Lincoln Center and the Chan Center for the Performing Arts in Vancouver, BC.

As a passionate advocate for musical education and outreach, Miller has taught and performed in several initiatives including The Juilliard School’s Music Advancement Program, the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra Connects Program, the BC Health Arts Society, Vancouver’s Opera in the Schools and for New York’s Opportunity Music Project. He is currently on the composition faculty of New York’s Special Music High School.

Born in Los Angeles in 1988, Miller holds Masters and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees from the Juilliard School where he studied with Samuel Adler and John Corigliano. He has also studied composition with Stephen Chatman and Dorothy Chang and piano with Sara Davis Buechner and Corey Hamm at the University of British Columbia. In 2014 at age 25, Miller was named the Victoria Symphony’s composer-in-residence – a position that he held until June of 2017. He is currently based in New York City where he maintains an active career as a composer and music educator.

Under Sea, Above Sky

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