by Mike Telin
When composer Margi Griebling-Haigh was asked to write a companion piece for Heitor Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5, for cello octet and soprano, little did she know that her 1999 work, Voices From the Other Side, a setting of three poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay, would resurface years later as inspiration for a recording project.
The album, “Voices From the Other Side,” was released in September 2024 on Navona Records.
On Tuesday, February 25 at 7:00 pm at Federated Church in Chagrin Falls, the album will be presented live when conductor Steven Smith leads soprano Gabrielle Haigh and the Erie Coast Cellists in Arvo Pärt’s Fratres and L’abbé Agathon, Heitor Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5, and Margi Griebling-Haigh’s Cantilena and Voices from the Other Side. Tickets are available online.
During a recent telephone conversation, Griebling-Haigh said that when she composed “Voices,” she had no idea that her daughter would go on to become a singer. “She was a little girl when I wrote that piece. She inherited my love for the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay.”