“For me, music is a poetic reading of time, where I work within time to create the opportunity for expressiveness, beauty, and poetic engagement, both within and between individuals.”
Trained in the United States and Europe, Kim Diehnelt established her craft as conductor in both Finland and Switzerland, leading Baltic, Russian, and European ensembles. In Helsinki, Kim founded the Helsinki Camerata, a group dedicated to a chamber music approach to orchestral performance. Her pacing and style reflect an inherent understanding of rhetoric and dramatic flow, receiving praise for her "unusual talent to communicate through the orchestra to her audience."
Kim has been composing works for solo instruments, chamber, orchestral and choral ensembles since 2011 when, after decades on the conductor's podium, she "suddenly had something to say." Her style is best described as a “Nordic Palestrina” as her works possess a lyrical, vocal quality with an attention to beauty and the sense of an unfolding story. Kim was named the KISMET Foundation’s 2018 Artist-in-Residence and created the nature-inspired work Yarmouth Time for Violin and Cello which appears on the Trio Casals album "Moto Finale" released in December 2021. The Filharmonie Brno performance of Striadica: A Symphonic Passage was released on the album "Legends and Light, Vol. 2" in January 2022.
- Trio Casals performs “Yarmouth Time” at Carnegie Hall, May 5, 2023. Details.
- The Community String Orchestra of the Adirondacks premieres the work “Adirondack Spring,” written for them and dedicated to my friends in Lake Placid, June 22, 2023.
- Commissioned work, “Memento” for Clarinet, Horn and Four Cellos, completed and awaits performance in Portland, Oregon, Summer 2023
- "Song of Well-Wishes" for viola and cello, completed. In the style of a Loving-Kindness Meditation, the song evokes traditional phrases of well-wishing. Heartfelt and wordlessly. “May you……” Listen.
- Look for a new orchestral track to be released on the Navona label on November 10, 2023. And here it is! Dashing Vol. 4!
- Chamber Music Coach, July 2023. One-week Chamber Music camp in Burlington, VT
- Conductor of the Burlington Orchestra Workshop for Strings, aka BOWS. Burlington, VT.