Except from a longer interview that appeared in New Music Box
Molly Sheridan: It seems as if no writer can resist pointing out how you mix pop and classical elements in your work, and clearly there are reasons for this—from instrumentation to vocal style to the artists you work with. The tone of shock that often accompanies this sort of description, however, has always seemed strange to me, as if composers were otherwise kept completely sheltered from contemporary life. Still, was this integration of elements a style that you developed over time or was it your instinct from the start?
Sarah Kirkland Snider: Well, looking back for a second, I grew up a total classical music nerd, studying piano and cello, and singing in choirs, but at home my parents were always playing pop music. So I had this life that was filled with a lot of music. I would go to my orchestra rehearsals or my piano lessons and hear classical music, and then I’d be home hearing the Beatles and Fleetwood Mac and Joni Mitchell. For me, it was all just music. I didn’t have anybody telling me that pop was down here and classical was up here. It was all just ways to express oneself musically.
I started writing music when I was a kid, but I didn’t take my first composition lesson until I was 25. At that point, my first teacher made it very clear to me that I needed to bifurcate and strip away the pop influences, set aside my interests and just focus on the classical tradition. I definitely got the message that you were supposed to keep them separate. Then going to Yale was interesting because it was a much more relaxed mindset and there were professors and students with lots of different ideologies. I became increasingly uncomfortable keeping the pop influence away. I remember leaving a seminar at Yale and getting in my car and listening to Sleater-Kinney, and I was just like, why is there this weird divide? And the reason why it was often Sleater-Kinney was because of the female issue. I was frustrated; I was the only female in my class at Yale for the first two years, so it was a constant issue for me. I realized that I was subconsciously associating all the things I didn’t like about new music—pedagogy, ideology, over-intellectualization—with a male mindset, and so I would need to go and get in my car and listen to Sleater-Kinney so that I could just steep myself in a completely different vibe and mindset.
I think that, subconsciously, that also had to do with the reason why, when I left Yale, I started incorporating my pop influences. It was a bit of a rebellion.
“The Lotus Eaters” from the album “Penelope” by Sarah Kirkland Snider, featuring Shara Worden and Signal, conducted by Brad Lubman. New Amsterdam Records. Lyrics by Ellen McLaughlin. Filmed and directed by Murat Eyuboglu; edited by David Sarno.
Musica Kaleidoskopea 