Live performance of Richard Danielpour's Agnus Dei at The Golden Bridge's 10th Anniversary concert

Inspired by the current uprising and historic struggles of Iranian women seeking equal rights and freedom, Grammy-winning composer Richard Danielpour’s new work "Breaking the Veil" honors his family’s Persian heritage, and is dedicated to his mother Mehri Danielpour Weil, an Iranian sculpturist. Explore the work's inspiration as we sit down with Richard to learn more about its creation and his family's experiences as Iranian Americans, immigrating to settle in the United States in the 1940s. 0:00 The work's inspiration 2:04 What to listen for 3:54 The creative process 4:50 His family's heritage and immigration 5:59 A catalyst for healing Commissioned by ROCO as part of Richard's Season 19 residency, "Breaking the Veil" was premiered on October 20, 2023, at Asia Society Texas Center as part of the Connections Series concert RISE UP—an evening of thought-provoking new chamber works and dialogue spotlighting the ongoing fight for women’s rights and equality, in the U.S, Iran, and around the world. Watch the work's world premiere performance by ROCO, conducted by Artistic Partner Mei-Ann Chen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDd_ct5130A "It is a statement that I wanted to make both in tribute and in support of the women of Iran, but also, I wanted to write this piece as a way of speaking out against all repressive regimes." Videography and editing by Spectrum Fusion Studios

Composer Richard Danielpour discusses his new work "Toward a Season of Peace" commissioned by Pacific Symphony for their 2012 American Composers Festival celebrating Nowruz. Richard Danielpour Toward a Season of Peace The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Two http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHX18g03bUI The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Three http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ztogyd3ZrTs The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Four http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9jfDiuPTZE The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Five http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XDSbwC5QqQ The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Six http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWRCvw7gdZk The Journey Toward The Piece -- Part Seven http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBYUjcsIaKY

Discover the premiere of 'The Unhealed Wound' at the Arthur Zankel Music Center, Skidmore College. This song cycle, composed by Grammy Award-winner Richard Danielpour and featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Rita Dove's poignant words, addresses racial injustice, resilience, and the human spirit. Explore More: https://wmht.org/aha

Philippe Entremont celebrates his 75th birthday together with the Vienna Chamber Orchestra in the Vienna Konzerthaus. The program: Mozart´s Piano Concerto d-minor KV 466, and Richard Danielpour´s "Souvenirs", composed especially for this anniversary.

"While Toward the Splendid City was composed as a portrait of New York, the city in which I live, it was written almost entirely away from home. Work on the piece began in Seattle in the spring of 1992 and was completed in mid-August of that year in Taos, New Mexico. At the time I was nearing the end of a yearlong residency with the Seattle Symphony and had serious second thoughts about returning to New York. Life was always complicated in the city and easier, it seemed, everywhere else. I was, however, not without a certain pang of nostalgia for my hometown, and as a result Toward the Splendid City was driven by my love-hate relationship with New York. It was, needless to say, a relationship badly in need of resolution. Eventually, upon returning to Manhattan, I began to understand that the humanity and the difficulty of New York were inseparable – and that if in the difficulties of urban life humanity is to be embraced, then the inconveniences must also be accepted. The work’s title comes from the heading of Pablo Neruda’s 1974 Nobel Prize address, in which he included the following: “We must pass through solitude and difficulty, isolation and silence, to reach forth to the enchanted place where we can dance our clumsy dance and sing our sorrowful song – but in this dance or in this song there are fulfilled the most ancient rites of our conscience in the awareness of being human.” Toward the Splendid City is, in addition to being a portrait of New York, a tribute to its Philharmonic Orchestra." Richard Danielpour