Maya Bennardo (she/her) is an active performer and composer living in Stockholm, Sweden. Maya is interested in opening the dialogue and blurring the boundaries between composers and performers, and is devoted to performing music of the present. She is a founding member of the violin/viola duo andPlay, described by I Care If You Listen as “enthusiastic champions for new music and collaboration.” She performs new and traditional repertoire for violin and piano with pianist Karl Larson in their Bennardo-Larson Duo, and was a member of the internationally renowned Mivos Quartet. 

Maya's compositions are characterized by slow, unfolding timbral movements--exploring the co-existence of pitch and noise. Her compositions have grown naturally out of her improvisational practice on the violin, and the two continue to inform each other. Recently, Maya has composed new works for NoExit + andPlay, Lamnth, Alkemie + Amanda Gookin, Bennardo-Larson Duo, and a new long-form solo work for violin, and this season she is writing a new work for solo cello for Thea Mesirow, solo bandoneón for James Parker, and a piano, bass, percussion trio for NYC-based Bearthoven. 

She graduated from NYU with a Master of Music and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music with a Bachelor of Music studying with Gregory Fulkerson at both institutions. Apart from performing, Maya enjoys a rich teaching life in her private studio. She performs on a modern instrument made by the late Tetsuo Matsuda. 

"sliver of light in a crowded room" (2023) for Lamnth (violin and cimbalom)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2vfVsGadFU

"dormant gardens i." (2022) for andPlay (violin and viola)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7yo7X_-TqM