Cherokee composer Anjelica Lindsey makes history giving voice to the ‘Oklahoma woman’

(TVLSE, Okla.) Long before audiences heard her compositions performed by string quartets or orchestras, Anjelica Lindsey was a child surrounded by music.

Her father had a recording studio in the home she grew up in, filling it with synthesizers, tape players and guitars. Lindsey grew up exploring musical sounds, never realizing they would become a career that blends her Cherokee identity, love for contemporary classical music and deep commitment to tell stories that have rarely been heard on the concert stage.

Lindsey is a Tulsa-based Cherokee composer, violinist, vocalist and recording artist whose work is gaining national attention. Through her music, she explores identity, history and the lived experiences of Indigenous women.

In 2025, Lindsey became the first known Cherokee woman to premiere a string quartet, adding a historic milestone to a career centered on composition.

Lindsey began playing violin at 11 years old. She later earned a scholarship in violin performance at Tulsa Community College before beginning to write her own music. Now, after more than 20 years of performing in orchestras, she is still expanding her abilities. Lindsey is studying music through Juilliard Extension, the continuing education program of the Juilliard School in New York City, which offers courses for students and working artists who want to deepen their training without relocating. 

At the same time, she writes and records original music at Wild Mountain Studios, the recording studio she co-founded in Osage County with her husband, composer and engineer Mark Kuykendall. The arrangement allows her to continue learning and creating without having to leave the state she calls home.

”I can live here in Oklahoma at my home and recording studio, Wild Mountain Studios, but have that connection to New York and music composition through the extension,” she said.

As Lindsey’s career has expanded from performing to composing, she says the violin still inspires her by shaping how she writes. Years of playing the instrument have sharpened her attention to melody and the emotional qualities she wants listeners to feel in her compositions. 

”Playing the violin taught me to listen closely to the shape and movement of a melody,” Lindsey said. “Because I started out as a violinist I love romance in music, as well as themes and motifs. When I compose, I want those musical ideas to feel clear so people can understand and connect with them when they hear them.”

Lindsey describes herself as an architect of sound, writing music not just for today’s audience but for future generations. Much of that is captured in her latest album, Oklahoma Woman Quartet, released this summer.

The original 11-song cycle for string quartet and voice explores modern Indigenous womanhood through Lindsey’s experiences while examining what she describes as the “Oklahoma woman” archetype.

“The thing I’m really proud of is establishing the Oklahoma woman as a perspective, as an American archetype,” Lindsey said. “I want people to know what the Oklahoma woman is, this character who made her way here to Indian territory and went through this colossal transition over the last hundred and fifty years, and what her perspective is, and then how those inherited histories have affected her experience in life.”

Oklahoma Woman Quartet shares themes from Lindsey’s first album, Perhaps: Abstractions, released in 2024. While the two albums explore different ideas, she says they share the same musical foundation.

”My albums have been in the works for a long time, and so it’s just wonderful to finally have official recordings of all this beautiful music that I can share with the world,” Lindsey said.

That work will soon reach new audiences during two big performances this fall. On Oct. 2 and 3, Lindsey will make her symphonic debut during the Good Medicine Indigenous Music Festival in Houston. She will premiere two orchestral works and three compositions for string quartet and soprano sung in Cherokee, continuing her efforts to integrate the Cherokee language into contemporary classical music.

”I’m really excited to get that language integration in my compositions out there,” Lindsey said.

Then, on Oct. 7, Lindsey will return home to present Oklahoma Woman Quartet as part of the Tulsa Performing Arts Center’s Brown Bag It concert series. The free, 40-minute performance begins at 12:10 p.m. in the Westby Pavilion and is family-friendly and open to the public. No tickets or reservations are required, and audience members are invited to stay afterward as Lindsey shares the stories behind the music and answers questions.

For Lindsey, those conversations are just as important as the performance itself.

“I would really love for the people to just be touched by understanding the perspective of what I was calling the Oklahoma Woman as an archetype,” Lindsey said.

As Lindsey’s career continues to grow, she says her focus goes beyond concert halls and recordings. Lindsey hopes her work encourages others to believe their own stories deserve to be heard.

”I’m most excited about integrating the Cherokee language in my music and showing other women and girls that this kind of thing is possible,” she said. “I hope that people believe that whatever their music is, there could be something in their life, it may or may not be music, but I want them to know that it’s possible for them to do whatever their music is.”

You can also catch Lindsey during the “Art as Sovereignty” Symposium this September, as a panelist for “Take Your Medicine: Music and Ceremonial Preservation” on Sept. 12 at 101 Archer.