Music With a Mission: Harpist Yolanda Kondonassis on Her New Album, Five Minutes for Earth, and Connecting Activism and the Arts
Yolanda Kondonassis. Credit: Laura Watilo Blake
Classical musicians are incredibly passionate about their work. But that doesn't mean they can't make room in their hectic lives for other passion projects. For harpist Yolanda Kondonassis — one of the world's greatest soloists and head of the harp departments at the Cleveland Institute and Oberlin Conservatory — earth conservation has been the focus of her activism for more than 20 years. And it's led her down some fascinating roads both inside and outside the music world.
In 2012 she published her first children's book, My Earth, My Home: A Kid's Book About Why Protecting Our Earth Matters. She also founded Earth at Heart — a nonprofit organization that serves to increase earth conservation awareness and action through the arts.
Yolanda's latest album, Five Minutes for Earth, is a perfect example of the way she connects her many passions. A collection of 15 five-minute works for solo harp she commissioned from some of today's most dynamic compositional voices, Five Minutes for Earth is more than an album, she explains in the latest episode of the Classical Post podcast: "It's a project with some long-reaching goals."
"Once all of these pieces are released and premiered, they'll be available to harpists all over the world. And for each verified performance — by any harpist, anywhere in the world — an automatic donation will be made to one of a list of really worthy, vetted earth conservation organizations through Earth at Heart."
In addition to prompting awareness and action about the climate crisis, Yolanda's project also looks to empower musicians to play a part in the earth's future, given that the financial constraints of an artist's life often make it difficult to donate monetarily.
"I wanted to explore the idea of giving musicians a way to contribute through their performance, through their service, when discretionary income may not permit them to write a check to a worthy organization for a very dire cause."
In this conversation, we learn more about Yolanda's album and activism, and hear why she defines success not only by what she's done but by how she's done it. Plus, she shares the homeopathic anti-inflammatory she can't live without, the ways visual arts inspire her music-making, as well as the New York City eateries she turns to when she's craving steak frites or the best lobster roll outside of Maine.
Listen to Five Minutes for Earth on Spotify, Apple Music, or wherever you get your music.
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