photo Karen Pearson
Composer-vocalist Gilda Lyons (b. 1975) creates works that sing from the inside out, vigorously redefining what constitutes composition and performance through the lens of vocalism. Whether instrumental, electronic, theater or concert-based, her resolutely pan-historic creative and physical voices are uncompromising in their emotional honesty, the systematic rejection of orthodoxy, and a fierce dedication to connecting by fluently combining in her music everything from vocal howls to shape note singing, Renaissance polyphony to modernist extended techniques, Celtic ballads to art pop, overtone singing to soaring operatic melodies.
Social activism and her Nicaraguan roots underpin much of her work, from the environmentalism of her “powerfully effective” (Pittsburgh Stage Magazine) mainstage opera A New Kind of Fallout for the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh; to composing and premiering (as performer and conductor) her upcoming (2026/2027) searing political chamber operafilm Corazón de Esperanza for Esperanza Arts Center with the Dalí Quartet and percussionist Ben Toth; to Cenizas, a meditation on “the ashes left when rights and time and possessions and lives are stolen,” commissioned by the Mid-American Conference Band Directors Association, premiered at the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA) National Conference, and recorded by the Hartt Wind Ensemble. la flor más linda for wind ensemble, composed as a direct response to the political unrest in Nicaragua, has already been taken up by over thirty bands and premiered in both an orchestral version under the baton of Miguel Harth Bedoya and at the North American Saxophone Alliance Region 8 Conference in a version for saxophone ensemble (Carrie Koffman/Hartt Saxophone Ensemble). Musica Viva NY’s debut recording of Momotombo (Naxos) was described in Gramophone as an “irresistible a cappella paean … five movements of vivacious rhythmic activity.” Other recordings of her works are on AMP, Clarion, GPR, New Dynamic, New Focus, Parma, Roven, and Yarlung including Laura Strickling’s Grammy® nominated Songs of Lament and Praise, and releases by Quince, Entelechron, Sing for Hope, Gail Levinsky, and the Makrokosmos 50 Project (Nic Gerpe).
“Gilda Lyons's clear soprano compels admiration,” writes Opera UK of her performance on the Buffalo Philharmonic recording of the opera Shining Brow (Naxos), while Opera News commends her “winning delivery, full of character” (also on Naxos) in her Lyric Fest debut with Laura Ward. Winner of the Paris Film Awards’ Best Actress in an Indie Feature Film for her starring role in the operafilm 9/10: Love Before the Fall (streaming on Amazon Prime Video), she has also received best actress laurels from the Austin International Art Festival, Edinburgh Film Awards, London International Filmmakers Festival, Mindfield Film Festival (Albuquerque), Nashville Independent Filmmakers Festival, and Santa Monica International Filmmaker Awards and best ensemble cast laurels from AltFF Toronto, Sacramento Independent Film Festival, and the Cannes World Film Festival. She has also commissioned and premiered dozens of new works by emerging composers as Founding Director of The Phoenix Concerts, New York's "intrepid Upper West Side new-music series" (The New Yorker), 2005-2023.
Restoring Darkness - “Gilda Lyons performs this new work composed with Daron Hagen for solo voice, exploring a poem by Walt Whitman with techniques ranging from vocal polyphony, to musical improvisation, to site-specific performance. In a single unedited take, filmmaker H. Paul Moon captures this evocative meditation on ‘Youth, Day, Old Age and Night’ from Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass.”
Lyons is Program Chair and Associate Professor of Composition at The Hartt School, University of Hartford, and is the Artistic and Executive Director of the Richard P. Garmany Concert Series. She serves on the Board of Advisors of Composers Now, the Steven R. Gerber Trust, and Sparks & Wiry Cries. Composer-in-Residence of Chautauqua Opera in 2019, she also served as Composer-in-Residence of Quince Ensemble’s 2023 Summer Vocal Institute in Seattle and of Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble’s 2025 Heretic’s Guide to Musicianship. Her music is published by Schott, E.C. Schirmer, and Burning Sled Media. She received her Ph.D. in Music Composition from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh and Bard College. Lyons made her professional debut as composer and vocalist with the American Symphony Chamber Orchestra, Leon Botstein, conductor, in 1997, performing the world premiere of her orchestral song cycle Feis.
“Her music is hair-raising, yet elegant [with] slides, dips, yips and yelps amid ceremonial intensity.”
“Lyons’ command of varied musical textures is masterly.”
“It’s fresh and fun and sounds like nothing you’ve ever heard before.”
“the music rejoices... syncopated Latin rhythms flash...”