…what would you do? Okay, you get as long as you want to write the piece, but it can only last 30″. That’s the concept behind the Microscores Project, which started at CalArts and has performed all over the place. Over the years, they’ve garnered some fascinating pieces by folks like Harold Budd and Pauline Oliveros (who wrote hers on a plane). Just before he died, James Tenney wrote them a gorgeous bagatelle. As part of their appearance at ARTSaha! 2008, the Microscores Project are putting out a call for new music. Anyone can send them a score for violin and
Read moreI’ll go first. Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, Sandstone (W.Va.) High School Gymnasium. 1959. Bill was pissed because the total gate was less than $200 but he was there with musicians and once he started to play the money thing disappeared. All the great ones: “Uncle Pen,” “Footprints in the Snow,” “Little Maggie,” “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” “Molly and Tenbrooks,” “In the Pines.” Update 1: Stop me if you’ve heard this one. I saw Charlie Mingus play one night at the Five Spot Cafe in 1963. First day of the first time I was ever in New York.
Read moreInstitute & Festival for Contemporary Performance Marc Ponthus, Founder/director JUNE 10-17, 2008 www.mannes.edu/ifcp 212.580-0210 ext 4884 • MONDAY, JUNE 16 All-CARTER 7:30 conversation: the relationship between Carter & Speculum Musicae 8:00 – Music of Elliott Carter – program 2 Speculum Musicae Elizabeth Farnum, soprano Program to include “A Mirror On Which To Dwell’ (1975 – Speculum Musicae Commission), ‘Figment lll’ (2007 – Written for Speculum Musicae bassist Don Palma), ‘Oboe Quartet’(2001) and the ‘Sonata for Flute, Oboe, Cello and Harpsichord (1952) • TUESDAY, JUNE 17 Music by APERGHIS and CARTER; Performed by IFCP Institute participants.
Read moreCheck this out. (Be patient, it doesn’t really get good until 1:10) [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmfHHLfbjNQ[/youtube] This is a remix of Radiohead’s song “Nude” from their recent album “In Rainbows.” Radiohead held a remix contest, selling the individual tracks of the song on iTunes, and this was one of the results. Here’s the instrumentation, as listed by remixer James Houston on the YouTube description: Sinclair ZX Spectrum – Guitars (rhythm & lead) Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer – Drums HP Scanjet 3c – Bass Guitar Hard Drive array – Act as a collection of bad speakers – Vocals & FX And as you
Read moreThis Ojai Music Festival season was one of those to remember. When the low point is a screening of a Chaplin film with live orchestra, that means that the high points are pretty consistently high. And they were, this season. No full-sized orchestra, spilling out the bounds of the stage, but quantity of performers can’t hold a candle to quality. Saturday night’s concert continued the Festival’s subtheme of music for voice with two works from composers new to Ojai, Phillippe Manoury and Michael Jarrell, selected by David Robertson. The Jarrell work, Cassandre (1994) was termed by Manoury a “spoken opera,”
Read moreWatch this video and tell me you don’t think that this will fundamentally change music, pretty much all genres, the day after it comes out (September). [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3SsYQrgcyA[/youtube] http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/06/moog-unveils-ba.html
Read moreCharles Wuorinen, who turns seventy today, has been commissioned by New York City Opera to compose an opera based on Annie Proulx’s short story Brokeback Mountain. It is scheduled to be produced in 2013. Happy Birthday CW! http://pressroom.nycopera.com/pr/nycopera/news/_prv-BrokebackMountain.aspx
Read moreAmong the cats who know great charts, the names Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan are magic. Eddie exited a long time ago; Bill, just last week. [youtube]87_iN2xW6Ks[/youtube]
Read moreSaturday afternoon, already. We’re half-way through this year’s Ojai Music Festival, and I need some time-shifter to slow things down. Today’s mid-day concert was superb. Dawn Upshaw, but that’s redundant. It was a lovely program. Each song, seemingly, gave her a different opportunity to tell a story. Anyone there could pick a different set of highlights. My own included a simple, beautiful song by Ruth Crawford Seeger of a lyric by Carl Sandburg, “White Moon”. But then an absolute highlight came with the last set: a French song by Kurt Weill and three cabaret songs by William Bolcom. For each
Read moreI move that the role of Al Gore be essayed by the entire La Scala Opera Chorus! Wait . . . no: Anna Netrebko–who wouldn’t drive a Prius for her? . . . No–I got it now: a dancer on stage who doesn’t sing! (ala Death in Venice) . . . hmm, but maybe that’s how “Global Warming” should be portrayed. Heck, I don’t know. But there better be a horse in this damn thing, ‘else I’m not going!
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