as COMPOSER

INTERVIEWS & FEATURES
Our life, our breath, our hopes and dreams: Makrokosmos IX by Charles Rose (Oregon ArtsWatch)
Letters That You Will Not Get on Visualising War podcast, hosted by Alice König and Nicolas Wiater
Keeping Classical Weird Episode 47: Not Dead Composers Featuring Kirsten Volness, hosted by Casey Bozell
Navigating the Wave: An interview with Kirsten Volness by Matthew Neil Andrews (Oregon ArtsWatch)
Finalist in Recording Inclusivity Intiative, hosted by All Classical Portland, Bodecker Foundation, and Naxos Recordings
Two Commissions: “Gnizo” and “The Pathless Woods” by EmmaLee Holmes-Hicks for Community MusicWorks
River Rising Album Release Party, hosted by DJ Robert Ham, XRAY FM and Aligned Artistry
The Spirit of Radio by Matthew Neil Andrews (Oregon ArtsWatch)
MusicWatch Monthly: Death and recirculation by Charles Rose (Oregon ArtsWatch)
MusicWatch Monthly: A vote for diversity by Charles Rose (Oregon ArtsWatch)
The American Opera Projects Release Three Music Videos for Veterans Day by Francisco Salazar (OPERAWIRE)
The American Opera Project Presents "Songs of Suffering and Suffrage" by David Salazar (OPERAWIRE)
The American Opera Project Announces WORKING WOMEN: Songs Of Suffering and Suffrage Online Tour (Broadway World)
Suffrage Grant Spotlight: Letters That You Will Not Get by Rebecca Sutton (National Endowment for the Arts Blog)
American Opera Project to Stage LETTERS AND THE LOST VOICES OF WOMEN IN WORLD WAR I (Broadway World)
featured on New Sounds with John Schaefer
.....#4518: Electroacoustic Music
.....#4461: Musical Landscapes
.....#4413: Music About Climate Change
.....#4171: Music About Climate Change
Nocturne and Year Without A Summer on AllClassical Portland's Club Mod with Andrea Murray
Third Angle's Quarantunes, Mix Tape 8: Made in Oregon
Lexical Tones (podcast by Adjective New Music)
Interview with GoLocalProv re: Verdant Vibes Winter Warmer
Klang New Music
WRUU Contemporary Classics, Piano & Electronics
Original Gravity Podcast, episode 8
Patch In on SoundNotion, discussing Precious Nothing, River Rising, women in electronic music, and more
Hotel Elefant: Preview of Precious Nothing (in progress)
Hotel Elefant: Preview of Precious Nothing (complete)
No Extra Notes
Washington Square Winds Composer of the Month

ARTICLES
Music Prof Wins Award for Opera Based on WWI by Anna Mann of Reed Magazine
Let's Talk 21st Century Music by Allie Shinskey of The Good Five Cent Cigar
Kirsten Volness: Staying Composed by Matthew Lawrence of Take Magazine
Three RI Composers Win $25,000 Fellowships by Chris Barnett of Rhode Island Foundation
Three Inventive RI Composers Win $25,000 MacColl Johnson Grants by Andy Smith of Providence Journal
Three Cheers for Three Musicians by Beth Comery of Providence Daily Dose
URI music, art instructors bond over love of music by Elizabeth Rau of URI Today
Embracing Life's Rhythm: Dr. Kirsten Volness on the Rewards of Her Art Form by Aria Mia Loberti of URI.edu
Arts Festival Created to Unite Different Creative Departments Scheduled for this May by Emily Drell of The Good Five Cent Cigar

ABOUT MY WORK
AnEarful's Best of 2020: Classical by Jeremy Shatan
"...There's plenty of variety and no shortage of personality on this wonderful album. It will stay with you —" about River Rising

'Wired' collects inventive new music for a terrific Boston duo by Joshua Kosman of SF Chronicle
"...irresistible... atmospheric and rhythmically catchy..."

Transient Canvas’ Wired Features Electroacoustic Commissions by Matthew Younglove of I Care if You Listen
"...electronics fade in and out of the texture like a spirit passing between worlds"

Critic's Notebook: On Themes and variations, bass clarinets and marimbas by Jeremy Reynolds of Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"...desperately, gorgeously lyrical — 'Year Without a Summer' was a particular highlight — showcasing the players’ mastery of their instruments as well as their contagious commitment to the works."

2017 New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival: Political Protest and Social Justice by Jean Ballard Terepka of TheatreScene.net
"One of the finest pieces in the Festival was Volness’ response to recent accounts of refugee displacement from the 2106 [sic] UNHCR report and of international enslavement from the current Global Slavery Index."

Hub New Music and Kelsey Broersma at Sound and Fury by Cristina Lord of New Classic LA
"Kirsten Volness creates an exquisite sound world in Little Tiny Stone, Full of Blue Fire..."

Waking the Monster by Masary Studios
"Masary Studios activates the Green Monster at Boston's Fenway Park. Combining original scores, custom-mapped animation and 9 percussionists, Masary was responsible for Waking the Monster at the Illuminus Boston Festival 2015." (CME)

Precious Nothing by Michael Miller of New York Arts
"The scoring, from the use of the mezzo-soprano voice to the percussion and electronics is nothing short of gorgeous, and in a way its richness opens the door to the disparate stylistic elements Volness brings in, including jazz."

Broad Ambition: Hartford New Music Festival 2012 by Lisa Renée Coons of New Music Box
"The ensemble EXILKABARETT unleashed a furious burst of acoustic energy in Kirsten Volness’s Peppermill Songs."

the infinite space between by Jennifer Berke of The Daily Texan
"Interior design junior Bronwyn Hunt said each performance was different, but she enjoyed 'The Infinite Space Between' the most.
'It was interesting. I had more of an emotional response to the performance by being free to experience the space' Hunt said. 'The music even affected the way people moved through the space.'”

Bering Sea by Bruce Hodges of Seen and Heard International

Bering Sea by Be'eri Moalem of San Francisco Classical Voice

Hints and Hauntings by Topher Levin of KCMETROPOLIS.ORG
"The electronics expanded to a wider variety of timbres, from late 90’s-sounding synth pipe organ sounds to water sounds to dense soundmass swells.'

Gaia by Jim Phelps of Computer Music Review
"Similarly championing the appreciation for appropriately short pieces was Gaia, by Kirsten Volness. The piece was a tasty, percussive morsel based on features of dynamic relationships within life systems."

COMPILATIONS
» Composers Circle April 2014 Mix Tape
» I CARE IF YOU LISTEN Summer 2014 Mixtape

DISCOGRAPHY

» Lush Escapist Dream (EP)
» River Rising
» Ultraviolet on Andrea Cheeseman–Somewhere
» Year Without a Summer on Transient Canvas–Wired
» River Rising on Music from SEAMUS Vol. 25
» Meridian Project—Dark Matter (multimedia album)

as PRODUCER

REVIEWS / WRITE UPS
5 Questions to Verdant Vibes by Anne Goldberg-Baldwin of I Care If You Listen (.com)
"The 'build it and they will come' model does not work. If you want different people to send you their stuff, you have to learn about them, find them, and meet them where they are, and ask them."

Classical Meets Contemporary by Amanda M. Grosvenor of Providence Monthly
"Verdant Vibes has carved out a niche for rethinking classical music in Providence."

First Fridays Start at Music Mansion by Beth Comery of Providence Daily Dose

Head to the Music Mansion for First Fridays by Casey Nilsson of Rhode Island Monthly
"Music Mansion's 2017 series, curated by composer-in-residence, Kirsten Volness, features an unusual spread of music, from English and Irish folk to electronic compositions."

'Verdant Vibes' At Hope Artiste by Beth Comery of Providence Daily Dose
"And now for something completely different. Avant music ensemble Verdant Vibes presents new electro/acoustic music and multimedia by composers from around the world . . . lots of grooving, epic, sublime new music, with electronics, video, improv, etc. at the Hope Artiste Village."

A New Sound by Adara Meyers of Take Magazine
"'Fun, engaging, and transcendent (if but for a moment).' That’s how Providence, Rhode Island-based composer-pianist Kirsten Volness describes the sometimes brazen, sometimes ambient, and always envelope-pushing music on deck for the December 6 launch party and concert of her latest undertaking: Verdant Vibes, a new music ensemble and concert series on the cusp of its inaugural season."

as PERFORMER

REVIEWS / WRITE UPS
A Group of Young Dancers, Conversing With Their Feet by Alastair Macaulay of The New York Times
BalletCollective Plays with Wildfire by Alastair Macaulay of The New York Times
Leaping from Within, Narratives of a Young Ensemble by Alastair Macaulay of The New York Times
BalletCollective and Hotel Elefant at the Skirball Center by Steven Pisano of Feast of Music
Q2 Music's Meet the Composer Launch Party at The Greene Space: Feast of Music
For Young Ensembles, An Entrepreneur and an Audience by Steve Smith of The New York Times
Hub New Music Illuminates Norman's constructs at MFA by David Weininger of The Boston Globe

DISCOGRAPHY
» Richard Carrick's Cycles of Evolution—playing piano with Hotel Elefant on Prisoner's Cinema


as ACTIVIST MUSICIAN

REVIEWS / WRITE UPS

The Tenderloin Opera Company Gives Voice to the Homeless by Jenn Salcido of Providence Monthly
Buses into Land Sharks: Alternative Theater in Providence by Sophie Kasakove + Lisa Borst of The College Hill Independent
Tenderloin Opera Company, "Real Conversations Series" by Rob Clark of The Good Five Cent Cigar
Wrong and Strong by Carol McCarthy of URI.edu

PHOTOS
Available upon request ...or there's this