Interviews

CDs, Contemporary Classical, Interviews, Violin

Talking with Jennifer Koh

Violinist Jennifer Koh has, since even before this past Spring showed its face, been pretty much living out of a suitcase or two. Crisscrossing this country and a couple other continents, She’s been playing everything from Antonio Vivaldi to John Zorn. Just last week she was beautifully acquitting herself at Miller Theatre, in a performance of Kaija Saariaho’s Graal Theatre. December is about all the break she’s getting, too, before it starts all over again.

In the middle of all this came her newest CD on Cedille, Rhapsodic Musings, a collection of solo violin music almost all composed within the last ten years: Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Lachen Verlernt (2002), Elliott Carter’s Four Lauds (1984-2000), Augusta Read Thomas’ Pulsar (2003), and John Zorn’s Goetia (2002). It’s an intensely involving and personal listen, definitely not simple showy fare, and the recording is close and crystalline. Here’s a short video of Jennifer talking about the genesis of the CD:

I recently had the chance to ask Jennifer a few questions via e-mail, and her answers follow:

S21: You’ve got quite a wide repertoire at your command, but when it’s come to recordings you haven’t gone with much in the way of the grand war-horses. The Szymanowski 1st is about as close as you’ve come, the rest delving back into lesser-known gems by Menotti, Martinu, Bartok… And then most recently lots of contemporary (and usually living) American and European composers. The pieces you choose — Higdon, Ruggles, Harrison, Salonen, Carter, Zorn — while often incredibly beautiful aren’t the stuff of easy crowd-pleasers. I get a bit of this feeling of you truly being taken deeply by something in each of these works, and bringing them to people almost like an excited kid shares their latest amazing discovery to their friends or parents. Am I getting warm here? …

JK: I just want to play music that I believe in!  This is true for music that is known or unknown, new or old.  When I play a piece, it means I will have lived with it in a very intimate and intense way for a long time and ultimately, I want to spend my life with music that I love and find meaningful.  If I discover a piece of music that I think is incredible but is not very well known, I do become fervently dedicated to it because I think it SHOULD be known to everyone and I want to share it with as many people as possible!  In the end, I don’t think I’m that different from the next person.  I’m just another member of society and I hope that if I find a piece of music to be compelling and interesting, then it will speak to other people as well.

S21:  These past few CDs you’ve gone from violin and orchestra, to violin and piano, to just solo violin. I know this can’t go much further (unless you toss the violin and just clap and sing!), but was that increasing intimacy and focus at all intentional? Does it feel any different when you make a CD where you know you’re responsible for every moment of sound on there?

JK: Everything about “Rhapsodic Musings” was intense and personal for me from the initial inspiration point for the program to the recording process to the actual compositions on this CD.  The idea for this CD came from a collective time of  shock and loss and I wanted to focus the CD into a personal  journey out of that collective experience.  During this same period of time, I saw the violin that one of my mentors, Felix Galimir played while he was alive.  Felix was a huge influence on me in so many ways especially because of the passionate relationship he had with the music that he worked on with the composers of his time which included Schoenberg, Berg and Webern.   When I played on Felix’s violin in the shop, I felt he was back with me because I heard him in that violin.  Violinists have very intense and intimate relationships with their instruments and it is almost impossible to separate the identity between violin and violinist because each lives in the other. I feel like my violin  is a part of me and I chose a solo violin program for “Rhapsodic Musings” because I wanted to express that personal relationship between violin and violinist. (more…)

by Steve Layton
Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Interviews, San Francisco

Let’s Ask Matt Davignon

Matt Davignon

Experimental music impresario Matt Davignon is known all over the San Francisco Bay Area for organizing unusual music performances.  In addition to being responsible for such events as the San Francisco Found Objects Festival, he’s a member of the Outsound Presents Board of Directors and the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival Steering Committee.  This Thursday evening, November 19, at 8:00 PM, Matt will present one of his DroneShift concerts at the Luggage Store Gallery, where he curates regularly.  The gallery is located at 1007 Market Street near 6th Street in San Francisco, near Powell Street and Civic Center BART. Admission is $6.00 – $10.00 sliding scale, with no one turned away for lack of funds.

I lured Matt into conversation with the assurance that there would be no artichoke hearts involved.

S21:  So how did your geographical wanderings bring you to San Francisco?

MD:  I was raised in Western Massachusetts, and moved to Santa Rosa, California with my family as a teenager. I moved down to San Francisco as a college student because I wanted to encounter the experimental music scene.

S21:  And how about your musical wanderings?

MD:  I started as a teenage bass player, who aspired (but lacked the motor skills) to be in a prog rock band. After moving to California in the early 90s, I was increasingly influenced by industrial music and ambient music (both of the 1990s variety and the Brian Eno variety).

By 1994 I was improvising, but using many different sound sources such as turntables, tape collage, household objects and drum machine. In the early 2000s I most frequently performed with just a turntable and CD player, improvising music by layering irregular loops of pre-recorded music. In 2004, I decided I wanted to put all the things I learned from my previous musical wanderings into one instrument. I was surprised to find that drum machine was the best choice.  It not only comes with a wide variety of sounds, but it also has the potential to be used melodically. Most importantly, since the drum machine can be played with one hand, the other hand is free to operate devices that process the sound.
(more…)

by Polly Moller
Boston, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Interviews, Performers, Podcasts

Who Interviewed Amanda Palmer?

Amanda Palmer (photo by Martin Foster)
Amanda Palmer (photo by Martin Foster)

Amanda Palmer is a bona fide rock star.  She first made her name as half of The Dresden Dolls, and has since struck out on her own with a solo album called “Who Killed Amanda Palmer.”  In June of 2008 she teamed up with the Boston Pops for two nights, and this December they’re doing it again for a New Year’s Eve concert.  Amanda has also been pioneering new models of how the rock music industry can work (staying in nearly constant contact with her fans via Twitter plays a key role), and I wanted to see if that ingenuity could be translated into advice for the classical scene.  I interviewed her by phone last week, and we talked about the upcoming Pops show, her musical background and training, and her impressions of the classical music industry:

Part 1:

Part 2:
Amanda is performing in Singapore right now, and when she returns she has a series of shows along the Eastern Seaboard which culminate with the Pops concert on December 31.
P.S. Here’s the link to the Shadowbox repertoire discussionAmanda mentions.
by Galen H. Brown
Bang on a Can, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Film Music, Interviews, Los Angeles

Goldberg on (UNTITLED)

Adam Goldberg
Adam Goldberg

(UNTITLED), an original film satire of New York’s avant-garde art scene, will appear in theaters across the nation this fall. By poking fun at the idiosyncrasies of 21st century Bohemia, (UNTITLED) introduces American audiences to some of the best that contemporary art has to offer, notably a score by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang, who merges the artistic expressions of the composer protagonist with his own musical voice.

(UNTITLED) revolves around melancholy composer Adrian (Adam Goldberg) and his whirlwind affair with a Chelsea gallerist (Marley Shelton), who unbeknownst to Adrian sells vacuous commercial works to high-paying corporate clients. The film explores the idea of true art and the question of integrity lost through commercialism – all with tongue in cheek. At the beginning, Adrian’s music comprises cliché contemporary classical music elements, such as crinkling paper and breaking glass. Once his perspective and emotions achieve depth and insight through his blossoming romance, his music becomes more profound.

John Clare had a chance to send questions to both David Lang and Adam Goldberg. In the second part (part 1 is here with David Lang), John Clare finds out more about (UNTITLED) from its star, Adam Goldberg.

1. Often with a joke, there is some seriousness or truth behind it. Is there some truth to this movie even though there is some fun being poked?

Well, actually upon my last viewing of it, the second time I watched it with an audience, albeit at LACMA–the perfect audience–it seemed to have a real weight to it. The film sort of takes a turn once the absurdity is established I think. For me the film really has always been about this righteous indignation, this sort of defensiveness of one’s position–whether as an artist or a audience member or a critic or an art dealer, in this case–that really is front for enormous insecurity. These characters are all wayward and tend to overcompensate with very stringent , often absurd, points of view.

2. There are some outrageous sounds and art. How does your taste run in real life – in both “new concert music” and “art”?

I definitely have always been obsessed with sound and strange sounds and repetition, but usually incorporated into something melodic or hypnotic in some way. I have for a long time been a fan of Steve Reich–whose work began with simple tape loops and phasing of found material, but eventually he applied this process to beautiful symphonic pieces. I have also been a fan of some conceptual art, but usually when it engages the viewer, interacts with him or her in some way or tells a story. I don’t like things that seem to aim merely to shock or to alienate. Basically if it moves me or I can relate to it in some way then, well, I like it.

3. David Lang is a Pulitzer Prize winner and incredibly gifted composer, but unfortunately not a household name – how was he chosen for the movie, and how was collaboration with Untitled?

I believe Jonathan, the director, knew David from music school. He had an interesting job, both to score the film and create the ‘sound’ pieces our little group performs–though in the end it was so bizarrely structured and arranged that we could often only barely perform to playback so much of the “music” we’re making we actually are making. David also served I think as a bit of a consultant to Jonathan when he was writing this, creating my character. I love David’s music and this score is quite beautiful I think.

4. What is the possibility of Untitled 2, or Untitled – the Showtime series?

Ha!

5. There have been quite a few composers in pop culture these days, from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” (Jason Segal) to “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium” (Natalie Portman’s piano/composer) and the likes of Paul McCartney & Billy Joel writing new classical music. Is composition a new cool as nerds (think Big Bang Theory) are?

Hmmm….I’ve never thought “Big Bang Theory.” Well, I remember years ago Elvis Costello put out a sort of classical record with the Brodsky Quartet that was pretty innovative. Conversely, Philip Glass many many years ago started I think to incorporate a sort of popular music element–singing an so forth–into his music. I think there’s always been some overlap. I saw a great piece that a childhood friend of my girlfriend’s put on. Michael Einziger from Incubus of all things. It was fantastic, sort of Reich meets Bernard Hermann. I think there’s something that feels for lack of a better word “legitimate” about working with classical elements. I know that some of the stuff musically I’ve done musically, with my project LANDy, that I’ve been most proud of incorporates some classical elements–arrangements of strings and that sort of thing. Albeit I’m usually humming the arrangements like a crazy person to the poor violinists.

(UNTITLED) opens tomorrow, October 23rd, in a limited release; and the soundtrack is out already from Cantaloupe!

by John Clare
Bang on a Can, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Film Music, Interviews

David Lang on (UNTITLED)

(UNTITLED), an original film satire of New York’s avant-garde art scene, will appear in theaters across the nation this fall. By poking fun at the idiosyncrasies of 21st century Bohemia, (UNTITLED) introduces American audiences to some of the best that contemporary art has to offer, notably a score by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang, who merges the artistic expressions of the composer protagonist with his own musical voice.

(UNTITLED) revolves around melancholy composer Adrian (Adam Goldberg) and his whirlwind affair with a Chelsea gallerist (Marley Shelton), who unbeknownst to Adrian sells vacuous commercial works to high-paying corporate clients. The film explores the idea of true art and the question of integrity lost through commercialism – all with tongue in cheek. At the beginning, Adrian’s music comprises cliché contemporary classical music elements, such as crinkling paper and breaking glass. Once his perspective and emotions achieve depth and insight through his blossoming romance, his music becomes more profound.

John Clare had a chance to send questions to both David Lang and Adam Goldberg. In the first post, here are Lang’s answers about (UNTITLED):

1. Often with a joke, there is some seriousness or truth behind it. Is there some truth to this movie even though there is some fun being poked?

There is a lot of truth in this movie, mostly about how people in the arts become passionately committed to something they believe in that may look unbelievable from the outside. I think that creative commitment is captured very well, as is the distance between the committed people and the people watching the committed people.

2. How cool is it for the composer to “get the girl” in this movie? Did it influence your music for the film?

Getting the girl didn’t influence my thinking in the movie, although it didn’t hurt. The progression of the character musically is that he begins by making music only for himself, because that is how large his world view is; when he meets the girl his senses and optimism and maybe even his idea of audience expand, and his music changes accordingly. I definitely tried to make that shift happen in the music. (more…)

by John Clare
Composers, Interviews, jazz, New York, Performers

COIN COIN & Matana Roberts

photo_by_Owen_Richards[Ed. note: Composer and S21 regular Chris Becker sat down recently with the one and only Matana Roberts. I told him I’d love to feature his interview, and so here it is: ]

………………

Saxophonist, composer, fanzine writer, and blogger Matana Roberts is the current artist in residence at Issue Project Room (NYC) where she is developing and presenting in a series of concerts material for her “large scale…sound narrative” COIN COIN.  COIN COIN might be described as a multi-movement composition utilizing composed, improvised, and pre-recorded music along with elements of theater (projections, candles, chains) to give voice to a complex family history that extends from Louisiana to at least three other continents.  Matana – a Chicago native – combines her Midwestern roots (including the influence of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians of which she is a member) with a very Southern-styled “collage” compositional technique to realize performances that (in Matana’s words) “…create an atmosphere where the people witnessing it feel enveloped into the experience.”  Those words certainly describe the two COIN COIN performances I myself have witnessed, the most recent being last week (September 30) where Matana, on alto saxophone, clarinet, and vocals, was accompanied by drummer and percussionist Mike Pride.

Her recent CD The Chicago Project (2008) is a wonderfully varied collection of original compositions featuring Chicago musicians guitarist Jeff Parker (Chicago Underground Trio, Nicole Mitchell’s Black Earth Ensemble), bassist Josh Abrams (Josh Abrams Quartet) and drummer Frank Rosaly (Ken Vandermark) and special guest tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson.  We talk a little bit about this recording in the interview that follows.

I first became aware of Matana’s work via her blog (Shadows of a People now called In The Midst of Memory). What I like about her writing is its immediacy and honesty whether she is providing details about her family ancestry or reacting to this country’s current confusions regarding race, gender, and class.  Matana’s will to give voice to her experience as a creative artist in the 21st century, as well as to the history of her Southern, African, and European ancestors is one of the things that inspired me to reach out to her for this interview.

Please note:  This interview was conducted and edited just before the untimely and tragic passing of Issue Project Room founder Suzanne Fiol.  Matana is certainly not the only artist to speak highly of Suzanne, and I would like to express my sincere condolences to everyone who knew and loved her.

Chris Becker:  As a composer and bandleader, can you talk about how you select musicians for a recording date or a Coin Coin performance? Do you compose with specific musicians in mind or do you go about the search and selection after the fact?

Matana Roberts:  I like to compose with specific people in mind when I have the luxury to do so.  Since I have been working on COIN COIN now for about 5 years as I re edit the work, I can pick and choose amongst sound makers that mean a lot to me not only as musicians but also as friends and almost honorary family.  I put together The Chicago Project with every musician that is on that record in mind. I wanted it to be a very specific document about my Chicago roots and development and all of the people involved are people who made it possible for me to play at the level I am playing now.

The only exception on that record would be Frank Rosaly– Frank showed up in Chicago right after I left, but I wanted him on the record because I felt he represented the positive new influx of creative direction Chicago has been getting in the last 10 years or so, and I also just liked him as a person. I’m more interested in musicians as people first, sound makers second. If they are not compassionate and open and considerate as people, that means that their sound output will (to me) be just as cold as their probable personality in my opinion.

CB:  Not to take anything away from the other musicians you play with, but one of the many exciting things about your CD The Chicago Project is the sound of Jeff Parker’s guitar playing alongside the sound of your alto saxophone.  You each have a very distinctive sound that blends as well as contrasts with the other throughout the tracks. What do you anticipate musically from Jeff when he is playing with you?

MR:  For whatever reason I have yet to figure out why Jeff and I have a very special musical connection that has always been apparent even in the little time we have played together.  Maybe it’s because he has such big ears.  He listens to some of everything and deals with the process of sound in so many different capacities – in collaborative groups, groups he leads, as a deejay.  He’s one of the busiest sidemen in creative music and so I just feel like he internalizes so much that allows him to connect with someone weird like me in a really empathetic and eerily intuitive sense.  He’s also just has an incredible big heart, the best laugh ever (Nicole Mitchell is a runner up to this though-her laugh comes from such an amazing wellspring of sound!) and speaks with such kindness about so many things, and knows how to speak on them with a tasteful brevity that I wish I could access more often… (more…)

by Steve Layton
Experimental Music, Interviews

Interview with Noveller

Photo: Aaron Wojack
Photo: Aaron Wojack

Sarah Lipstate is a  musician and film maker. She’s only been in New York for a few years, but has already made a name for herself as a strong, independent voice on the guitar. Her primary focus is Noveller, her solo guitar project, which presents gorgeous and evocative sound-scapes that are deliberate and slow building. In an age where so much music is at the click of a mouse, it’s exciting to see a musician who doesn’t care about getting to the point too quickly. In order to fully experience Noveller, you have to be on for the whole ride. Lipstate sat down with me in her Bushwick apartment to talk about Noveller, where it came from, and where it’s going.

Adam: First and foremost, how do you pronounce your stage name?

Sarah: It’s Noveller (Know-vell-er). When I was in college I played in a duo with this guy, and he was really into the idea of us having pseudonyms for the band. So, my pseudonym was “Novella”, which I chose just because I liked the way it sounded. When I started doing solo work, I recorded a track for a compilation called “Women Take Back The Noise”, I had to come up with a name. I was already used to having this Novella name and decided that Noveller of was kind of a nice spin on that.

A: How long ago, do you think the inklings of the music you’re creating now began?

S: I started doing more ambient guitar work when I was 19, at UT in Austin, Texas. I had a four track tape recorder that I had gotten for Christmas from my family, and I remember living in the dorms, setting up my guitar, and plugging into the four track. My friend had given me an Ebow, cause he was like “My uncle gave this to me, I think it’s totally boring, I don’t like it, you can have it.” But I just thought it was really cool, and I could get some really cool sounds with this Ebow. So I would record in my dorm room these sound scape-y experiments, and I didn’t really know any better but I used the same tape for six months, and then one day I was playing it back in my stereo and it got completely destroyed. I’m still kinda sad about that to this day. So yeah, as far back as that. Then eventually I moved for the four track to a recording program on my laptop computer, expanding what kind of sounds I could create at that time with limited gear, and not having that much space to play music out loud

A: When did you start performing that music? It seems that taking the leap from recording endless loops towards trying to do something with that energy live seems pretty different.

S: I didn’t perform live as Noveller until I moved to Brooklyn, in January 2007. Shortly after being here I was invited to play an experimental music festival in Washington, DC called Sonic Circuits. They offered me money, and it was a really cool festival, so I agreed to do it and prepared a set. It was kind of difficult to transition from the endless possibilities of recording and overdubbing, and then finding out how to do that with my double necked guitar and a looping pedal. I had to grow into creating live pieces that I was happy with, creating a full sound with two hands, my guitar and a few pedals. But it’s definitely fun. I think it’s evolved a lot from the first few shows.

A: How much of your music is pre-composed?

S: Everything that I do currently is stuff that I’ve worked on at home, to where I know there’s a structure laid out. It changes every single time I play live, there’s not a set length and I can adapt things wildly, but I know how things are going to start, progress and end for the most part. There have been a few cases where things have gone wrong during a show and I’ve just been like “OK, I’m going to wing the next ten minutes,” and then things get kind of crazy.

(more…)

by Justin Monsen
Chicago, Flute, Interviews, Podcasts, Violin

My Ears Are Open, ensemble dal niente

pre-season_party.jpg.w300h400I thought it might be nice to close out the month of interviews from Chicago by featuring a couple musicians from dal niente.  The ensemble has some great concerts planned for October, but I caught violinist Austin Wulliman and flutist Shanna Gutierrez back in June.

Austin’s episode is worth listening to just to hear him say, “I love me some Scelsi”.  You don’t hear that very often, but it’s true, oh so true.  Shanna talks a little in her episode about interesting experiences with composers, but the real value is in the seemingly endless list of resources she mentions if you are writing for flute, or are just thinking about writing for flute.

Listen to Austin’s interview here and Shanna’s here.  Subscribe to the podcast here.

Ensemble dal niente begins their season on Friday with what they are calling OKTOBERFest.  You can find all the details on their website.  How many groups are pairing Franco Donatoni with John Luther Adams, or Bach with Rihm, or Helmut Lachenmann one week and Arvo Pärt the next week?  They are doing it all in October – I wish I could be there!

Friday, October 2 – 7:30pm ($10/5)
Columbia College Concert Hall, 1014 S. Michigan Ave.

Sunday, October 4 – 3 pm ($5)
Sherwood Conservatory of Music at Columbia College, 600 S. Michigan Ave.

Sunday, October 18 – 2:00pm ($5)
Green Mill Cocktail Lounge, 4802 N. Broadway Ave.

Sunday, October 25 – 3:00pm (FREE!)
Preston Bradley Hall at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St.

by James Holt
Cello, Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Interviews, Orchestral, Premieres

There’s always room for Cello

Chris Theofanidis

This week, the Dallas Symphony premieres a new concerto written for cellist Nina Kotova. Christopher Theofanidis is teaching at Yale and about to embark on two new operas for Houston and San Francisco. He took some time out last week to let me know more about the work and what he’s been up to!
Listen to the conversation:

mp3 file
Tomorrow, a post with the soloist, who also composes…

by John Clare
Composers, Contemporary Classical, Interviews, Music Events, Orchestral, Premieres

Mandolin Master 2

Chris Thile

Labor Day 2009 and while John Clare has an airshift, he also has an interview. Chris Thile is relaxing in New York and making coffee, ready to talk shop. Thile jokes, waxes poetic and has a thoughtful answer for the questions. You see, Chris is about to add to the small repertoire of mandolin & orchestra concertos, with his own Ad astra per alas porci. The world premiere performances are September 17, 19, and 20, 2009 with The Colorado Symphony & Jeffrey Kahane.
In the second part of our interview Chris talks about how the piece came about and if others might perform it: Interview Part 2
Thile has been busy as well with his band, The Punch Brothers, and with a duo project with bassist extraordinaire Edgar Meyer. He’ll keep up the concerto as well, with six more chances for you to hear it, the Oregon Symphony (September 26, 2009; with Carlos Kalmar), the Alabama Symphony (October 29, 2009; with Justin Brown), the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra (January 23 and 24, 2010; again with Jeffrey Kahane), the Winston-Salem Symphony (March 13, 14, and 16, 2010; with Robert Moody); the Delaware Symphony (March 19 and 20, 2010; with David Amado);and the Portland Symphony (March 28, 2010; with Scott Terrell).

by John Clare