Festivals

Classical Music, Composers, Conductors, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?, Interviews, Orchestras

Interview: Julia Adolphe

This week, The New York Philharmonic premieres their second commission by composer Julia Adolphe. The first, 2016’s Unearth, Release, was a warmly received viola concerto for Philharmonic Principal Violist Cynthia Phelps. The latest, White Stone, will be premiered July 26th as part of the orchestra’s Bravo! Vail series in Colorado. I recently had a chance to catch up with Adolphe about both of these collaborations, as well as her opera Sylvia.    Who were/are your composition mentors at Cornell and USC? What is something that you’ve learned from each?   I’ve had two incredible mentors who’ve inspired me to become a composer. The first was Steven Stucky, who gave me private

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by Christian Carey
Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?, Improv, Interviews

Interview with Robert Morris

On September 15-18 at Spectrum, Collide-O-Scope Music begins its eighth season with a Festival celebrating the music of Robert Morris. A wide range of works will be featured, for electronics, piano, small chamber ensemble, and string quartet. In addition to Collide-O-Scope personnel, there will be guest performers, notably JACK Quartet. I recently interviewed Morris about the upcoming concerts: our exchange follows. How did this Festival of your music come about?   Out of the blue, on April 20, 2015, I received an email from Augustus Arnone proposing this festival of my music, complete with ideas for international outreach that drew

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by Christian Carey
Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?

Sunday Morning at Tanglewood’s FCM

The Sunday concert at Tanglewood’s Festival of Contemporary Music is always something of a marathon. It starts at 10 AM and is chock full of offerings that usually challenge the ear as much as tantalize it. The Sunday concert has traditionally also been the one that tests the capacities of the TMC Fellows most thoroughly. This year was no exception, although it was a horse race between Sunday’s chamber music concert and Monday’s presentation of Messiaen’s formidable Turungalila-Symphonie, a work that vibrated and thundered with intensity, shaped with eminently detailed care by conductor Stefan Asbury.   Ander’s Hillborg’s Brass Quintet

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by Christian Carey
Classical Music, Composers, Concert review, Concerts, Conferences, Contemporary Classical, Downtown, Electro-Acoustic, Events, Experimental Music, Festivals, Lectures, Media, Music Events, New York, Percussion, Performers, Sound Art, Strange, Twentieth Century Composer, Women composers

The New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival (NYCEMF) takes Manhattan

Most New Yorkers are walking about, minding their own business, completely oblivious to the international sonic earthquake vibrating through their midst all week: The New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival (NYCEMF). The first wave of the festival (seven concerts) took place as part of the New York Philharmonic’s Biennial at National Sawdust in Brooklyn last week. Yet the lion’s share of the festival is happening right now: 28 more concerts during June 13-19, at Abrons Arts Center on Grand St., for a total of 35 concerts. Yes you read that correctly: 35 concerts of electroacoustic music, including some 350 works,

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by Joshua Banks Mailman
Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?

The NY PHIL Biennial Begins

On Monday, May 23rd, with a performance by JACK Quartet at the 92nd Street Y, the New York Philharmonic’s second Biennial begins. Running until June 11th, a plethora of concerts are contained in this year’s offerings. Last week, Music Director Alan Gilbert outlined some of them at an “Insights at the Atrium” event. You can watch a video of it below.   On Tuesday, May 24th, Q2 whets listeners’ appetites for the Biennial with a 24-hour marathon devoted to the NY PHIL. Hosted by composer Phil Kline, it features recordings from the orchestra’s archive and record label. At 7 PM, there will be a live broadcast from National Sawdust of violinist Jennifer

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by Christian Carey
Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals

Bowling Green Showcases Jennifer Higdon’s Large Ensemble Music

This past Saturday night, Kobacker Hall, on the campus of Bowling Green State University, came alive with the sounds of Jennifer Higdon’s compositions for wind ensemble and orchestra. The culminating performance of Bowling Green’s annual New Music festival, Saturday’s concert marked a rare opportunity to hear a program of large ensemble music focused on the works of a single living composer, and both Higdon, and her compositional craft, were aglow in the spotlight. As the featured guest composer of this, the 36th annual new music festival at BGSU, Higdon shared herself, and her music, with students are audiences in numerous

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by Garrett Schumann
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Los Angeles, Ojai

ICE at Ojai Music Festival

The International Contemporary Ensemble – ICE – was one of the featured groups performing at the 69th Ojai Music Festival. On Friday, June 12, 2013 ICE presented a varied concert of virtuosic pieces at the gazebo in the center of Libbey Park. A good-sized crowd turned out to hear the ICE artists play traditional acoustic instruments artfully combined with amplification and electronics.     Dan Lippel was first with Electric Counterpoint, a piece for guitar and tape by Steve Reich. The music was immediately recognizable as classic Reich and bubbled along with a satisfying groove. The playing by Dan Lippel

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by Paul Muller
Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Festivals, Los Angeles, Microtonalism, Ojai, Premieres

Ojai Music Festival – Sila: The Breath of the World by John Luther Adams

The 69th annual Ojai Music Festival featured the West Coast premiere of Sila: The Breath of the World by John Luther Adams, staged outdoors in Libby Park as a free community event. Performers from ICE, red fish blue fish and Cal Arts – some 80 musicians in all – were placed in selected positions in the center of the park and the audience was invited to move around and among them as the piece progressed. Sila is an Inuit concept for the spirit that animates the world and marks the second outdoor piece by John Luther Adams at Libby Park.

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by Paul Muller
Boston, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?, Orchestras

FCM on Monday

On Monday, July 21st at 8 PM, the last concert of Tanglewood’s 2014 Festival of Contemporary Music is a well-stocked program of orchestral works. The centerpiece is Roger Sessions’s Concerto for Orchestra, a work commissioned by the BSO thirty years ago. Steven Mackey’s violin concerto Beautiful Passing will feature as soloist Sarah Silver, one of Tanglewood’s New Fromm Players. Music by John Adams has not in recent memory frequently been featured on FCM programs, but this year his Slonimsky’s Earbox makes an appearance. The sole work by a younger composer, The Sound of Stillness by Charlotte Bray, piqued my interest

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by Christian Carey
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Electro-Acoustic, Experimental Music, Festivals, Los Angeles

Electroacoustic Concert in Santa Monica

The City of Santa Monica was the scene Friday, May 2, 2014 of HEAR NOW Goes Electroacoustic, the first in a series of three consecutive concerts featuring music by contemporary Los Angeles composers. Presented by HEAR NOW and People Inside Electronics the six works in the program all included some kind of electronic accompaniment. The Miles Memorial Playhouse was filled and the cozy, Spanish Colonial style performance space with its wooden ceiling beams and stucco walls provided good acoustics and excellent viewing. This concert was dedicated to William Kraft and the composers offered a few remarks prior to the performance

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by Paul Muller