Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Music Events

Wrapping Up “American Mavericks”

By now, the members of the San Francisco Symphony, their director Michael Tilson Thomas, and the rest of the musicians responsible for the orchestra’s magnificent “American Mavericks” Festival have left Ann Arbor for New York and the next stop on their tour: Carnegie Hall. In immediate relection, I’m confident the concerts lived up to the title bestowed upon it by Alex Ross: “the major musical event of the winter/spring season” – though, in Ann Arbor, I argue the “Mavericks” share that spotlight with January’s presentation of Einstein On The Beach.

Immeasurable credit is due the Symphony and MTT for the sheer audacity of their programming and the high level of their performances. The music they shared with us energized Ann Arbor’s concertgoers to a level I’d never before witnessed, and I believe all those who attended feel indebted to the University Musical Society for bringing this once-in-a-generation event to our Midwestern haven.

In the mold of the 17 American composers featured on the tour, the Symphony’s four concerts were blisteringly unapologetic and daring – almost to a fault, in fact. Personally, the composers who shined the most in my ears were (in alphabetical order) Mason Bates, Henry Cowell, Lukas Foss, Meredith Monk and Carl Ruggles, but there was lots of music to go around for every concertgoer’s taste. I was heretofore uninitiated to the work of these last three composers, and, thanks to their pieces Echoi, Realm Variations and Sun-Treader (respectively), I am determined to listen to Mr. Foss, Ms. Monk and Mr. Ruggles’ music more regularly.

Before last week I was also rather unfamiliar with Mason Bates’ work, but my encounter with him, and his new choir/organ/electronics piece Mass Transmission, could not have been more impressive. Mr. Bates is, obviously, one of the most successful living composers in America, but this fact only makes his unfailingly down-to-earth character more endearing. He was very candid when he presented to us students, opening his chat by declaring his near indifference for being dubbed a “Maverick”, and later revealing his desire to achieve more lyricism in his music – something he excels at in Mass Transmission.

The Festival also gave me an opportunity to meet another top-flight American musician: renowned pianist Jeremy Denk. Charming, witty and articulate, Mr. Denk is as gifted a performer as he is a wordsmith, crafting two spectacular performances, and one stellar presentation to the UM Composition Department, while he was in Ann Arbor. Last Thursday night, Mr. Denk brought Henry Cowell’s Piano Concerto to life, and, yesterday afternoon, took part in performing Lukas Foss’ raucous and virtuosic Echoi – a work he sarcastically described in his master class as, “the hardest piece ever written”.

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by Garrett Schumann
Contemporary Classical

Crowdsourcing Nawlins

Help me out here.  A couple of my acquaintance are celebrating their 40th anniversary in New Orleans in a couple of weeks and asked me where they should go for a “special” night of music.  I haven’t been there in years and don’t have a clue but I said I would ask around.  I’m asking around.  Bear in mind that these are folks who think that Al Hirt and Pete Fountain are probably the greatest jazz players who ever lived.  And, I’m guessing that too loud or too grungy would not be good.  Who has some recommendations?

As long as we’re talking Nawlins, there are three–count  ’em–big Dr. John shows at BAM coming up in April.   And anybody know a piano player/singer from New Orleans (now living in New York) named Brian Mitchell?  Saw him gigging with Levon Helm a few months ago and really liked his stuff.  If you see him, please tell him I’m looking for him.

by Jerry Bowles
Contemporary Classical

When Music Met Fashion – A Chat with Sugar Vendil

I was sitting in the S21 headquarters–Starbucks on 57th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues–sipping a latte and trying to guess which of the several attractive Asian-American women in the room was Sugar Vendil,  founder/artistic director/pianist of The Nouveau Classical Project, when a helpful message popped up on my iPhone:  “I’m the one with the black bowties on my shoes,” it said.   But, of course, I thought, that makes perfect sense.  This is a woman who has been producing three or four concerts a year since 2008 that bring together the unlikely combination of composers, performers and fashion designers  to create performances that are as much fun to look at as they are to listen to.  Of course, she wears bowties on her shoes.

Sugar–a combination of Suzanne and Edgar, her parents’ names–is a 29-year-old Filipino-American from the Bay Area who started playing the piano at 3 1/2 but didn’t get really serious until she heard a classmate playing Lizst’s Hungarian Rhapsodies–the one made famous by Bugs Bunny–at around 6.  She knew immediately it was time to step it up a notch.

“I didn’t have the typical Asian ‘Tiger Mom’ or anything like that,” Sugar says. “My parents were more laid back.  They never pressured me at all.  If I practiced a lot it was because I wanted to practice.  They let me develop at my own pace and I’m was happy for that.”

Sugar arrived in New York in 2001, enrolled at NYU, and settled into life in the music and fashion capitals of the world.  She has posed for fashion shoots herself and admits that “fashionista” is not a term often used to describe most denizens of the new music demimonde where geekiness is often the aspired to look.  But she sees nothing strange about inviting emerging designers to create clothing that matches the music program.

“Music and fashion have always been my passions,” she says.  “I see fashion as simply another way of expressing myself.  The idea of combining classical music with creative clothing may sound a little superficial but it’s really not.  We play serious music at our concerts but the fashion elements add touches of theater and style and  provide some context for the music we’re playing.”

Case in point:  The Nouveau Classical Project’s next concert at Symphony Space  on Thursday, April 5 is a salon event, Wearing the Lost Generation which Sugar describes as a “reimagining the Parisian Avant Garde.”  The musical program is Ravel’s Piano Trio in A minor and  the world premiere of Lost Generation, an electro-acoustic work by Trevor Gureckis.  The performers will be wearing music-inspired pieces  by milliner and designer Heidi Lee, who has a reputation for producing “quirky” hats. St-Germain is sponsoring the post show reception with complimentary cocktails.

Like so many young people with vision who come to New York determined to make an impression, Sugar is tireless in her ambitions.  She organizes The Nouveau Classical Project programs, comes up with themes, finds the venues, finds the right designers and composers, selects the programs, and usually does the promotion.  This is not even to mention the rehearsals needed to play professional level concerts in public.   I asked her if with all that she still had time for a personal life.  She assured me that she does.

“I have a boy friend that I’m crazy about and I play a mean game of volleyball,” she says.  With that, she dashed off to tackle Ravel.  Poor man doesn’t have a chance.

by Jerry Bowles
Contemporary Classical

Opportunity Knocks – Issue Project Room

ISSUE Project Room is looking for a Marketing Coordinator to fill a part-time contracted position. The position requires coordination of the website and multiple modes of print, in order to outreach to the community to build audience and membership for ISSUE Project Room’s programs. A large part of the position consists of coordinating marketing materials from the Curatorial and Development staffs, and working directly with the Executive Director to produce the final products. This position is the manager and driver for all marketing projects, therefore, keeping on top of deadlines is essential. In addition, this position plays a key role in meeting ticket sale goals and toward those efforts, strategizes and carries out targeted marketing campaigns. As the Marketing Coordinator is responsible for finalizing content and outreach, excellent copy editing and interpersonal skills, as well as keen sense of ISSUE’s mission and language are required.   Read more…

by Jerry Bowles
Brooklyn, Composers, Concerts, Conductors, File Under?, Interviews

Conductor and Composer Discuss Resurgence of Wind Ensembles

Jeff W. Ball

Brooklyn Wind Symphony Artistic Director Jeff W. Ball interviews Dr. David Maslanka on the music of the late composer John Barnes Chance, “channeling” the composer, and the growing prevalence of commissioning consortiums among wind ensembles.

JWB:  When did you first hear a composition by John Barnes Chance?

David Maslanka

DM: My first contact was “Incantation and Dance.”  It was around 1965.  I was a first-year grad student at Michigan State and the band there was playing the piece.  I wasn’t in the band, but heard rehearsals and performance. The piece was “hot” that year – everybody was playing it.

JWB: Has your impression of this piece changed over time?

DM: It was, and remains, an attractive piece. I liked its fresh percussive rhythmic nature, and clear instrumental colors. Working with it many years later for the Illinois State University recording was still a positive experience.

JWB: How did that project come about?  What was your role?

DM: Dr. Stephen Steele, conductor of the Illinois State University Wind Symphony, was asked by Susan Bush of Albany Records if he would be interested in making a CD of select Chance works. Susan thought this would be a timely CD, one that many people would find interesting. This is a nice recognition of the enduring quality of some of Chance’s music. Steve’s first step was to send me all the scores he had collected of Chance’s wind music – about a dozen. I reviewed them all, and came up with what I termed an “A” list. My recommendations included Incantation and Dance, Variations on a Korean Folk Song, Symphony No.2, and the piano concerto piece. In rehearsals and the recording session I acted as the “presence of the composer.” It was my job to read the score and be the reminder for basic stuff like tempos, dynamics, and qualities of articulation – to insist on these, and to offer thoughts on qualities of style. There is what is printed in scores, and then there is what has accumulated as performance practice over the years. My job was to bring things back to the score. The most interesting piece for me was Symphony No.2, a piece that Chance never heard in his lifetime. I felt like I was “channeling” Chance, allowing him to be present, both to hear his music for the first time, and to offer the suggestions he would have made for performance. This assertion certainly cannot be proven, but it was a very curious experience for me.

JWB: Why do you think that Albany Records recording has been so successful?

DM: Chance’s music is still fresh and likeable, and a large number of people remember it fondly from their younger band days. It has also not left the repertoire. Steele’s recording of this music is simply very good. It is exactingly performed and well recorded.

JWB:   Has the music of Chance (and his contemporaries) influenced your growth as a composer?

DM: I would certainly say that Chance’s music, and that of people like Clifton Williams and Vaclav Nelhybel, and my teacher, H. Owen Reed, influenced my early growth as a composer. This was different music than the so-called mainstream of the time, which was serialism and significant branching off with people like Penderecki and Berio.  Chance and other band composers were more “down home” outgrowths of school music. It has taken all the years since Chance for wind band music to attain something of mainstream status. The influences on current wind band music are as varied as world music itself, but I would say that the music of the “early modern” wind band composers pointed in a fresh direction that many of us found attractive.

JWB:   Chance was a percussionist and this heavily influenced his writing style. What was your primary instrument growing up?

DM: I was a clarinetist, and had both band and orchestra experience as a high school and college student. I had more band than orchestra, and I guess that the band sound was in my ear when I thought about writing for larger ensembles. Playing clarinet has certainly been central to my writing for winds. Being in the center of an ensemble as a performer is a major factor for any composer writing ensemble music. The influence of clarinet on my writing style is certainly there, but the factors influencing writing style are many and varied. Many people are convinced that I am a percussionist, which I am not in the least. Composers have to learn the languages of all the instruments, and then absorb and transform in themselves all the music they come in contact with.

JWB:   What do you think Chance’s music would sound like today if he hadn’t tragically passed away at the age of 39?

DM: There is no knowing how Chance would have evolved!

JWB:  Chance’s Second Symphony serves as the centerpiece for the Brooklyn Wind Symphony’s annual Modern Wind Symphony Concert. Do you believe it is important to continue writing symphonies for wind bands?

DM:   I don’t necessarily think that it is important for composers to continue to write symphonies for wind band.  Composers need to write whatever they need to write.  I happen to write symphonies (now seven of them for wind band) but that is something I have felt the urge to do since Symphony No.2 in 1985. Wind bands do not need symphonies in order to be “important”, to try to lift themselves to “orchestral” status.  They need powerful music, well-crafted for the medium, music which inspires the players and their audiences. This has been happening for quite some time now, and the grass roots wind band movement has become a world phenomenon. Wind bands need to program significant works, regardless of length or form, because players and audiences are intensely hungry for deeply nourishing and affecting musical experience.

JWB: Most wind band commissions occur at the collegiate level. Do you think it is important for community based wind bands and secondary schools to commission new music?

DM:  Most wind band commissions occur at the college level because they have figured out how to do consortiums. This is a relatively recent phenomenon. One person takes the lead and enlists a number of other conductors to share the burden of cost. This has resulted in a huge number of new pieces that immediately have more than a single use.  Not all of the music is good, but the simple fact is the more pieces that are written the high likelihood that a percentage will be outstanding. Regarding consortiums, there is no difference between a college band and a community band, except possibly the sense of being connected with other bands. The College Band Directors National Association offers college directors immediate connection to hundreds of other conductors. The CBDNA national and regional conferences, and other events like the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic, allow for very intense networking among conductors. Community bands can simply join in if they wish.  Anyone can join CBDNA. Commissions are now starting from high schools as well. There is the realization that the band world is all one big family, and colleges, community bands, and high schools are willing to help each other out.

JWB: The Brooklyn Wind Symphony is happy to be leading a consortium to commission a new work from you. What do you look for and take into account when requested to write a piece for a specific ensemble?

DM:   The energy and seriousness of the conductor involved is a high consideration. I deeply respect people who are trying hard to build or do something, and I am interested to work with them. For me this has included ensembles all the way from small school groups to major recognized names.

Brooklyn Wind Symphony presents an 80th birthday concert in honor of John Barnes Chance on Saturday, March 24, 2:00 PM. Grand Street High School, 850 Grand Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn. $10 suggested donation.

by Christian Carey
Austin, Birthdays, Chamber Music, Concerts

Happy Birthday to Austin’s New Music Co-op!

This weekend, the Austin New Music Co-op celebrates its 10th year of wild music with two nights of concerts. The programs will function partly as a retrospective on those years, reprising some of their most ambitious and unique projects, like last year’s massive US premiere of Cornelius Cardew’s “The Great Learning” (excerpted now with the Texas Choral Consort). Other group milestones on the program include:

Two of Morton Feldman‘s chamber works “de Kooning” and “The Viola in my Life”
Alvin Lucier‘s “Still and Moving Lines of Silence in Families of Hyperbolas” for vibraphone and sine waves, as well as an installation in the lobby for “unattended percussion” and sine waves.
Excerpts of Earle Brown‘s “Folio” performed by chamber ensemble
Arnold Dreyblatt‘s 2007 “Kinship Collapse” commissioned by NMC

The New Music Co-op is also a cohort of composers, and a selection of their pieces will also appear on the programs:

Brent Fariss‘ “I apologize Julius, for judging you” for amplified chamber ensemble.
Nick Hennies‘ “Second skin with lungs” for snare drums
Keith Manlove‘s “Becoming Machine II” for voice and electronics
Bill Meadows‘ “Loose Atoms” for wacom graphics tablet.
Travis Weller‘s “Toward and away from the point of balance” for violin, viola, cello and custom instrument “the owl”

Here’s to many happy returns.

WHERE/WHEN/HOW:
Friday March 23rd 8pm &
Saturday March 24th 7pm
At the MACC (600 River St, Austin TX)
Advance tickets available now at End of an Ear (http://endofanear.com)
$17 one night / $25 both nights
Student and advance tickets discounted to $15 one night / $20 both nights

by Elliot Cole
Contemporary Classical

A Visit From San Francisco

Michael Tilson Thomas

Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony are visiting Ann Arbor this week as part of their American Mavericks Festival, a celebration of 17 living and passed American composers ranging from Mason Bates to Charles Ives. The orchestra is giving four concerts starting this Thursday (3/22) and Sunday (3/25) and will be joined along the way by incredible soloists like Jeremy Denk, Jessye Norman, Joan La Barbara, Emmanuel Ax and others.

Ann Arbor is one of three stops in the Symphony’s centennial tour (the others being Chicago and New York), and their residency coincides with the University of Michigan’s second annual American Orchestras Summit, which features presentations by composers, musicologists and leaders in the world of American orchestras.

Sam Richards, a colleague of mine in the Michigan composition department is covering the Summit, and will be live-blogging during its presentations over the next three days. Additionally, I will live-tweet the presentations, performances and the conversations the students here have planned with Mason Bates and Jeremy Denk.

You can find Sam’s first post on the Summit here, and he also created a nifty ‘family tree’ connecting the ‘Maverick’ composers featured in this week’s upcoming concerts.

If you’re interested in reading my tweets regarding the various music and conversations I witness and participate in this week, follow me @garrt.

 

 

by Garrett Schumann
Contemporary Classical, File Under?, Twentieth Century Composer

Sixty Postwar Pieces to Study

Sixty Postwar Pieces to Study

Recently, a couple of the undergraduate composers in the program at Westminster Choir College asked me for lists of postwar pieces to study. Given the vocal and choral emphasis in our program, I’ve compiled the list below to provide a different vantage point. Hence the emphasis on instrumental music and a preponderance of post-tonal composers that they might not encounter when learning their own recital repertoire. Given a different student population, composers like Jennifer Higdon, Christopher Theofanidis, and Donnacha Dennehy could just as likely appear on a listening list such as this.

And, of course, it is frustrating what one must leave out to keep a list manageable in size. Indeed, I’ve had to leave off a number of sentimental favorites. Note that I am not attempting to give them the “greatest hits” of the past sixty-five years. Instead I strove for a diversity of selections, both watershed masterworks and vibrantly interesting pieces that merit attention, even if they may not be the first ones that come to mind for the given composer. On a different day, we could come up with sixty different pieces: a composer must be prepared for a lifetime of listening, score study, and learning. Even after that, they must also be humbled by the fact that they will only get to a fraction of all the good stuff out there!

Let’s say that an undergraduate composer began working with this list or a similar one at the beginning of their junior year; listening to and, if possible, studying the score for one of these pieces every week. Between their own performance experiences, WCC’s theory and history courses, and this survey of recent works, by the time that they were ready to consider applying to graduate programs in their senior year, they would have a decent grounding in the repertoire.

1-    Adams, John C. Nixon in China (1987)

2-    Adams, John C. Chamber Symphony (1992)

3-    Adams, John Luther. Red Arc/Blue Veil (2002)

4-    Andriessen, Louis. La Passione (2002)

5-    Babbitt, Milton. Philomel (1964)

6-    Babbitt, Milton. Arie da Capo (1974)

7-    Berio, Luciano. Circles (1960)

8-    Birtwistle, Harrison. Secret Theatre (1984)

9-    Boulez, Pierre. Le marteau sans maître (rev. 1957)

10-  Boulez, Pierre. Répons (1984)

11-  Cage, John. Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano (1948)

12-  Cage, John. Concert for Piano and Orchestra (1958)

13-  Carter, Elliott. String Quartet No. 1 (1951)

14-  Carter, Elliott. String Quartet No. 5 (1995)

15- Chin, Unsuk. Akrostischen-Wortspiel (1993)

16- Crumb, George. Ancient Voices of Children (1970)

17- Czernowin, Chaya. String Quartet (1995)

18-  Davies, Peter Maxwell. Eight Songs for a Mad King (1969)

19-  Feldman, Morton. Rothko Chapel (1970)

20- Feldman, Morton. For Samuel Beckett (1987)

21-  Ferneyhough, Brian. Bone Alphabet (1991)

22- Ferneyhough, Brian. Terrain (1992)

23- Foss, Lukas. Echoi (1963)

24- Glass, Philip. Satyagraha (1980)

25- Grisey, Gérard. Les espaces acoustiques (1985)

26- Haas, Georg Friedrich. In Vain (2002)

27- Harrison, Lou. La Koro Sutro (1973)

28- Kurtág, György. Kafka-Fragmente (1986)

29- Kurtág, György. Stele (1994)

30- Knussen, Oliver. Where the Wild Things Are (1983)

31-  Lachenmann, Helmut. Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern (1990)

32- Lang, David. Little Matchgirl Passion (2007)

33- Ligeti, Győrgy. Atmosphères (1961)

34- Ligeti, Győrgy. Violin Concerto (1993)

35- Lim, Liza. City of Falling Angels (2007)

36- Marshall, Ingram. September Canons (2003)

37- Messiaen. Olivier. Éclairs sur l’au-delà… (1991)

38- Monk, Meredith. Songs of Ascension (2008)

39- Nancarrow, Conlon. Three Canons for Ursula (1989)

40- Nono, Luigi. …sofferte onde serne… (1976)

41-  Pärt, Arvo. Fratres (1976)

42- Penderecki, Krzysztof. Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima (1960)

43- Reich, Steve. Music for Eighteen Musicians (1976)

44- Reich, Steve. Different Trains (1988)

45- Riley, Terry. In C (1964)

46- Saariaho, Kaija. L’amour de loin (2000)

47- Scelsi, Giacinto. Prânam 2 (1973)

48- Sciarrino, Salvatore. Vento D’Ombra (2005)

49- Schoenberg, A Survivor from Warsaw (1947)

50- Shapey, Ralph. Millenium Designs (2000)

51-  Stravinsky, Igor. Variations (Aldous Huxley in Memoriam) (1964)

52- Stockhausen, Karlheinz, Kontakte (1960)

53- Takemitsu, Tōru. From me flows what you call Time (1990)

54- Turnage, Mark-Anthony. Blood on the Floor (1996)

55- Xenakis, Iannis. Pléïades (1978)

56- Xenakis, Iannis. Tetras (1983)

57- Varèse, Edgard. Poème électronique (1958)

58- Wolpe, Stefan. Quartet for Trumpet, Tenor Saxophone, Piano, & Percussion (1954)

59- Wuorinen, Charles. A Reliquary for Igor Stravinsky (1975)

60- Young, LaMonte. The Well-Tuned Piano (1964-present)

by Christian Carey
Chamber Music, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?, Minimalism, Video

ACME at ATP (Video)

Our friends (and the performers on the last Sequenza21 concert) ACME appeared at All Tomorrow’s Parties last week. Quite a coup for the indie classical group, which is enjoying increased crossover success. Below check out video footage of them performing Gavin Bryars’s “Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet” live at ATP.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWapzwPAxmU&feature=related[/youtube]

by Christian Carey
Contemporary Classical

A Composer Gives High Marks to highSCORE

When I was notified of my participation in last year’s highSCORE Festival in July 2011 , I had no idea how pivotal this would be for my prospects as an aspiring young composer. The highSCORE Festival attracts very high caliber composer participants representing leading music educational institutions throughout North America and Europe. The faculty of the highSCORE Festival 2011 included Giya Kancheli, Christopher Theofanidis, Paul Glass, Giovanni Albini and Amy Beth Kirsten, to name but a few. In addition to several private lessons and group master classes, we had the opportunity to hear our music performed in wonderful medieval church acoustics in various venues in the ancient city of Pavia, which has roots dating back to pre-Roman times.

I was lucky in that I heard three of my pieces performed live during the course of the festival: Aftermath for solo guitar (Omar Fassa, guitar), Sanctus for string quartet Quartetto Indaco) and My Beloved for horn and piano (Corey Klein, horn; Ethan Braun, piano). The latter two were world premieres and have since received subsequent performances and Aftermath will be appearing on the next highSCORE CD, recorded by Omar Fassa.

Like many composers I don’t hesitate to work on pieces after having heard them performed. This was the case with Sanctus, in which I found some sections to be very effective, and others less so. I rewrote the piece over the six months that followed the festival, and submitted it to a competition for new works for string quartet, announced by the Villiers Quartet in London. Sanctus is one of six compositions chosen from among over 50 submissions that was selected into the semifinal round by the ensemble.

The friends that I met at the festival encouraged me not only to continue to compose for them, but also to apply to some of the top schools in the United States, where I have long desired to continue my studies. I was recently notified of my acceptance to my top choice school – purportedly one of the most exclusive schools in America.

Giovanni Albini has been extremely supportive of me and my undertakings since the end of the festival. Being a member of the highSCORE New Music Center is a great opportunity open to all past participants of the festival. I have been in constant communication with the highSCORE New Music Center, notifying them of my career developments, some of which they have posted to their news feed, which is viewed by industry people throughout the world.

I highly recommend any aspiring composer to apply to the highSCORE Festival. It is a great place to expand one’s perspective, travel, make lifelong friends and be exposed to living new music legends. As the winner of the 2011 highSCORE Prize, I will be returning to the highSCORE Festival 2012 free of charge and I look forward to reconnecting with the highSCORE faculty and meeting new colleagues.   The application deadline for this year’s Festival is April 15.

by Riho Esko Maimets