Sandra Cisneros and Derek Bermel

Cisneros is the author of the acclaimed novel The House on Mango Street, winner of the Before Columbus Foundation’s American Book Award. Her works include two full-length poetry books, My Wicked Wicked Ways and Loose Woman, as well as the collection Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories, the novel Caramelo, A House of My Own: Stories from My Life, and Puro Amor, a bilingual story that Cisneros also illustrated. Her most recent works are the Spanish and English story Martita, I Remember You/Martita te recuerdo and a poetry collection, Mujer sin vergüenza. 

Composer and clarinetist Derek Bermel has received the Alpert Award in the Arts, the Rome Prize, Guggenheim and Fulbright fellowships, and the Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His recordings Intonations, Migrations, and Voices have been nominated for Grammy Awards. His orchestral commissions have included works for the Pittsburgh, National, Boston, Saint Louis, and Pacific symphonies as well as the Los Angeles Philharmonic. His chamber music has been commissioned by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Eighth Blackbird, the Guarneri String Quartet, Copland House, the Seattle Chamber Music Festival, and the Koussevitzky and Fromm Foundations, among others.