Ellen West

Prototype Festival

New York, NY

“Lidiya Yankovskaya brilliantly led the orchestral accompaniment, finding meaning in every gesture.”
–Eric C. Simpson, New York Classical Review

“Lidiya Yankovskaya fluently conducts a string quartet, bass and piano.”
–John Rockwell, Financial Times

“Lidiya Yankovskaya’s musical direction is an equal partner, lending the piece plenty of emotional weight and dramatic tension.”
–Clive Paget, Musical America

“Tension from beginning to end… The Aeolus Quartet conductor Lidiya Yankovskaya sets the instrumentalists into a mild pizzicato frenzy.”
–Chris Ruel, OperaWire

“Music director Lidiya Yankovskaya and the Aeolus Quartet did a fine job in bringing out the best elements of Gordon's score…”
–Richard Sasanow, Broadway World

“Yankovskaya conducted the Aeolus Quartet with passion…”
–Maria Mazzaro, Opera News

“Gordon’s music captures the tumultuous emotions of the libretto. The vocal lines are at times punchy, then achingly simple; the instrumentation sometimes becomes so frantic that it sounds like a first-rate thriller score. Lidiya Yankovskaya conducted the Aeolus Quartet with passion: the ensemble played behind a scenery window, and was visible through the mullions.”
–Maria Mazzaro, Opera News

“The text is an enigmatic and poignant expression of a self that feels itself unreal…Gordon’s elegantly impassioned score drew dusky lyricism from the Aeolus Quartet, conducted here by Lidiya Yankovskaya.”
–Zachary Woolfe, New York Times

Album

“Lidiya Yankovskaya’s punch musical direction brings out Gordon’s multifaceted orchestrations and the opera has been beautifully captured live with minimal stage noise.”
–Clive Paget, Musical America