On Monday, we mentioned that the Miner’s Hymns, for which Jóhann Jóhannsson composed the score, was screening Downtown in NYC. Jóhannsson has a live appearance scheduled tonight on the United States’ opposite coast.

Joined by the Formalist Quartet, Jóhannsson will give a retrospective concert at the Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever Cemetery on February 8th. The composer was also featured last night on KCRW’s program Morning Becomes Eclectic (Listen here).

Event Details
Wednesday, February 8th – Los Angeles, CA
@ The Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever Cemetery – 8PM, $25
Jóhann Jóhannsson performs music spanning his entire career with the Formalist Quartet

Philip Glass is 75 today. The American Composers Orchestra gives the American premiere of his 9th Symphony at Carnegie Hall tonight.

My interview with Dennis Russell Davies, who is conducting the ACO concert, is up on Musical America’s website (subscribers only).

If you’re looking for a terrific way to celebrate PG’s birthday, Brooklyn Rider’s latest CD on Orange Mountain Music includes Glass’s first five string quartets. The earthiness with which they play the music may surprise you at first, but it provides a persuasive foil for some of the more motoric, “high buffed sheen” toned performances of minimalism that are out there.  In a 2011 video below, they give a performance of a more recent work, a suite of music from the film Bent.

Philip Glass. Photo: Raymond Meier.

“Seventy-five used to be a very old age for a composer. Of course, with Elliott Carter around, it makes me feel like a youngster!” – Philip Glass.

The American Composers Orchestra, led by Conductor Laureate Dennis Russell Davies, gives the American premiere of Glass’s Ninth Symphony tomorrow at Carnegie Hall. Also on the program: the NY premiere of Arvo Pärt’s Lamentate for piano and orchestra with Maki Namekawa as soloist.

Tomorrow, Musical America will be running my interview with Davies.

Out on 2/13 in the UK (and everywhere else on 3/6/12), “Jerk Driver” is the lead off single from Gabriel Prokofiev’s Cello Multitracks, a CD that is his latest genre-bending release for the Nonclassical imprint. It features cellist Peter Gregson, a noteworthy genre bender in his own right, playing all nine cello parts, creating a swath of overdubbed strings that is then subjected to remixes by Paul Miller (DJ Spooky), musician/producer MaJiKer, and composer Marcas Lancaster. Check out a sample embedded below.

As Jerry Bowles points out on the homepage, Gregson and Prokofiev will be presenting the piece at Joe’s Pub in New York on 2/10. More US events are listed below: some of them include Prokofiev’s concert music; others, his work as a DJ!

Gabriel Prokofiev + Peter Gregson – Jerk Driver (preview) by Nonclassical

Nonclassical US tour
9th February: Gabriel Prokofiev Bass Drum Concerto (World premiere) w/ Princeton Symphony – Richardson Auditorium, Princeton, NJ
10th February: Peter Gregson & Todd Reynolds (+ Gabriel Prokofiev DJ sets) – Joe’s Pub, NYC
11th February: Peter Gregson w/ Joby Burgess ( + Gabriel Prokofiev DJ sets) – Terrace Club, Princeton, NJ
15th February: Peter Gregson w/ DJ Madhatter, Joby Burgess ( + Gabriel Prokofiev DJ sets) – MOCT, Wilwaukee, WI
16th February: Peter Gregson w/ Joby Burgess ( + Gabriel Prokofiev DJ sets) – Brink Lounge, Madison, WI
18th February: Peter Gregson w/ Joby Burgess ( + Gabriel Prokofiev DJ sets) – Chicago, IL (Venue TBC)
21st February: Gabriel Prokofiev Bass Drum Concerto w/ Chicago Composers Orchestra – Ruth Page Theater, Chicago,IL

Last weekend, mezzo-soprano Megan Ihnen and violinist Joseph Kneer premiered a new version of “He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven” (2011) on the Federal Hill Parlor Series. They are going to perform the piece again on Saturday in York, Pennsylvania. Below is a YouTube video of the 1/25 performance  (the first I’m aware of that features one of my compositions).

From Bora Yoon's "Weights and Balances." Photo: Julia Frodahl

Many of us waited with bated breath during the recent breakdown of talks between management and the orchestra at NYC Opera. Even though the season is proceeding, the company’s plan to keep themselves afloat (if not artistically viable) seems dubious at best. No music director, draconian cuts for the players and chorus, and no base of operations. Instead NYCO will present a truncated season at several venues. After hearing how shabbily the company has treated its employees – while George Steel continues to make in excess of $300,000 – why would they expect their audience to follow them around town? It portends difficult days to come for opera – and opera goers – in the city. Take nothing away from the Metropolitan (although its recent conductor troubles are noteworthy): but a city with New York’s operatic history would seem to have room for more than one major company.

Fortunately, as Zachary Woolfe points out in a recent excellent article in the NY Times, several smaller companies are attempting to fill the void left by City Opera’s vicissitudes. Opera Omnia, Gotham Chamber Opera, DiCapo Opera, and others are making it possible to hear a plethora of works from the repertoire that are unlikely to be programmed any time soon, either at the Met or languishing NYCO: baroque gems, less known Mozart, neglected bel canto, and the like. The remaining challenge, and it’s a daunting one, is to nurture operas by living composers.

To further the efforts of those working towards that end, three longtime champions of contemporary works – HERE’s Kim Whitener and Artistic Director Kristin Marting and Beth Morrison of Beth Morrison Projects (BMP) – have recently announced a promising new venture. Prototype: Opera/Theatre/Now, a festival that they plan to be an annual event, debuts in January 2013.

Unlike NYCO, Prototype will have a single performance venue, HERE’s space in Soho, for which they will try to build an audience. And, also unlike City Opera, the festival, with steady hands at the rudder, will pursue a coherent artistic vision, presenting chamber operas in the contemporary classical/post-classical vein. Some of the names being mentioned as participants in the Prototypes‘s initial presentations should be familiar to those who’ve attended recent editions of VOX: David T. Little, Byron Au Yong, and Bora Yoon.

Dare we hope for an open call for proposals for new chamber operas? More information about Prototype as it’s available.

In her recital at Columbia University on Wednesday, organist Gail Archer is premiering a new composition by Sequenza 21 friend Hayes Biggs. His Three Hymn Tune Preludes use stirring material for their inspiration: He Leadeth Me! O Blessed Thought, Be Thou My Vision, and Eternal Father, Strong to Save.

The recital is the first of Archer’s ”An American Idyll” programs that occur throughout the city during 2012. Their focus is American repertoire, including many neglected and under-performed pieces. Now that’s an “Idyll” we can all vote for!

An American Idyll

I’ve finally taken the plunge and decided to offer some of my recordings on Bandcamp. The Gilgamesh EP includes incidental music from Immortal: the Gilgamesh Variations, a 2011 adaptation of the Epic of Gilgamesh, produced at the Bushwick Starr in Brooklyn. I made the score using electronics, prepared piano, piano, voices, and percussion. It was great fun to hear my music as part of a play, albeit on tape.

The next step for the Gilgamesh project: creating a concert suite from the score for live instruments. On August 24 at Riverside Church in New York, Locrian Chamber Players is going to premiere Gilgamesh Suite, a newly composed work based on selections from the incidental music. Written to celebrate the 2012 Cage centenary, its touchstone work is “Sonatas and Interludes.” The score, written for the entire Locrian cohort, will feature prepared piano, harp, and string quartet.

You can stream all of the tracks on the EP at Bandcamp and the bonus track “Duo” is available for free download. But, if you are so inclined to buy the EP (name your price), all of the proceeds will go towards funding the Gilgamesh Suite project. Hope you enjoy!

Please join us for the Federal Hill Parlor Series’ January Open House: the enormity of small things.

Featured Performers:
Lydia Beasley, Soprano
Megan Ihnen, Mezzo-Soprano
Joe Kneer, Violin

Jordan Faye Contemporary Gallery
1401 Light St
Federal Hill
Baltimore, USA

Featured Composers:

Josh Bornfield
Doug Buchanan
Christian Carey
Vaughan-Williams ‘Along the Field’
Gustav Holst ’4 Sacred Songs’
David Lang ‘I had no reason’

Tickets available online (recommended) and at the door: $20.00.
Please also take a moment to thank our contributing composers by making a donation to the Composers Fund while purchasing your tickets.

Tickets can be purchased/donations can be made here.

Even if you are not able to make it to this performance, please consider making a donation to the Composers Fund so that the Parlor Series may continue to bring new and important contemporary works to our guests.

Program note for piece by Christian Carey:

I enjoy working with unconventional combinations. I’ve composed a number of pieces in recent years for solo voice and solo string player. The W.B. Yeats poem “He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven” was one of the readings that my wife and I selected for our wedding ceremony. For our first anniversary, I created this setting for vocalist and string instrument. The inscription on the score’s title page reads:

-Christian Carey