Composer pal (and one of the selected composers on our second Sequenza21-sponsored concert a few years ago) Jeremy Podgursky has been busying-it-up in the Hoosier State for a while around Indiana University, and one of the fruits of that labor is happening this week: Holographic is a new series devoted to presenting contemporary music outside the confines of the Jacobs School of Music, taking new sounds to greater Bloomington and maybe even beyond. The first two concerts (music by Jacob Druckman, John Gibson, Amy Kirsten, Alex Mincek, John Orfe and Sam Pluta) are happening this Thursday, March 8 at 8:00pm
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Commissions, Competitions, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Contests, Hilary Hahn, Interviews, Violin
Next up in Hilary Hahn‘s chats with the composers writing for her 27 Pieces: the Hilary Hahn Encores!, it’s New Zealand composer Gillian Whitehead. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J7OdgRJegs[/youtube] And composers, don’t forget that the 27th encore slot is still open until March 15th, and it could be you! So tusches off seats, fire up your Finale & Adobe, but get cracking!
Read more2011 was an great year for freelance composer/cellist/conductor Peri Mauer. Premiere performances of her work this past year included her trio AFTERWORDS, for clarinet, cello, and piano; BLOGARHYTHM: Scenes 1 & 2 for 24-piece chamber ensemble (which she also conducted) RHAPSODANCE, for clarinet and piano; BLOGARHYTHM ON THE ROCKS, for chamber ensemble, as part of Make Music New York 2011 in Central Park in June; and MORNING IN A MINUTE, in the Vox Novus Concert Series at Jan Hus Church in October. In 2011 her music was heard on the radio for the first time as well. Just this past
Read moreHilary Hahn is at it again, working her way through chats with all of the composers commissioned for her “In 27 Pieces” collection of encores. This time up it’s a bright, young up-and-comer by the name of Jennifer Higdon (OK, maybe not quite so young, and maybe she’s pretty much arrived, but she’s still pretty darn bright!) [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pu7PewnFGxo[/youtube]
Read moreS21’s intrepid reporter-in-the-field (oh yeah, and superstar violinist, too!) Hilary Hahn just happened to virtually bump into the dean of (very young) American composers, Nico Muhly. …Well, maybe there was a little advanced planning, but let’s keep this casual, shall we? Here they muck-de-muck for a friendly quarter-hour, about the musical life and the pieces Nico’s composed for Hilary. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IBk_U6b2Hw[/youtube]
Read more[Ed. Note: Please welcome composer (and long-time S21 supporter) Dennis Bathory-Kitsz, and sit back as he spins a tale for the ages (and yet all quite true!), of how he managed to conceive, write, and finally produce his very own opera in the (semi) wilds of Vermont.] In the past week I’ve received emails from other composers, many of whom had doubted that my opera Erzsébet would ever be mounted. After two decades of promises, nearly two years of faltering fundraising, three directors, and a flood that pushed us out of our home, opening night seemed distant and dim. How
Read moreWe’ve profiled and interviewed composer Michael Hersch before here at S21. Unlike a lot of composers who lineage and influences I get pretty easily, In Hersch’s case there’s something coming from a place that I don’t get. And I tell you now, that’s a good thing. There isn’t a big grab bag of the latest tricks and fashions; the style could almost be called traditionalist. Yet there’s something at work that is so “interior”, an almost hermetic voice that owes nothing to anyone but the composer himself, that makes for a slightly unsettling but endlessly fascinating listen. And tonight, for
Read more[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/29161015[/vimeo] About to turn the ripe old age of 8, Matt McBane‘s crazy idea of a 20-something composer/performer creating an annual new-music festival in a bump in the road north of San Diego has not only survived but thrived. Something about a last late-summer outing, to an idyllic village parked right at a Pacific beach, seems to consistently draw a crowd from both Los Angeles to the north and San Diego to the south for this three-day affair. And, well, maybe it’s just a little about the music, too… Excellent string quartets, pianists and ensembles mix it up with rock
Read moreOn an Overgrown Path‘s Bob Shingleton gives an intriguing sketch of the Vietnamese composer Ton-That Tiêt (b. 1933), well worth exploring. A small interview with the composer is here.
Read moreMany instruments have their 99-cent toy counterpart: tiny play trumpets, cheap plastic recorders, pint-sized accordions, even mini drum-kits with cymbals the size of espresso saucers. But it’s only the toy piano that has graduated to the big leagues, with an large and diverse repertoire and even a dedicated group of high-caliber performers to boost its status. I really think this all came about from two sources: John Cage‘s modest 1948 Suite for Toy Piano, and the instrument’s inclusion in George Crumb‘s highly influential Ancient Voices of Children (1970). Both of these works had (and still have) a certain vogue; pianos
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