Five Minutes for Earth —Yolanda Kondonassis, harp (Azica 71349)
Yolanda Kondonassis, head of the Harp department at CIM, talks about this album as a “project that both celebrates our planet and illuminates our challenge to preserve it. In 2020, I asked each of the composers featured in this collection if they would consider contributing a work for solo harp of approximately five minutes in length that expresses a powerful experience inspired by Earth in one of its many conditions or atmospheres. I was overwhelmed by the generosity of their immediate responses and set about assembling this labor-of-love project. The endeavor quickly expanded to include a live, multi-media concert, a unique video for each track, a separate published collection of Earth-inspired solos for younger harpists, and most importantly, the opportunity for harpists all over the world to perform these innovative, Earth-inspired works for solo harp by some of today’s most lauded composers; in doing so, every verified performance of any of the works from the Five Minutes for Earth collection, anywhere in the world, will result in a monetary contribution to a recognized earth conservation organization, sponsored by my non-profit organization, Earth at Heart. Five Minutes for Earth is also a metaphor for the urgent and compressed timeframe that remains for our global community to embrace and implement solutions to our fast-growing environmental crisis. What is at stake . . . is only everything we have.”