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CEDAR COMMISSIONS SPOTLIGHT INTERVIEWS

Over the next few weeks we’re featuring the six artists of the 2022-2023 Cedar Commissions (taking place Friday, February 17th, and Saturday, February 18th at The Cedar) in a series of interviews on our site. The Cedar Commissions is a flagship program for emerging Minnesotan composers and musicians made possible with a grant from the Jerome Foundation.

In 2022, the first year that The Cedar was open from January to December since 2019, these artists began crafting their commissions with a bit more normalcy on the horizon, but a lot of strangeness, newness, and darkness in the rearview. They’ve been composing, exploring new ideas, and assembling teams of musicians to bring their work to fruition on The Cedar’s stage later this month. Over the two nights of the Twelfth Annual Cedar Commissions, audience members will witness performances about the existential threat of petrol, the importance of protecting and embracing Somali youth, how to find meaning in the indescribable, how to listen to the song of the planet, an illustration of journeying gender transition, and a depiction of the soul-body reunion after trauma.

Our sixth and final spotlight interview in this year’s cohort is with Sophia Deutsch (she/her). Sophia is a cellist and composer. Her creation for the 2022-2023 Cedar Commissions, Vis Vitae, is an exploration into our planet as a sonic landscape. Simultaneously charmed and overwhelmed by the vast sources of inspiration in the concept of ‘nature,’ Sophia embraces the heavy weight of it by trusting her body’s interpretation of these earthly phenomena. She spoke with Twin Cities music writer Youa Vang about the legacy of earth-inspired music, the restriction and subsequent freedom provided by classical training, and the wisdom of a mentor.

“What I found by going into the forest and rivers while thinking about “How does this get translated into music?” It brought me back to the God complex insecurity. I can’t possibly make this into music, so I’m gonna pick small ways to inspire myself to make this piece of music such as the way that a waterfall spreads and the pattern of the beating of the water and then it transmutes into steady rhythm and linear rhythm along the day. That’s one small way that I can focus a big topic into something that goes on a page of music.”

— Sophia Deutsch

Youa Vang (she/her): How did you approach your Cedar Commission? What were the first steps?

Sophia Deutsch (she/her): When I started this project, I was thinking about how I could possibly translate the way that you feel in nature and the sonic environment that surrounds us into music. How could you possibly do that? It made it seem like I have a God complex or something, and I don't. So I started thinking about it a different way, and I realized that the score needs to be a graphic form of sorts. I felt the form needed to align with some of the ideas I was trying to approach. I thought about graphic scores — I've never worked with that before — and more experimental composition. That took me to the Minneapolis Public Library, which has honestly been such a great resource in a lot of ways for really interesting materials to look through for different forms and literature. It was also a great place to go when I needed to get out of my own home, my own studio, and go somewhere else to think about things.

The beginning stages of this project was a lot of reading and research. I didn't anticipate that, but I did want to come into it from a place of knowledge and of inspiration where other artists may have thought about similar things. I started reading about composers such as George Crumb and looking at all of his scores and really dissecting these really strange ways in how he communicated texture and dynamics. The world of writing music opened to be truly infinite. I could create my own language, and it became even more challenging to decipher. “What is the language that I am going to invent for this idea that I have about this one piece of music?” That's been a really very fun and exciting and inspiring challenge that I've taken on. Where do I go from there?

Youa: How have you worked in the past? Did you gather info first, or did you dive right in?

Sophia: Through my working artist life as an adult, I really enjoyed just letting myself break free of standards and boundaries and just rebelling against my classical background, which was a big part of my childhood. Working in this more conceptual way, I have to think about what I'm doing, because there's option paralysis. “How do you do anything?” It was really nice to be able to just sit down and think about “what is this thing and what is this huge idea and how to address it in my own small way as a small person or an individual?” Of course, the concept of nature [in music] is not new. Pretty much every composer ever has been inspired by nature, so it is sort of a personal journey of “what does it mean to me? Why is this so important to me?” Alongside reading and researching, I also went to the woods by myself.

Youa: What did you find?

Sophia: I found that the answers are all out there. What I found was more questions and clarity. The questions I ran into were, “This big sonic universe, is this the orchestra – the sound-scape of the world – the indeterminate composition?” If I am the performer, or am I the audience?” I've been getting into some trippy realms of thought, especially all alone in the woods. What I found by going into the forest and rivers while thinking about “How does this get translated [through me] into music?” It brought me back to the God complex insecurity. I can't possibly make this into music, so I'm gonna pick small ways to inspire myself to make this piece of music such as the way that a waterfall spreads and the pattern of the beating of the water and then it transmutes into steady rhythm and linear rhythm along the way. That's one small way that I can focus a big topic into something that goes on a page of music.

Youa: Classical music has a lot of rules. It's very traditional and very set. Do you feel your background helped you with your composition?

Sophia: Definitely. My classical background helped me to make music, but it gave me something to rebel against.

Youa: What do you mean?

Sophia: I started getting into making weird cello music when I was maybe 18. It was kind of born out of really not wanting to be disciplined or practicing. I wanted to break away and go far away from what I had been doing in my childhood. When I did, it took me immediately to the realms of making noise music. From classical music to noise music, it's been just a slow crawling back and forth ever since. Yeah, classical music has helped me understand beauty and how to make beautiful things. I've always understood beauty, but having the classical training made it all make a little bit more sense and a little bit easier to replicate.

Youa: How do you feel when you're pushing against the norms?

Sophia: I don't know, this might sound contrived, but I would say I feel like myself.

Youa: Where are you at in your project right now?

Sophia: I'm nowhere near the end, honestly.

Youa: Are you stressed? Are you okay?

Sophia: I'm totally stressed, but I’m okay. I've got a lot to do. It's huge, it’s a huge project. I'm really grateful to be stressed about this. The trip out to nature was before, during, in the middle, and after and going to the future. It's just something I do that will inform and inspire the piece. Though I live in the city, it's not life-giving. I love the people that I'm around, but I feel that we are nature, humans are nature, and it's important to come back to that.

Youa: How do you take those natural concepts and put it into music without having to be very literal?

Sophia: That's the million dollar question. It's completely subjective. It really has a lot to do with how I interpret these things that I feel. “What do I feel like a ray of sunshine beaming down at you [sounds like]?” or “What does wind sound like as it pushes and pulls?” How do I interpret that into tonal music? That's why it's been difficult, but at a certain point, I just have to decide what [the feelings] sound like to me. It sounds infinitely different or feels infinitely different to literally every single person. That's why I'm grateful that I've received this opportunity to go within myself and outside of myself and really study these really incredible features of sonic environments and how they affect me.

Youa: How did you come to work with some of your mentors?

Sophia: I have had the great privilege of having multiple mentors along the way, and firstly, I'd love to mention Jacqueline Ultan, she's been near and dear to me and absolutely a creative life cello mentor for me for many years, and she is the one that encouraged me to write the proposal.

Youa: Why do you think she urged you to write the proposal?

Sophia: I don’t know why. I guess I'd have to really go back to that conversation, but it kind of just ended with, “Well, you should apply to the cedar commission, and my immediate reaction was, “Of course.” I had a bunch of lessons lined up with her, even when I had nothing to go off of, nothing written, I always had my mind blown by her. Every meeting that we had, she was incredibly perceptive and creative and beautiful. It was a combination of all of those qualities.

Youa: Are you working with other artists for this project?

Sophia: This was a really good opportunity to work with artists that I've always wanted to work with and collaborate with. I want to leave room for organic processes. I'm not just trying to synthesize nature, I'm trying to pull it out of myself and other people that I'll be making music with. There's different ways that I'm trying to inspire that through the composition. There are certain [lyrical] parts in the composition that you won't hear but will just kind of be recited internally. It will evoke a certain dynamic or emotion.

Youa: You said in your proposal that it’s important for you to pay the musicians working with you on this commission a living wage. Why is that important to you when music is so consumable and could be so cheap?

Sophia: I would rather prioritize opportunity at this point. It is important for me to pay the artists that are working with me. I'm asking these people to do this kind of crazy thing with me and dedicate their time out of their own complex lives to this project that means something to me. It's worth so much more than money, but the tangible thing that I can offer is money. I can offer love and hugs and whatever, but that won’t pay the rent.

Hopefully, when we talk in ten years, and I'm making a living as an artist, you’ll find me on a mountain top and living with my goats and not needing money. The goal is to not need money.

Youa: You have about a month left. Have you been rehearsing?

Sophia: That's where I'm pretty far behind. I still have some things to write and I've had some major writer’s block. That's just one more thing. I've really learned a lot about my process, because I haven't gone to college. I haven't really had to focus in this way before. I do hope to go to college, because I do wanna be an artist that understands context and history and all that. I'm engaged by that, but it just hasn't happened. Procrastination is inevitable for me, and honestly, the pressure of this time at the end is bearing down on me, but it will come together.

Catch Sophia Deutsch’s performance of Vis Vitae premiering live at The Cedar on Saturday, February 18th as part of the Twelfth Annual Cedar Commissions. Buy tickets here.