12 Ransom Everglades LOG FALL 2026 The dream led to an incredible workload. “I was prepared for that part of it,” she said. “I already knew what kind of art I liked.” The desire to produce music with the best in the world drove her rise through Oberlin, the Yale School of Music, the University of Michigan (where she earned her doctorate) and studies in Paris and Berlin. She currently works as a composer in London while also serving as Professor of Music Composition at Cardiff University in Wales. Her award-winning composition work has been described as having “its own character, in which historical and contemporary influences are fused into a highly flexible and distinctive style” and “packed with crisp, vivid detail that’s not at all hand-me-down.” She draws from her less-than-casual lifelong fascination with history, game theory, military strategy and, of course, nature. The nature she experienced in Coconut Grove still defines many of her works. A number of her chamber and orchestral works employ birdsong and ideas from the natural world, incorporating real-world sounds and rhythms such as in Nature Symphony (2017), commissioned by the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and Radio 3. Bird Symphony (2022), for the Utah Symphony, plays with scale and distance using transcriptions and field recordings of birdsong. Today’s music students at Ransom Everglades can choose from a chamber ensemble, a string orchestra, a jazz combo, a panoply of bands from jazz to concert to symphonic. They can study voice, guitar and advanced placement music theory. Not so in Arlene Sierra’s day. “When I was at Ransom Everglades, I knew of only one other serious musician,” she said. “Ransom was well known for academics and sports, but all that was offered for music was a wind ensemble – not an option for the piano student I was in those days.” Despite the lack of advanced music classes, RE offered a vibrant intellectual and music culture. “My musical ability wasn’t lost on my classmates,” she said. “I was asked to play keyboards and sing with a student rock band at a school fair and to accompany a comedy sketch for assembly by playing the Godfather theme on the piano; great fun!” Added Sierra: “Two of my first friends at Ransom Everglades were Mike Malinin ’85, who later became the drummer for the Goo Goo Dolls, and Shawn Miller ’87, who is now a writer, lawyer and a longtime patron of my recording projects.” She also recalls the academic growth she experienced at RE. “I loved history class with Mr. [Geoff] Pietsch, who always spoke to us like adults and had a kind of serene wisdom and humor,” Sierra remembers. “Our teachers were essentially college professors.” Other favorite teachers were Evelyn La Russe, who taught Spanish and Robert (Doc) Crabtree, who taught Anatomy and Physiology. She recalled attending plays at the Coconut Grove Playhouse under former English teacher Blake Leach. “We went to the productions as a class,” Sierra recalled. “It was a wonderful way to learn about writing, staging and dramatic timing, both essential in my work as a classical composer, especially when writing opera.” “These young composers – who were all guys – had so much attitude and were considered the ultimate cool kids, the ‘rocket scientists of music’ because they could write musical compositions.” – Arlene Sierra ’87
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