Alisson Kruusmaa
*7 March 1992
Works by Alisson Kruusmaa
Biography
Winner of the Annual Prize of the Endowment for Music of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia (2021), Alisson Kruusmaa (born 1992) has emerged as one of the most exciting and commissioned young Estonian composers of today. Currently living in Tallinn, Kruusmaa is focusing on large scale orchestral works and stage music. During the season 2023/2024, she is in residency at the Dutch National Opera and Ballet in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Kruusmaa's music is best described through ethereal, fragile and spacious soundscapes featuring a delicate and sparse orchestration. Her work has been commissioned in Europe, Asia and the United States. Among many others, she has worked with the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Estonian National Symphony Orchestra, Tallinn Chamber Orchestra, Orkest de Ereprijs, Phion, Pelargos Quartet, Le Cameriste Ambrosiane and Rookh Quartet. In recent years, Kruusmaa has participated in several festivals, including the Gaudeamus Muziekweek and Andriessen Festival in the Netherlands, the international cello festival Cello Fest in Finland, Mise-En Festival and Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra Festival in the United States.
Throughout the years, Kruusmaa’s music has received several recognitions. In 2013, she was awarded Erkki-Sven Tüür Young Composer’s Scholarship. In 2018, her piece Rain (2018) for mezzo-soprano and orchestra won the Best Composition Prize at the 24th Young Composers Meeting in the Netherlands. She has been a featured composer twice at the Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra Composition Competition in Los Angeles (2018 and 2021). In February 2022, her string quartet Three Miniatures (2016) was performed by the Eclipse Quartet at the University of California. She is the winner of the Annual Prize of the Endowment for Music of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia (2021). In 2023, Kruusmaa received the fellowship given out by maestro Tõnu Kaljuste.
Kruusmaa studied composition at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre and at the Conservatorio di Musica di Giuseppe Verdi di Milano. At this moment, she is concentrating on her doctoral studies focusing on composing music for ballet.
About the music
“Alisson Kruusmaa's Five Arabesques for string orchestra are much more modern than the Pärt pieces, which are based on traditional triad harmony. They skilfully alternated between soundscapes à la György Ligeti and delicate flageolets. Here the conductor Toomas Vavilov let the strings play colorful and dynamically finely differentiated.” — Vogt, Mario-Felix. 2023, August 23. Berliner Morgenpost
“Biggest contemporary surprise of the day, at the start of a Pärnu City Orchestra concert masterminded by Estonian Festival Orchestra's violinist Mikk Murdvee in the handsome main room of the 1903 school, was Alisson Kruusmaa’s Five Arabesques for Chamber Orchestra: what an original voice, with a real sense of the numinous in the fluting dissolves of sustained string lines.” — Nice, David. 2023, August 5. theartsdesk.com
“The most awaited piece of the evening was definitely Alisson Kruusmaa’s newly composed Accordion Concerto. As Kruusmaa has gone through a great journey of discovery, she has exquisitely used the instrument’s rich palette and diverse technical possibilities. The solo instrument has a clear leading role in the concert, as the orchestra is rather supporting the musical waves of the accordion. The entire piece is built up as tides of sound masses that start from nothing and gradually grow more powerful — and break off so that a new one can begin once again.” — Klooren, Äli-Ann. 2022, November 2022. Sirp.
“Alisson Kruusmaa’s work for marimba and piano was an exhilarating gourmet experience. Even though I have not heard the original version, I have a feeling that the kind of luscious twinkling lights, like in this piece of music, are best heard with marimba and piano. At times, in a certain way, I associated this shimmering even with the northern lights.” — Hinn, Andre. 2022, December 15. Muusika.
The work of Alisson Kruusmaa ranges from chamber music to orchestral pieces, including works for voice and instruments with poetic titles often inspired by images of nature. Alongside traditional ensembles, she uses a number of ensembles with unexpected timbres (for example, Songs on Texts by Andres Ehin (2013) for mezzo-soprano and timpani, Songs of a Black Butterfly (2014) for four horns, Rain (2018) for mezzo-soprano and wind orchestra, By the North Sea (2022) for percussion quartet), which hint at the composer's sensitivity to sound and her search for timbre. The sound-world created by Kruusmaa has breadth, light and tenderness — the lyrical sense of emotion is balanced by a crisp, clean form and a nuanced mode of expression.
In recent years, Kruusmaa’s orchestral works have gained recognition among artists and audiences worldwide. In 2021, her piece And the Great Winds Come and Go (2021) for mezzo-soprano and symphony orchestra was premiered at the Andriessen Festival in the Netherlands. Another highlight of the season was the premiere of Under Evening Sky (2020), which marks Kruusmaa’s first collaboration with the Grammy Award-winning Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra (conductor Mihhail Gerts).
The piano concerto As if a River Were Singing… (2021) is one of Kruusmaa’s most extensive works involving symphony orchestra to date. The piece was recently featured on the classical music database Bachtrack and released under the British label Odradek Records. Next in the genre was the premiere of Kruusmaa’s Accordion Concerto (2022) performed by Momir Novakovic (solo accordion) and Pärnu City Orchestra (conductor Kaspar Mänd). The piece was praised for its nuanced use of timbre and technical possibilites. In 2023, Kruusmaa’s cello concerto Ali (Wings, 2023) received its world-premiere by the Finnish cellist Martti Rousi and Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra (conductor Robertas Šervenikas). In 2024, another significant choral piece So Set Its Sun in Thee (2024) received its world premiere by the Grammy Award-winning Estonian National Male Choir and the Rascher Saxophone Quartet (conductor Mikk Üleoja).
In 2024, Kruusmaa will make her debut at the prestigious Baltic Sea Festival with her new work And If I Had a Dream (2024) commissioned by the Swedish Radio Choir/Berwaldhallen and composed for Tallinn Chamber Orchestra and maestro Tõnu Kaljuste. In November 2024, Kruusmaa’s first full-length ballet Light from the End of the World (2024) will receive its world-premiere at the Estonian National Opera.
