Lera Auerbach is an Austrian-American composer, pianist, writer, and visual artist. Born in Chelyabinsk in the Ural region, she began performing and composing as a child and remained in New York during a United States concert tour in 1991. Her studies included piano and composition at The Juilliard School and further piano study in Hannover. Her musical catalogue ranges from symphonies, concertos, operas, and ballets to chamber music, choral works, and solo cycles. Performers of her music include the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, and Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Alongside her musical career, she writes poetry, fiction, aphorisms, and libretti, and makes drawings, paintings, and bronze sculptures. These activities form distinct but closely connected parts of her artistic life.