Video

CDs, Concerts, Downtown, File Under?, New Amsterdam, New York, Recordings, Video

Newspeak’s sweet light crude

The new indie classical kids on the block, Newspeak, have just released their first video. David T. Little’s composition sweet light crude, featuring soprano Mellissa Hughes in fine voice and the ensemble grooving up a storm, is ready for your delectation on YouTube.

The piece has been given the “jump cuts and jitter” treatment by videographers Satan’s Pearl Horses.

sweet light crude, Newspeak’s debut CD, is slated for release by New Amsterdam Records on November 16. Jitter not included: perhaps that’s for the best.

Newspeak on Tour

Fri., Nov. 12 (today):  Progressive Rock Showcases at Orion Sound Studios (2903 Whittington Ave # C, Baltimore; 410-206-1801). WithKayo Dot.

Sat., Nov. 13:  Secret Art Space, Bethlehem, PA (24 Rink St. at South New St.).  With Kayo Dot.

Sun., Nov. 14:  Littlefield, 622 Degraw St. (between 3rd and 4t Aves), Gowanus, Brooklyn.  With Kayo Dot and Loadbang.

by Christian Carey
Awards, Bang on a Can, CDs, Chamber Music, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Downtown, File Under?, Minimalism, New York, Video

We Love Advances

Steve Reich’s latest Nonesuch CD recently arrived, sans artwork in a little cardboard case. The disc features Double Sextet and 2×5, his collaborations with Eighth Blackbird and Bang on a Can. The former piece won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize in Music. The latter is his most explicit use of rock instrumentation to date.

According to the Nonesuch site, it’s still in the “pre-order” phase of activities, so we’ll be good and hold off on a proper review ’til it’s closer to the actual release date (9/14).

Suffice it to say, if you’re a regular visitor to Sequenza 21, you’re likely going to want one, possibly three, copies of this recording. An intergenerational summit – minimalist elder statesman meets post-minimal/totalist ace performers – that, in terms of importance, is more or less the Downtown version of Duke Ellington and John Coltrane.

Here’s some footage of Reich rehearsing BoaC:

by Christian Carey
CDs, Composers, File Under?, Video, Violin, Women composers

Laurie Anderson talks about “Homeland”

Composer, violinist, and performance/video artist Laurie Anderson has never been one to rest on her laurels. But Homeland, her latest project for Nonesuch takes her farther afield than she’s previously been.

Rather than staying at home to record, Anderson developed the album’s songs over a two year period of touring. And, for the first time, she’s involved her partner Lou Reed in a collaborative recording process (he receives a co-producer credit). The results sound recognizable as songs by Laurie Anderson; but the sonic formula has been tweaked – indeed, refreshed – by the risks taken and departures made during the recording process.

A recurring character is Fenway Bergamot, Anderson’s “male alter-ego,” who graces the album cover and performs on the recording.

Below are a couple of “making of” videos Nonesuch has posted to YouTube.

by Christian Carey
Contemporary Classical, Mexico, Obits, Performers, Video, viola

Omar Hernández-Hidalgo, 1971-2010

There’s a lot of shock and sadness in the Mexican classical community just now: last week one of the finest violists in Mexico and the world, Omar Hernández-Hidalgo, was found dead in his hometown of Tijuana, four days after apparently being kidnapped. A principal violist by the age of 21, Grammy-nominated twice, the first violist in his country to recieve a PhD. (at Indiana University), praised by Pierre Boulez, Hernández-Hidalgo was a champion of contemporary music, especially the new and vital in his own country. While his technique was commanding and virtuosic, his own personality was warm, modest and endlessly generous. He was in the midst of a demanding schedule of performances and festivals right up to his disappearance, and the sudden hole his senseless death leaves in the Mexican musical soul is keen and intense. Our hearts go out to his colleagues, family and friends, along with our hopes for sanity, peace and determination to stand for a world that will not stand for this kind of evil. RIP.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEFwstO-54w[/youtube]

 

by Steve Layton
Cello, Click Picks, Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Video

Composing and Listening Out Loud

Saturday, March 27th at 7:30pm CDT, anyone in driving range of Birmingham, Alabama should be paying UAB’s Hulsey Recital Hall (950 13th Street South) a visit. Back last year, Meet the Composer’s Met Life Creative Connections Program gave some funding for a program of new compositions by three composers (Connecticut-based Alphonse Izzo, Aleksander Sternfeld-Dunn from Washington State, and Alabama resident Craig Biondi), all written for the fantastically able chops of cellist Craig Hultgren.

What’s that, you say you’re not going to be anywhere near Birmingham just then? Why son, you’re as close as that little screen in front of your face! That’s because the concert will be streamed live courtesy of USTREAM; all you have to do is click that link I just gave you and you’re there (they’ll also be streaming the pre-concert discussion, slated for 6:00pm CDT).

The program’s title is Listen Out Loud, and what made the run-up to this one so interesting is that for the past few months, each of the composers has been blogging about their experiences while composing their respective piece. At the blog Composing Out Loud, you can follow the genesis and fruition of each of the composer’s ideas.

Each composer will present a work for solo cello, and a work for cello with ensemble. Izzo’s solo cello piece The Madcap Laughed is the composer’s surrealist tribute to Syd Barrett, the late founder of Pink Floyd. Hultgren is joined by Katherine Fouse on piano and Denise Gainey on clarinet for the premiere of Izzo’s Memory Theater.

ASO English horn player Erica Howard and Hultgren engage in an intimate dialogue in Aleksander Sternfeld-Dunn’s “...and I will love the silence…”. Dramatic contrast follows with the premiere of the light hearted solo work Snap! Crackle! Pop!

Biondi will present a haunting work for solo cello, Adrift.  Then Fouse and Hultgren are joined by Soprano Kristine Hurst-Wajszczuk and percussionist Gene Fambrough for the premiere of Biondi’s improvisatory Two Psalms.

So between all of the great, intimate  background information, brand-spanking new works and a concert itself brought close no matter where you may live, here’s beautiful example of what a concert in this century can be. I know I’ll be in the ‘audience’, even here in Houston!

by Steve Layton