Composer in residence: Caroline Shaw & Gabriel Kahane

Caroline Shaw

American Caroline Shaw is composer in residence at Het Concertgebouw this season. Together with her fellow countryman, singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane, she will perform a song cycle inspired by Borges' The Library of Babel . Shaw will perform as a singer. 'Singing is vulnerable', she says. 'I've played the violin all my life, it's even easier than talking. And when you compose, there are many technical aspects that you can hide behind as a person. But singing reflects who you are, what you're concerned with, how you're doing.'

Song cycle by Caroline Shaw & Gabriel Kahane

After more than a decade of musical friendship, composer-performers Caroline Shaw and Gabriel Kahane present their first large-scale collaboration on a new work Hexagons , inspired by Borges's The Library of Babel . In this co-written song cycle, Shaw and Kahane invite audiences to reflect on the joys, sorrows, wonder and bewilderment that come from living in a world oversaturated with information.