About Sarah Pillow:

Sarah's musical life has been shaped by curiosity. From an early age, she was drawn to a wide range of musical worlds, moving easily between jazz, classical music, opera, early music, sacred music, and progressive rock in search of new artistic connections.

As a teenager, she was already performing professionally when recordings by Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald sparked a lasting fascination with jazz. The summer of har 18th year, Sarah appeared at the Montreux Jazz Festival, an experience that also earned her recognition from DownBeat Magazine and was an early indication of her talent for navigating new musical territory.

That spirit of exploration led her from jazz studies in Santa Cruz - alongside future jazz luminaries Donny McCaslin and Kenny Wollesen - to the Oberlin Conservatory, where she immersed herself in classical repertoire while continuing to perform jazz professionally. After settling in New York City, she became part of a vibrant artistic community that carried her from choral singing and modern dance projects to collaborations with early music specialists in both the United States and England.

Rather than choosing a single musical path, Sarah embraced them all. Her recordings and performances have ranged from jazz and sacred music to historically informed early music, often bringing the spontaneity of one tradition into another. As co-founder of Buckyball Music, she further expanded her creative independence, producing projects that crossed stylistic and historical boundaries.

Among the most distinctive of these were collaborations with progressive rock musicians Percy Jones and John Goodsall, blending 17th-century music with contemporary jazz and rock, and Galileo's Daughters, a multimedia ensemble that united music, science, history, literature, and visual art. Created with author Dava Sobel, Perpetual Motion: Revolutions in 17th Century Science and Music toured throughout North America and Canada, and is now memorialized as a CD and DVD package. The project reflects Sarah's belief that art is most exciting when disciplines intersect.

Whether performing medieval drama, contemporary opera, sacred music, or jazz, Sarah has remained guided by the same impulse: to follow the music wherever it leads. Her newest album reflects that lifelong wanderlust, moving from jazz standards to the adventurous music of Charles Mingus, Pat Metheny, and Chick Corea before arriving at the dreamlike landscapes of "Nature Boy" and "Wayfarin' Stranger." Throughout her career, Sarah has found that the richest discoveries often emerge where traditions, eras, and genres meet.