Departure Duo

Departure Duo is a soprano and double bass duo comprised of Nina Guo and Edward Kass. Committed to performing repertoire written specifically for soprano+double bass, the duo seeks to show the incredible variety of styles and sounds possible through their combination. Departure Duo firmly believes that contemporary music can and should be accessible to all, and by encouraging dialogue with audiences, new music will not be viewed as a niche genre.

The duo’s long-term project, "30 by '30," aims to catalog 30 hours of soprano+double bass music by 2030. The approach is twofold: commissioning+premiering new works and researching pre-existing ones. Departure Duo frequently collaborates with living composers to create new music for their “high-low” partnership and, since 2015, has brought over a dozen works to life, including three of the pieces on this album. Their commissioning work has received support and recognition from Chamber Music America's Classical Commissioning Grant Program and New England Conservatory's Entrepreneurial Musicianship Department. On the research front, Departure Duo maintains the “30 by '30” database, which has over 22 hours of catalogued repertoire and is a freely accessible resource for anyone interested in soprano+double bass. The goal of “30 by ‘30” is to show that soprano+double bass music is an undeniable body of repertoire, one that is both musically viable and extremely diverse. The duo wants to recognize the whole community that makes up this high-low corner of the musical universe and encourage more people to join. 

Departure Duo regularly tours and performs recitals, and recent highlights include Spoleto Festival USA, a Yellow Barn artist residency, Center for New Music (San Francisco), Indexical (Santa Cruz), Omaha Under the Radar, Jordan Hall, and KM28 (Berlin). As individuals, Nina and Edward have appeared with contemporary music groups including Ensemble Dal Niente, Ensemble Modern, ensemble ascolta, Callithumpian Consort, Wet Ink, and Decoder, and at festivals around the world such as the Tanglewood Music Center, Lucerne Festival, Achtbrücken (Cologne), SICPP (Boston), the Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music, and Pacific Music Festival (Japan).