The music of Laura Bowler tends to divide opinion. Go looking for reviews and you’ll find some arguing her work is vital, an urgent intervention into social issues that brings much-needed aesthetic experimentation to contemporary music. For others, her work is frustrating: all-too-angry, unenjoyable and ultimately off-putting. For me, her music is both moving and intellectually ambitious. Watching and listening to one of Bowler’s pieces unfold is like precious few other experiences in contemporary music. Her compositions are complex and deeply challenging, from the Antonin Artaud-inflected noise of “Theatre of Cruelty” for string quartet (2010) to the almost-too-much-to-bear emotional intensity of “fff” (2018). In person, Bowler is kind, funny, hospitable and remarkably self-effacing about both her work and her own talent, quick to ask questions and quicker still to point to her collaborators and fellow artists. How to make sense of this composer with a rapidly expanding body of work and a seemingly relentless drive for tackling some of the most urgent social and political questions of the day?
Unlimited access to our
