How Bryce Dessner juggles orchestral concertos with indie rock stardom

He is the guitarist and keyboardist in The National, one of indie rock's most successful and prestigious acts, which he co-founded in 1999.

At the same time, he was a classically trained Yale graduate who composed and performed experimental music around Brooklyn into the early 2000s.

He has won Grammys for both alternative and chamber music albums, earned a Best Original Song Oscar for Train Dreams, co-written with Nick Cave, collaborated with minimalist masters Philip Glass and Steve Reich, and penned orchestrations for Paul Simon, Bon Iver and Taylor Swift (on albums produced by his twin and The National bandmate Aaron Dessner).

This month, he teams with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra for the first solo Australian tour of his orchestral work.

Dessner views both disciplines as complementary.

"They're actually kind of similar," he tells Double J. "They're this collaborative, very human archetype of people who work together week in, week out on music."

The big difference? The National composes together whereas, with an orchestra, "I have to show up with a fully completed score. It doesn't mean the collaboration is any less deep or important; it's just a different process".

Then there is the grander scale an orchestra provides: "I can really dig in deeper, and there's lots of colours to explore."

He compares it to writing poetry versus an epic novel. This month he'll showcase his newest musical chapter: the Australian debut of his cello concerto Trembling Earth

The political and the pastoral

Trembling Earth was inspired by an Oslo exhibition of landscape paintings by Edvard Munch.

"They were pre-World War I, probably a similar time [to now] in terms of the intensity of situations playing out on a global scale," says Dessner, who grew up in Ohio surrounded by maple and cedar trees.

"I found it so moving.

"He's painting these old oak woods … so full of emotion and tragedy."

It recalls a quote from German painter Anselm Kiefer: "There is no such thing as an innocent landscape."

"Trembling Earth is like a pastoral symphony but reflecting on the state of the human condition," Dessner says.

"I didn't necessarily want to make a really political piece, but obviously the times we're living in are so difficult, traumatic and full of conflict."

As the Czech Philharmonic's inaugural composer-in-residence, Dessner wrote Trembling Earth for Russian cello virtuoso Anastasia Kobekina.

He calls Kobekina a "force of nature" who can play all the classics ("Dvorak, Elgar, Tchaikovsky") but also loves new music "like Radiohead and Aphex Twin".

Kobekina is the concerto's axis, animating its melodic, lyrical moments and bringing a forceful intensity that evokes the rhythmic power of Shostakovich or Stravinsky.

"She's one of the premier soloists in the world, so it's a big deal for Australian audiences to hear her," Dessner says.  

Landscape is a unifying force in Dessner's music.

Impermanence, an award-winning work commissioned by the Australian String Quartet and Sydney Dance Company, was written in response to Australia's devastating Black Summer bushfires. 

Set to Rafael Bonachela's visceral choreography, it juxtaposes beauty and devastation. Those themes extend to Trembling Earth, where calamity and renewal co-exist.

"The way the Earth bears witness to the effects of humanity's bad decision-making," explains Dessner. "And that, despite its fragility, spring does come. There's a sense of renewal and hope in these pieces."

St Carolyn By The Sea, another Australian premiere, features two electric guitars that function like harps, overlapping in waves against strings ranging from soft to frenzied.

It was inspired by Jack Kerouac's 1962 novel Big Sur, written while the author battled alcoholism and declining mental health.

"He wrote it about the west coast and the Pacific Ocean," Dessner says. "But also mentioning Stravinsky, John Coltrane and Beethoven. It just felt vast and orchestral.

"This endless sky, the sense of the ocean – the orchestral sound can really do that."

The concert hall vs the algorithm

The orchestra's size and scope allow Dessner to translate landscape into sound. But both his classical and rock backgrounds serve similar artistic impulses: capturing emotion and the fragility of the human condition.

In the age of what he calls "algorithmic culture", feeds bombarded by "AI and computer-driven music, where we don't even know if it's a human being behind it", Dessner argues live music and human connection matter more, not less.

"The concert hall itself has become this kind of haven, this human temple of creativity," he says.

"Let's get off our phones and listen to live music, not be filming it. Just be in the space with sound, with musicians who spent their lives playing these instruments. 

"It's an interesting time. People are freaking out about seeing AI artists on Spotify. I don't think we're going to see that in the concert hall; robots on stage playing Beethoven or something.

Dessner remains busy. He recently finished his first opera, Herakles Mad, "which I'm really happy about," that opens next year.

Next month, The National reunite for a one-off show; their first since a "good, healthy break" from intense touring supporting back-to-back 2023 albums First Two Pages of Frankenstein and Laugh Track.

It is not too soon to talk about a follow-up.

"We never turn it off. Matt [Berninger, vocalist] sent me something last week," Dessner reveals.

"We don't have a deadline or a plan necessarily, but we're starting to veer back towards each other."

It is a wonder Dessner finds time to sustain his many creative threads.

"There's seasons of things … moving calendars," he says. 

"It can get lonely. And writing a concerto can feel like climbing Mount Everest.

"I told myself, 'You know what? I do this because I love it'. I try to keep track of that … that I'm enjoying doing it. That keeps me grounded."

Turning 50 prompted reflection on his achievements – and his shrinking bucket list.

"There was a time when I was like, 'Oh god, I really want to write a string quartet or orchestral piece'. I've done quite a few of these things now, and I'm proud of the music," he says.

"It really becomes a choice of, 'What am I most excited to do?' And keeping track of what I have to say, and enjoying that time."

Bryce Dessner's Trembling Earth, with Anastasia Kobekina and Umberto Cleriici, is at the Sydney Opera House on September 19 and 20.

Bryce Dessner and The Sydney Symphony's A Portrait In Music, September 24 at Sydney City Recital Hall and September 25 at Melbourne Recital Centre.