Camila Agosto: The Memory of Water, Volumes I & II

Camila Agosto: The Memory of Water, Volumes I & II Reforesters Sound Clinic Residency Presentation What if grief were not an ending but a form of return? The Memory of Water traces the arc of a life—from water, through memory, back to water—asking what remains when we release what we thought defined us. Memory erodes. Water returns. The room will hold you, suspended between the world of the music and the one you inhabit, as sound moves around you and through you. Field recordings captured in Berlin and New York, viola, cello, voice, and electronics are woven together into a multidimensional environment that breathes, creating an immersive sonic world built from grief, memory, and renewal. Composer Camila Agosto presents three works from The Memory of Water, an ongoing project spanning continents and years of collaboration that traces the symbolic arc of a life that begins in water and returns to water — threading personal grief, ecological urgency, and the slow unraveling of identity into immersive sonic environments. The program includes the US premiere of The sky moves beneath our feet, arriving in New York for the first time since its 2023 Berlin debut. Performed through Reforesters' 24.2-channel sound system, these works will envelop the room—placing listeners inside shifting soundscapes built from field recordings, live electronics, viola, cello, and voice. This performance is a sonic invitation to step into this sound world and find a moment of stillness within it. Program: Where darkness swallows the sky, from The Memory of Water Vol. II For viola, cello, and electronics This work depicts a descent into vulnerability and surrender as the piece moves through the murmurs of souls navigating memory's erosion. It incorporates text from two poems by Martine Kinsella Thomas: [WHISPER. LEAVE NO IMPRINT. THE REFLECTING] and [UNTITLED]. between Here and Elsewhere, from The Memory of Water Vol. II For viola and cello Continuing Vol. II's meditation on souls in transit, this piece sits with the quiet distortions time creates on what we think we remember — navigating the soft blur between presence, past, and forgetting. The sky moves beneath our feet, from The Memory of Water Vol. I (US Premiere) For solo viola and electronics Premiered in Berlin in 2023 and arriving in the US for the first time, this work traces the tender and eroding terrain of memory, time, loss, and grief—drawn from Entwined 3, a poem by Martine Kinsella Thomas. It weaves together viola, voice, field recordings from Wannsee, Schlachtensee, and New York, and custom instruments. Performed by Martine Kinsella Thomas (viola), Thea Mesirow (cello), and Camila Agosto (electronics). --- Camila Agosto is a composer, interdisciplinary artist, scholar, and educator based in New York City. She is drawn to the ways sound can hold memory, shape emotion, and spark connection, creating immersive sonic environments that invite deeper listening and reflection. Her work explores themes of memory, perception, psychoacoustics, and somatic experience, with a focus on how sound and vibration shape our emotional and physical relationship to music. Working across acoustic and electroacoustic concert formats, installations, improvisation, and interdisciplinary collaborations with visual artists, choreographers, filmmakers, and instrument builders, her compositions range from fully notated to improvisational works. She explores the sonic potential of acoustic and electronic instruments through extended techniques and tactile electronics, centering embodied approaches to music-making and listening that highlight the human element of live performance. Storytelling and sharing histories are integral to her work, helping to construct worlds and soundscapes that create spaces for healing. She has been commissioned and performed by leading artists and ensembles, with her work featured at venues and festivals across the U.S. and internationally. Camila was the youngest fellow accepted to the American Academy in Berlin, where she received the Fall 2023 Berlin Prize. She is currently an ABD doctoral candidate in Music Composition at Columbia University. Upcoming projects include Shimmer Furnace for brass quartet commissioned by Ensemble Musikfabrik, The Shape of Forgetting for chamber ensemble commissioned by the International Contemporary Ensemble, and In the wake of remnants for solo piano and electronics commissioned by Eunbi Kim expected to premiere 2026-2027 season. To explore more of her music and work, visit camilagosto.com -- Martine Kinsella Thomas is a violist based in New York City, performing internationally as a soloist, chamber musician, improviser, and composer collaborator. She is the violist for Bergamot Quartet and has performed as a soloist and chamber musician with Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, the International Contemporary Ensemble, Tyshawn Sorey, Claire Chase, Vijay Iyer, and Talea Ensemble. She has appeared at the Berliner Philharmonie, Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Mariinsky Theatre, Disney Hall, the KKL Lucerne, the Beijing National Centre for the Performing Arts, and at the BBC Proms, Mariinsky White Nights Festival, Donaueschingen Festival, and Lucerne Festival. Martine has special interests in contemporary music, folk music traditions of Ireland and Norway, and playing hardanger viola and hardanger d’amore. Martine studied in the Harvard-NEC dual degree program and teaches at Brooklyn College Conservatory. For more of her music and writing, please visit martinethomas.com and bergamotquartet.com. -- Thea Mesirow is a cellist, educator, composer, and artist based in NYC. She is the cellist for Telos Consort, principal cellist of the ADCA Symphony Orchestra, and has played with ensembles such as Alarm Will Sound and Talea Ensemble, and performed at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Radio City, and Lincoln Center. In this 2025/26 season, she is expanding her performance art project, shared residues, presenting a series of concerts for the Chamber Music Society with Telos Consort, joining the Tilted Head Ensemble for a performance of premieres, and playing new works for soprano and ensemble by ICEBERG New Music, among other projects. As a composer and artist Thea’s work explores women’s autonomy within community spaces. Her projects have been presented at PAC-NYC and the DiMenna Center, and supported by LMCC and UMEZ. A passionate educator, she currently teaches with YOSL, WHCCFA, and the NYU composition department. Learn more about her work at theamesirow.com