May 12: Harpist Yolanda Kondonassis Releases New Single, Arturo Sandoval’s Wildflower 'Yolanda’s Song'

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Contact: Katy Salomon | Primo Artists | VP, Public Relations 
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 Harpist Yolanda Kondonassis
Releases New Single, 
Arturo Sandoval’s 
Wildflower “Yolanda’s Song” 

Mother’s Day Weekend Release Celebrates 
Themes of Springtime and Motherhood in
Sandoval’s Lush, Jazz-Inspired Style

Watch the Trailer for the Wildflower Music Video

Part of the FIVE MINUTES for Earth Collection, 
Wildflower Generates Funds for Earth Conservation Causes
Through Kondonassis’ Non-Profit, Earth at Heart 

New Single out May 12, 2023 on Azica Records

Stream the FIVE MINUTES for Earth Album
Watch the FIVE MINUTES for Earth Music Videos

“Harpist Yolanda Kondonassis is a force of nature.” – New York Music Daily

www.YolandaHarp.com | www.EarthatHeart.org
 

New York, NY (April 5, 2023) – On May 12, 2023, multiple GRAMMY-nominated harpist Yolanda Kondonassis will release her new single Wildflower “Yolanda’s Song” on Azica Records. This supplemental track to Kondonassis’ 2022 album FIVE MINUTES for Earth® was composed for her by the great Cuban virtuoso trumpeter and composer Arturo Sandoval – winner of four GRAMMY Awards and a dear friend of the harpist. Timed for a Mother’s Day weekend release, the highly personal Wildflower is a celebration of Kondonassis’ own mother’s influence in her life, and of the irreplaceable role played by mothers everywhere. The single is accompanied by a video that pays touching tribute to the special bond between mothers and daughters, set against the colorful backdrop of wildflowers and nature in a striking visual montage.

Watch the Wildflower Trailer | Read the Liner Notes for Wildflower | Read Yolanda’s Blog on Wildflower

Like the other works in the FIVE MINUTES for Earth catalog, the Wildflower single will generate funding for earth conservation causes. For each verified performance of any work in the FIVE MINUTES collection – by any artist, anywhere in the world – Kondonassis’ non-profit organization Earth at Heart® will make a donation to a recognized conservation group – with beneficiaries including The Rainforest Alliance, The Sierra Club Foundation, Environmental Defense Fund, The Nature Conservancy, Ocean Conservancy, and Wildlife Fund. All composers have generously waived their commission fees in support of the project.

Kondonassis described Wildflower – delivered to her by Sandoval in the pandemic-fraught summer of 2021 – as “the light and breath I desperately needed. Playing it for even a short amount of time lifted my spirit, cleared my head, and made me feel hopeful.” On choosing a title for the track, she said she and Sandoval both wanted a name expressing purity of spirit and a callback to simpler times. “In today’s complex world, there are so very few things that universally symbolize beauty and positivity, honor and respect, love and celebration, and the good in us all so broadly and cross-culturally as flowers do,” she said. “This piece celebrates the idea that there are still common threads that bind us together, common truths upon which we can all agree, and a planet that sustains both our practical needs and our higher aspirations. Like flowers, we come in all colors of the rainbow and we must never forget that love, beauty, and light are still at the core of all we are, and all we should be.”

On the track’s connection to Mother’s Day, Kondonassis said it evoked memories of her own late mother, an accomplished piano teacher and her first mentor in music. “My mom passed away in 2012, but she was a ferocious spirit and her presence stays with me,” Kondonassis said. “Somewhere along the way in the process of internalizing this beautiful work, Wildflower became hers. Even the title embodies her spirit. The closeness I feel to my own mother in this thread of common experience is not only a bridge to her legacy in me, but an inspiration to continue cultivating that same meaningful connection with my own daughter. Motherhood is a spiritual undertaking, a leap of faith, and unlike anything else in this world.”

For the original FIVE MINUTES for Earth® album, also released through Azica Records, Kondonassis asked some of today’s most innovative composers to create new works for solo harp – each around five minutes in length – that express a powerful experience inspired by Earth in one of its many conditions or atmospheres. The project is built on the idea of bringing the classical music community together in support of earth conservation and “paying it forward” through artistic contributions, where the creation and performance of music results in sponsored funding for earth causes. Among the contributing composers were Jocelyn C. Chambers, Chen Yi, Michael Daugherty, Daniel Dorff, Reena Esmail, Keith Fitch, Patrick Harlin, Stephen Hartke, Nathaniel Heyder, Takuma Itoh, Aaron Jay Kernis, Steven Mark Kohn, Philip Maneval, Máximo Diego Pujol, Gary Schocker, and Zhou Long. The collection was introduced by Kondonassis live in a concert featuring 17 world premieres at The Cleveland Museum of Art in October 2022.

The FIVE MINUTES for Earth® Project is an initiative of Earth at Heart, a nonprofit organization founded and directed by Kondonassis. Earth at Heart’s mission is to inspire earth conservation awareness and action through the portal of the arts by supporting and commissioning earth-inspired works, providing earth-inspired programming and earth education resources, and by funding automatic donations to worthy earth conservation organizations with each verified performance of works in the FIVE MINUTES for Earth® collection. Kondonassis began the project with commissioned works for her own instrument, but plans to expand the creation of commissioned projects to include works for other instruments and art forms in the years to come.

About Yolanda Kondonassis
Yolanda Kondonassis is celebrated as one of the world’s leading solo harpists. Hailed as “viscerally exciting” (The Chicago Tribune) and a “brilliant and expressive player” (Dallas Morning News), she has performed around the globe as a concerto soloist and in recital, pushing the boundaries of what listeners expect of the harp. Also a published author, speaker, professor of harp, and environmental activist, she weaves her many passions into a vibrant and multi-faceted career.

Praised by Gramophone for her “keen sense of dramatic timing and a range of colour that’s breathtaking,” Kondonassis has sold hundreds of thousands of albums and downloads worldwide and her extensive, critically acclaimed discography, released on the Telarc, Azica, New World, Channel Classics, and Oberlin Music labels, includes over twenty titles and over two-dozen world-premiere recordings. She was nominated for a 2020 GRAMMY Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo for her live, world premiere recording of Jennifer Higdon’s Harp Concerto (written for Kondonassis) with The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (Azica, 2019). Her 2008 album of music by Takemitsu and Debussy, Air (Telarc), was also nominated for a GRAMMY Award.

Since making her debut at age 18 with the New York Philharmonic and Zubin Mehta, Kondonassis has appeared as soloist with major orchestras in the United States and abroad including The Cleveland Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Detroit Symphony, NFM Wroclaw Philharmonic (Poland), Orquesta Sinfonica de Puerto Rico, Odessa Philharmonic (Ukraine), and New World Symphony to name a few. Other appearances include engagements at Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, the 92nd Street Y, Taiwan’s National Concert Hall and at renowned festivals including the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Marlboro, Spoleto, Tanglewood, Bravo! Vail, and others. She has been featured on CNN, PBS, Sirius XM Radio, and National Public Radio. She holds the rare distinction of having performed two NPR Tiny Desk Concerts and was recently a guest host on SIRIUS XM’s Living American series.

The 2021-2022 season marked the debut of FIVE MINUTES for Earth®, a project created by Kondonassis that both celebrates Earth and illuminates the challenge to preserve it. 17 composers generously donated their work to the project, and in partnership with Kondonassis' nonprofit organization Earth at Heart®, every verified performance of any of the works after the live and recorded premieres by Kondonassis – by any harpist, anywhere in the world – will result in a monetary contribution to a recognized earth conservation organization. The world premiere recording was released on Azica Records in April 2022 to rave reviews: “[Five Minutes for Earth] captures the powerful emotions raised by Kondonassis’ virtuosity with extraordinary impact.” (Gramophone)

As an author, composer, and arranger, Kondonassis has published four books to date with Carl Fischer Music: The Composer’s Guide to Writing Well for the Modern Harp; On Playing the Harp, a comprehensive guide to harp technique and methodology; The Yolanda Kondonassis Collection, a compilation of her many original transcriptions, arrangements and compositions for the harp; and The Yolanda Kondonassis Christmas Collection, featuring Kondonassis’ most popular arrangements from her acclaimed disc, Dream Season: The Christmas Harp. A new volume to be published by Theodore Presser and co-curated by Kondonassis, The Earth Collection, will feature two new compositions by Kondonassis, in addition to other earth-inspired works written especially for the publication, and will be available in 2023.

Born in Norman, Oklahoma, Kondonassis attended high school at Interlochen Arts Academy. She continued her education at The Cleveland Institute of Music, where she received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees as a student of Alice Chalifoux. Kondonassis heads the harp department at the Cleveland Institute of Music, is the founder and director of the nonprofit organization, Earth at Heart, and presents masterclasses around the world. For more information on Yolanda Kondonassis, visit www.YolandaHarp.com.

About Arturo Sandoval
Arturo Sandoval is a protégé of the legendary jazz master Dizzy Gillespie and was born in Artemisa, a small town on the outskirts of Havana, Cuba, on November 6, 1949, just two years after Gillespie became the first musician to bring Latin influences into American Jazz. Sandoval began studying classical trumpet at the age of twelve, but it didn’t take him long to catch the excitement of the jazz world. He has since evolved into one of the world’s most acknowledged guardians of jazz trumpet and flugelhorn, as well as a renowned classical artist, pianist, and composer. Sandoval has been awarded 10 Grammy Awards and nominated 19 times; he has also received 6 Billboard Awards and an Emmy Award, the latter for his composing work on the entire underscore of the HBO movie based on his life, “For Love or Country” that starred Andy Garcia as Arturo. In addition to his iconic accomplishments as a jazz artist, Sandoval performs regularly with leading symphony orchestras around the world. His own Concerto for Trumpet & Orchestra can be heard on Arturo Sandoval: The Classical Album. Recently released is a new book chronicling Sandoval’s relationship with Dizzy Gillespie, entitled The Man Who Changed My Life. In 2013, Arturo Sandoval was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. For more information on Arturo Sandoval, visit ArturoSandoval.com.

Photo Credits: Arturo Sandoval by Jeremy Lock. Yolanda Kondonassis by Laura Watilo Blake.

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