Contemporary Classical

Click Picks, Composers, Contemporary Classical

Steve’s click picks #39

Our regular listen to and look at living, breathing musicians that you may not know yet, but I know you should… And can, right here and now, since they’re nice enough to offer so much good listening online:

Strange and intimate places via Myspace

Rather than go in-depth on one or two musicians, we’re going to play epicurean. The back-stories and other works of each of these musicians may (or sometimes, may not) be found easily enough with a few clicks around; I’ll leave that up to you. Right now, it doesn’t matter; I only want to lead you to a specific track on their individual Myspace pages, tracks that keep echoing around in my mind long after the first encounter.

None of these are truly “classical”; yet none are quite pop, jazz, etc. etc… they all inhabit the cracks in between, with no apologies or justifications other than that they exist. They’re also each one “intimate”. By that I mean we feel a kind of “beside-ness” with the artist, drawn into their space rather than simply presented to. Simple or complex, across all cultures, that drawing-in is one of the greatest achievments of any art. So simply find the suggested title on the flash player on each page, click and listen, and see where each leads you.

10-D PJ  (UK)  “My tears are for you” — Exquisite mix, match & mash of completely different Asian-and-otherwise recordings, creating some entirely new place in the world.

Charles Reix  (Montréal) “Contemplation” — Brilliantly dark, serpentine duo for shakuhachi and ‘cello.

Thomas Leer  (Scotland)  “Blood of a Poet” — The voice of Charles Bukowski, placed just so into the perfect “frame”.

Sylvain Chauveau and Felicia Atkinson (France)  “How the Light” — The simplest of songs: a few chords and figures, no sung melody. Yet a completely absorbing emotional “space”.

Olivia De Prato  (Wien-Venezia-NYC)  “Ageha Tokyo” — Over and over, a nervously unstable play of string and electronics suddenly refracts into hopefully radiant textures.

Samson Young[Update: Due to the flaky options Myspace offers for putting anything other than pop songs on the site, I passed over the tiny bit that tells me that “Ageha Tokyo” is actually a piece by the composer Samson Young (Hong Kong, but currently finishing his study at Princeton). A wonderful piece nonetheless, and Olivia’s is a fine performance. Samson’s own website, with much more information and listening is at http://www.samsonyoung.com/.]

Maxim Moston (Moscow-NYC)  “Myrtle Blue” — A solo guitar, with just a few chords, out-Harold-Budds even Harold Budd.

by Steve Layton
Classical Music, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Opera, San Francisco

APPOMATTOX: The War Within

[youtube]6J14flyMOQo[/youtube] 

Human behavior’s funny. The more we try to change the more we don’t seem able to. Are we cursed to repeat the same mistakes in our private lives — with lovers, friends — as well as in our public ones? Are we genetically condemned to disjunction, discord, and war, like Sisyphus trying to keep that enormous rock from crushing him each day? Philip Glass’ SF Opera commission, APPOMATTOX, which world premiered 5 October, and which I caught 16 October, seems to accept these things as givens. Its ostensible subject is Robert E. Lee’s surrender to U.S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on 9 April 1865, and its subsequent impact. But its central question seems to be how can we change history if we can’t even change ourselves?   

These are weighty questions, and Glass’ music addresses them with seriousness and point. The opening figure for double basses and wind mixtures is immediately affecting. Then Julia Dent Grant (soprano Rhoslyn Jones) emerges from a backlit alcove in Riccardo Hernandez’s umbrous metal set, her posture contained, “The spring campaign ___  In four short years I have grown to dread those words … ”  She joins four other women — Mary Custis Lee (soprano Elza van den Heever), her daughter Julia Agnes (soprano Ji Young Yang), Mary Todd Lincoln (soprano Heidi Melton), and her black seamstress Elizabeth Keckley (mezzo Kendall Gladen) — in an almost Baroque lament on the sorrows of war — ” never before has so much blood been drained … Let this be the last time.. ” The women who stand behind their men and keep it all together are, of course, the unsung heroines of any war, and Glass’ immediate focus on them, signals this piece’s unwavering depth.

(more…)

by Michael McDonagh
Classical Music, Contemporary Classical, Critics

The Norman Conquests

Norman Lebrecht is an entertaining writer who has never let the facts get in the way of a good story.  Come to think of it, he may have been the world’s first blogger–he adopted the sloppy research habit before blogs were even invented.  For years, he’s been planting verbal IEDs along the classical music highway, wiping out entire convoys of evildoers and occasionally fragging some innocent bystanders in the process.  So, it is with some smugness that one is able to report this morning, or the New York Times is able to report, that Stormin’ Norman has had a bit of a comeuppance.  The Brtisih publisher of his latest missle–Maestros, Masterpieces & Madness: The Secret Life and Shameful Death of the Classical Record Industry–has agreed to recall and destroy the book and apologize to Naxos Records Founder Klaus Heymann. 

Heymann had filed suit against Lebrecht for “accusing him of serious business malpractices” and for at least 15 errors of fact.  Penguin agreed to settle rather than go to court. 

For a much more reliable portrait of Heymann and his role as an internet music pioneer, see Alex Ross in this week’s New Yorker.

by Jerry Bowles
Contemporary Classical, Microtonalism

Microtonal Train Wreck of the Super Cheese Wiz’s

In the interest of furthering dialog between our 12ET brethren and our more flavorful microtonalist artists I present this provocative YouTube recording of America’s favorite band, Van Halen attempting to close a set with their signature cheeseburger – Jump.
The backstage sound guy accidentally plays the synth opening at 48K rather than 44.1 causing a 1.5 semitone tonal conflict to occur. Eddie and the crew attempt to roll with the microtonal noise but no… it is not meant to be. Somehow I believe new music’s brilliant microtonalist/guitarist Neil Haverstick could have done a lot better.

[youtube]Mjx_GjyXCs4[/youtube]

by Jeff Harrington
Contemporary Classical

The Sequenza21 Wiki Needs Your Help

As many of you know, we also run a new music wiki here. It’s got lots of user-created content, links to very cool MP3 files through our Listening Room and a lot of lists of performers, and opportunities. Recently we’ve come under attack, not from SpamBots but from a new type of bot which seemingly means only to destroy wikis. We’re not the only one being attacked, but it has seemingly focussed a great deal of attention on our little homebrew music information site.

If you check out the Recent Changes you’ll see auto-generated usernames and very slight random text modifications to a bunch of articles, maybe your article. It’d be really cool if we could get the wiki cleaned up, but for that to happen, it’ll require a few more worker bees than me and David Toub. Please give it a look if you can and remove the random texts. They seem to only preface articles with obviously unreadable words.

And if you haven’t written an article about your favorite contemporary composer, performer and musical technique please add to our wonderful collection of articles. For those that don’t know, the wiki gets a lot of traffic. And please read the Getting Started page before you start writing. We insist that composer pages be not merely self-promoting, but informative. Thanks!!

by Jeff Harrington
Contemporary Classical

Last Night in L.A.: Enjoying Kraft

It’s a pretty short list when you try to name the persons who have really affected and changed musical life in Los Angeles.  There are many who brought fame to L.A., and there are several who became famous through Los Angeles.  But fame is much easier than impact and change.  Bill Kraft is one of that short list.  He was a member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 26 years, 18 of which were as Principal Timpanist.  As conductors and administrators worked with the orchestra to make it a more stellar ensemble and to bring vitality to contemporary music, Bill Kraft was a leader from within the orchestra.  He was founder and director of the Phil’s New Music Group, instrumental in getting that started and recognized.  He was the Phil’s composer in residence for four years.  He was a soloist.  He was a performer.  He was a director.  He was a teacher.  He was and is a composer.

Last night Southwest Chamber Music opened their series with the first concert devoted to the music of William Kraft.  They had initially programmed seven (7) of Kraft’s “Encounters”, but found that rearranging percussion for each piece (with one exception) took a little too much time.  As a result, their plan for two “Encounters” concerts now looks like at least three, stretching into next season.  I’m one of the many fans of Kraft, so as far as I’m concerned, the more concerts the better.

The concert comprised “Encounters” from the late 1960s and the 1970s.  This period includes the only “Encounter” that lacks percussion; interestingly, it may have been the first “Encounter” written.  Encounters I: Soliloquy (1975) is for percussion with tape.  While Bill writes for percussion, he puts tuned percussion at the center of so many of his works.  Often the instruments are the timpani, but in Encounters I (and through much of the evening) the major instrument was the vibraphone.  The work was done on commission for a performer who wanted a work to take on travel appearances; the vibraphone was selected because Kraft was able to work with a full range of techniques to color and shape the tones.  Ricardo Gallardo, leader of the percussion group “Tambuco“, was soloist and did a lovely job with a work that seems to require a person with three arms to handle the bows and the mallets. 

Encounters II (1966) is for solo tuba.  It was composed for and with the great tubaist Roger Bobo, for so many years a vital part of the Phil as well as soloist and recording artist.  Bobo and Kraft wrote a work showing off the musical range of the instrument and changing its sound color through a variety of techniques, including singing while playing.  The soloist was Zach Collins, who will receive his doctorate in tuba from USC this December.  [Yes, I know that the degree is actually in music performance; I enjoy thinking of someone with a tuba doctorate.]

Encounters III: Duel for Trumpet and Percussion (1972) had trumpeter Thomas Stevens as commissioner and collaborator, and it was performed well last night by Tony Ellis.  Lynn Vartan, the percussionist of Southwest Chamber, was the rival, and victor, in the contest.  Kraft spoke to the audience about his tendency to write music in which percussion wins, and he related how after one performance of this piece the trumpeter slowly left stage with his final diminuendo to return to stage waving a white handkerchief. 

After intermission they presented Encounters VII:  Blessed Are The Peacemakers: For They Shall Be Called the Children of God (1978) for speaker and two percussionists.  Miguel Gonzalez of “Tambuco” joined Vartan in this attractive work that emphasizes the ability of percussion to make melody.  The narrative elements, fortunately short, include quotations from religious texts and from secular poetry.  The conclusion of the concert was Encounters VI: Concertino for Roto Toms and Percussion Quartet (1976).  Vartan was joined by the “Tambuco” quartet in a good performance.  It’s the only work I’ve ever heard with eight (8) bows getting notes from the vibraphone simultaneously.  It’s a rare sound.

It was almost a sell-out at Zipper Hall last night, an audience of close to 300.  We stood and applauded to bring Bill Kraft out again and again.  I think the audience was as pleased as the performers and the composer.

by JerryZ
Composers, Contemporary Classical

Music From the Heart

Americans like to sit on their hands. Even when they’re telling the truth you have to worry. Are you trying to take something from me, steal my identity, assault my assiduously guarded self-image? I may be feeling something, but you’ll have to read between the lines. God forbid I should tell you what and why, and if I do it will likely be too late. These curious thoughts came to mind when I caught Lebanese oud master-composer-singer Marcel Khalife and his ensemble for the second time — the first was at New York’s Town Hall in 2004 — at San Francisco’s Herbst Theater.

Why? Because Khalife’s music goes straight to the heart, and never holds back, much less apologize for what it feels. Which isn’t to downplay its appeal to the mind. But its principal goal is to connect with the heart, and hearts and minds and bodies were certainly reached in this concert. Artists are people, after all, and wouldn’t you rather spend time with someone who can express than with someone who can’t? 

The American media likes to portray Arabs as unlettered savages, but that’s hardly the truth. Arabic music, after all, is one of the oldest, richest traditions on the planet, and Khalife has devoted his life to expanding and deepening these traditions. With about 80 maqamat, or scale /modes, this music is complex, sophisticated, and highly expressive. Khalife drew on these riches in his latest nearly hour long ensemble piece, Taqasim, where he was joined by his son, Bachar, on Arabic percussion, and guest bassist Mark Helias. Taqasim means improvisation, and this three-part piece is an instrumental evocation of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish’s work, which Khalife has set many times. It centers on the mid-lower range of the oud, and bass, with discreet, but colorful contributions from Arabic percussion like riqq ( tambourine ), and assorted drums. Lines coalesce and vanish, drones give way to unisons, the bass is sometimes played like a drum. The dream of Al-Andalus comes and goes.                   

Another, perhaps pan-Arabic, dream also seemed to be conjured, in further largely Darwish settings, which Khalife sang on the second half of the program — the primeval My Mother, with its wonderfully built contributions from Khalife’s other son, Rami, on piano, and the very famous Passport,  which had an even more brilliantly structured and stylistically varied solo from him. The nearly packed house was also big on audience participation — a Khalife concert specialty —  and yet another indication that Arabs aren’t wont to sit on their hands.  I Walk (lyric, Samih el-Qassim ), which is a kind of hymn of defiance and solidarity, got a call and response treatment from the balcony and main floor, while the closing O Fisherman, Haila, Haila ( lyrics by Khalife’s Al-Mayadine ensemble ), had a thick driving intensity from piano — hammered chords — Khalife pere, Helias, and Bachar Khalife’s Arabic bass drum.

We in the West like to think that music is principally melody and harmony, though its wellspring has always been rhythm, which is something that Arabic music has never forgotten. Western musicians — and especially American ones — can learn lots from this music. And it isn’t afraid to communicate, and touch the heart, on the deepest possible level. Khalife is the first Arab to ever win the UNESCO Artist For Peace Award, and it’s easy to see why.His San Francisco stop is but one of many on his Taqasim Tour. 

Michael McDonagh is a San Francisco-based poet and writer on the arts, whose poems have appeared in several places, including Stanford’s Mantis 3: Poetry and Performance, which ran 3 of the 6 poems Lisa Scola Prosek set as the song cycle, Miniature Portraits. He has done two poem-picture books with SF-based painter Gary Bukovnik, and has wriitten 2 pieces for the theatre — Touch and Go,and Sight Unseen.  McDonagh is a staff writer on the arts for the SF-based BAY AREA REPORTER. He is the sole writer for www.alexnorthmusic.com; and contributes to www.classical-music-review.org, www.21st-centurymusic.com; New Music Connoisseur; and www.sfcv.org.

by Michael McDonagh
Contemporary Classical

The New Season in L.A.: Pt. 3, Around Town

In this final piece on most prominent of the organizations that do noticeable programming of contemporary or near-contemporary music, I’ll deal with a variety of activities around the city. 

Perhaps the most consistently interesting programming in Los Angeles is put together by Jacaranda.  As implied by their subhead, “music on the edge of Santa Monica”, their programs do much more than give service to the idea that music is actually written and worthy today.  (Yes, their performances are held within walking distance of the ocean.)  This season they begin the first of two seasons focusing on the music of Olivier Messiaen, commemorating the centary of his birth in 1908.  The first of the Jacaranda concerts, in two weeks, will include the performance of works by William Bolcom and Joan Tower that fairly directly invoke Messiaen, plus works by Elliott Carter and Steve Reich that offer indirect associations.  Read their brochure.  Season tickets for eight great programs are only $190.

I don’t subscribe to the Los Angeles Master Chorale because I can only take a little religious music in secular concerts without becoming tone deaf, and this makes half of the LAMC’s concerts pretty unappealing to me.  But, oh, that other half! Their November concert includes the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra in the premiere of Louis Andriessen’s The City of Dis plus God Protect Us From War by the Estonian Veljo Tormis whose work is new to me.  The April concert programs Gorecki’s Five Marian Songs.  The early May concert is entirely contmporary, with works by Gorecki, Morten Lauridsen, Salonen, Stucky, Judith Weir, Eric Whitacre, and the premiere of a work by David O.  The mid-May concert of opera music includes the premiere of a choral concert suite from The Grapes of Wrath by Ricky Ian Gordon.  Even the Christmas concert comprises music and arrangements by contemporary composers.

The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra includes a contemporary work in almost half of their programs, and they are active in promoting commissions of new music in a program enabling small donors to participate in commissions.  It’s a model of a program.  Pacific Serenades, a chamber group, seems to include the premiere of a new work in each of their concerts in a season, giving each program in three venues:  one in Westwood, one in Pasadena, and one in a private home; season tickets are approximately $25 a concert.  Their concerts seem to use the contemporary work as the spread in a sandwich between works of 18th and 19th century composers, which is a little more conventional than I like.  But their list of premieres includes composers whose music I admire, and their site includes clips of several of the works.

REDCAT, the CalArts output in Walt Disney Concert Hall, provides an active music program edging to the avant garde.  The major concert this fall will be in less than a week with California EAR Ensemble performing Andriessen’s Dubbelspoor plus works by Liza Lim, Franco Donatoni, and Raphaele Biston, whose work is new enough to avoid references to him in Google.  The music program for the fall and winter is pretty adventurous, and it’s fun.  CalArts also sends out regular emails of events at their campus in Valencia.

UCLALive, which has a great program of performances for theatre and dance, serving as the West Coast equivalent to BAM, comes close to ignoring contemporary music except for a few rare performers who have gained name recognition and whose music might have been described favorably in the New York Times (e.g., Kronos, Bang on a Can).  The music programming is no more adventurous than the attitudes and positions of the speakers they bring in.

The Thornton School of Music at USC has a great program for the student audience, mostly by student performers.  The calendar of events includes some programs that would really be worth going to.  Noteworthy this fall is their Contemporary Music Ensemble, conducted by Donald Crockett, performing Stephen Hartke’s Sons of Noah.

Too many events, too little money and time!

by JerryZ