Contemporary Classical

Chamber Music, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Interviews, Music Instruments, New York, Percussion, Performers, Podcasts

My Ears Are Open. This week on the podcast: Alex Lipowski

It’s hard to imagine a percussionist that you would want to perform your music more than Alex Lipowski. Alex has a passion for the new, the challenging and the unusual and I find him to be one of the most inspirational musicians I’ve ever met. He spent much of our time together explaining how important it is to take risks and to find new and innovative sounds — good advice. You can see Alex and the Talea Ensemble on April 28 at the Players Theatre, 115 Macdougal Street, NYC. Looking ahead, there will be three episodes in May and I’ll be devoting the

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by James Holt
Contemporary Classical

Festivals, etc.

The spring festivals are underway; here are three you should know about. 1)  In Boston, the new Beeline Festival (curated by Evan Ziporyn and Christine Southworth) continues tonight with performances by Ensemble Robot and The Loud Objects.  The final concert will be Sunday, with performances by Gamelan Galak Tika and Dewa Ketut Alit.  With Beeline it seems that Boston finally has a new music festival with more of a Downtown slant. 2)  Tonight in Brooklyn, the first annual New Music Bake Sale runs from 7PM to midnight, featuring music from So Percussion, Lisa Moore & Martin Bresnick, Lukas Ligeti, Newspeak, ACME,

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by Galen H. Brown
Broadcast, Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Music Events, New York, Performers, Video

Trance Talking

Michael Gordon‘s huge and hugely wonderful, 50+ minute riff- and throb-fest Trance, composed in 1995, is being dusted off for what promises to be a memorable performance by the ensemble Signal, 7:30pm April 22nd at Le Poisson Rouge. The fun and games begin at 6:30 pre-concert in the bar, however; Gordon himself, along with Ronen Givony (from Wordless Music and Le Poisson), Signal director Brad Lubman, bandmate/composer Ken Thomson (who also does duty in Gutbucket) and others, will talk about producing and performing new works with emphasis on the whys and whats of a piece after their first presentation. Trance was premiered

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by Steve Layton
Contemporary Classical

Well, that’s certainly a new one!

From the Ojai Music Festival blog comes word of the latest twist on an old scam: We can’t really believe that this is happening. Last week, someone started calling the offices claiming to be Steven Mackey – the great American composer, and featured performer on the 2009 OMF lineup. His story was pretty complicated, but the gist of it was this: poor fellow got stuck in Jamacia over spring break, and now needs our producer to wire him money to get home. Our producer works remotely for most of the year, so after speaking with “Steven,” we called her. She

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by Steve Layton
CDs, Contemporary Classical, File Under?, Music Events, Recordings

Countdown to Record Store Day!

April 18, 2009 is National Record Store Day. Despite the embattled state of the “brick and mortar” retail record business, dozens of shops are planning a host of events, including in-store performances, giveaways, and the sale special products (including limited edition 7” vinyl singles) to celebrate the day. A website has been set up, listing participating stores and events occurring on the 18th. Last year, Kay and I had a grand time on Record Store Day in New Jersey, visiting Vintage Vinyl, Princeton Record Exchange, and Jack’s. This year, we’re planning to check out the aforementioned, plus Sound Station in

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by Christian Carey
Contemporary Classical

The Salonen Count-Down: … 2 …

Last night Salonen conducted the premiere of his new Violin Concerto, performed by Leila Josefowicz. You can be sure there’s a lot of advance buzz about a piece when the Wall Street Journal publishes an essay about the soloist of a piece of classical music; unfortunately, much of the WSJ is protected by a subscription-only wall, but here’s the link in case you are willing to try. The work was initially scheduled for premiere back in January when Salonen conducted the Chicago Symphony, but it wasn’t ready and he substituted performance of the new Los Angeles Symphony (No. 4) by

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by JerryZ
Contemporary Classical

The Salonen Count-Down: 3 …

The days dwindle down. For April we had only three remaining programs conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen as music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and after last night only two programs remain. Last night’s Green Umbrella concert gave us a look forward, plus just a touch of reminiscence. There could well have been a concert of Salonen’s works, but a retrospective of the man as composer (and as engine for the Green Umbrella series) can wait for a future year and a future visit. Instead, the program was a beautifully selected set of four world premieres by composers new to

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by JerryZ
Composers, Contemporary Classical, File Under?, Scores, Uncategorized

NMC’s Twentieth Anniversary present: A Boxed Set of Songs

  English imprint NMC is celebrating its twentieth anniversary with a special 4-disc CD boxed set. NMC Songbook features vocal music by a number of the UK’s finest and most prominent contemporary composers: Birtwistle, Davies, Weir, Goehr, Finnissy, Bryars, Harvey, Turnage, and many, many more. These are interspersed with galliards by British Renaissance composer Thomas Morley, arranged for modern forces by Colin Matthews. For those who’d like to perform some of this repertoire, it’s available for download at  Sheet Music Direct. Featuring both composers associated with vocal music and those for whom song is a comparatively rare venture, the songbook

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by Christian Carey
Bang on a Can, Boston, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Interviews, Performers, Podcasts

My Ears Are Open. This week: Evan Ziporyn

First, a quick introduction and thank you are in order.  My name is James Holt and I am a composer living in New York.  I started a podcast where I interview musicians specializing in performing contemporary music, and I ask them about their experiences with composers.  Simple. I want to thank Sequenza21 for inviting me to come on the site every couple weeks as a recurring feature to tell you about the new episodes. This week is my interview with Evan Ziporyn…I’m sure that he’s someone who needs no introduction to most of the s21 audience, but just in case:

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by James Holt
Contemporary Classical, Scores

death of a music store

According to the FB post of composer Lanie Fefferman, Patelson’s Music Store in NYC is closing as of 4/18. I’m assuming this is not a faux rumor, and if I’m creating a false run on Patelson’s inventory, I apologize. Anyway, many of us grew up in a time where including a trip to Patelson’s, even if just for browsing scores, was de rigeur anytime we were in Manhattan. I’d go there all the time from NJ, and back in the 70’s and early 80’s, it wasn’t too expensive to purchase a score or two, some violin music, some notation paper

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by David Toub