The latest wasteLAnd concert at Art Share in downtown Los Angeles was Friday, December 14, 2018 and drew a good sized crowd for five works featuring percussion and voice. Soprano Stephanie Aston and percussionists Dustin Donahue, Sean Dowgray and Ryan Nestor were on hand for a concert whose title, Capacity, was taken from the middle movement of a work by wasteLAnd featured composer Katherine Young. The first piece on the program was Difficulties Putting it Into Practice, by Simon Steen-Andersen. Ryan Nestor and Sean Dowgray arrived on the stage and seated themselves at a table containing a number of paper
Read moreBest of 2018: Composer Portrait CDs 2018 saw the release of a bevy of excellent recordings of music by contemporary composers. These were the portrait CDs that most frequently captivated my ear and captured my CD player. Ipsa Dixit Kate Soper Wet Ink Ensemble (Erin Lesser, flute; Ian Antonio, percussion; Josh Modney, violin) New World Records Composer and vocalist Kate Soper spent from 2010-’16 creating the multi-movement theatre piece Ipsa Dixit. Working in close collaboration with Wet Ink Ensemble, she has crafted a composition in which theatricality encompasses multiple texts – ranging from Aristotle to Lydia Davis –
Read moreBest of 2018: Compilation CDs (Various Genres) Wet Ink: 20 Wet Ink Large Ensemble Carrier Records Wet Ink Ensemble has been performing music for twenty years. To celebrate, they have released Wet Ink: 20, a collection of pieces by frequent collaborators, most from within the ensemble. Intensity is the order of the day on this recording, on the distressed fragmentation of Eric Wubbels’s Auditory Scene Analysis, Sam Pluta’s two clangorous Portraits for electronics and soloists, and Alex Mincek’s edgy Chamber Concerto. The group also tackles Composition 56 by Anthony Braxton, on which Wet Ink adopts a sense of rhythmic
Read more
Best of, Boston, CD Review, CDs, Choral Music, Contemporary Classical, File Under?, Orchestral, Orchestras
Best of 2018: Orchestral CDs with Voices Requiem John Harbison Nashville Symphony Chorus and Nashville Symphony Orchestra, Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor Naxos Records John Harbison’s Requiem Mass had a long and fragmented gestation, but it certainly sounds of a piece. This debut recording by Nashville Symphony Chorus and Orchestra, led by Giancarlo Guerrero, emphasizes the contrasts between hushed reverence and explosive drama that make the work an exciting and vital addition to this well-populated genre. Harbison’s fluid orchestration and deft vocal writing are fully in evidence here. Despite his deep catalog, Requiem is one of his most compelling compositions
Read moreBest Chamber Music 2018 Danish String Quartet Prism I ECM Records Prism I is the first of five CDs by the Danish String Quartet, each featuring a work by Bach, a work by Beethoven, and a complementary piece. The key of E-flat is the central focus of this recording. J.S. Bach’s Fugue in E-flat major (transcribed from Book Two of the Well-Tempered Clavier) is a buoyant opener. Shostakovich’s last string quartet, in E-flat minor, vividly contrasts with it. Shostakovich brings together pensive passages, a funeral march, and what appears to be a reprise of the “knock on the
Read moreThe December Tuesdays@Monk Space concert was titled Grinding Sounds, Repeating Patterns and Sonorous Incantations and was curated to take advantage of the friendly acoustics of Monk Space for just such music. As Aron Kallay noted in the program notes: “Not every hall is good for every combination of instruments and in many ways Monk Space takes this to the extreme. Two things the space absolutely loves are low strings, and voice.” Accordingly, Scott Worthington was on hand with his electrified contrabass and the Hex Vocal Ensemble provided the sonorous incantations. The first piece was I Feel Pretty, by David Lang,
Read moreSimone Dinnerstein in Recital Miller Theatre – Columbia University December 8, 2018 Published on Sequenza21.com By Christian Carey NEW YORK – On Saturday, December 8th, pianist Simone Dinnerstein made a return appearance to Miller Theatre to perform an intriguing and eclectic solo recital. The stage was set with subdued lighting, with electric “candles” placed throughout and, over the course of the evening, small shifts of color. Ms. Dinnerstein, dressed in elegant, flowing attire, created an atmosphere through her performance demeanor as well. The recital was announced with no intermission and the pianist paused from playing only once, midway
Read more[Ed. note: Former S21 contributor, member, and friend David Salvage has in the last couple years pulled up his U.S. tent pegs and landed in Italy. He’s offered up his review of the latest György Kurtág premiere last month at La Scala.] …………………………………………………. After decades of prodding, false starts, intense study, delays, and, finally, seven years of composing, György Kurtág, at age ninety-two, has written his first opera. For its subject matter, he has chosen Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, a play he saw during its initial run in Paris in 1957 and has loved ever since. World premieres don’t get any more hotly
Read more
Choral Music, Commissions, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, early music, File Under?, New York
Tallis Scholars: A Renaissance Christmas Miller Theatre Early Music Series Church of St. Mary the Virgin December 1, 2018 Published on Sequenza 21 By Christian Carey NEW YORK – The Tallis Scholars, directed by Peter Phillips, made their annual appearance in New York as part of Miller Theatre’s Early Music series at the Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Midtown. The program was billed as a dual celebration — the 45th anniversary of the Tallis Scholars and Miller Theatre’s 30th anniversary season. In honor of the occasion, Miller Theatre commissioned a new piece for the Tallis Scholars
Read moreBest of 2018 – Best Violin Concerto Michael Hersch end stages, Violin Concerto Patricia Kopatchinskaja, violin, International Contemporary Ensemble, Tito Muñoz, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra New Focus Recordings fcr208 Composer Michael Hersch consistently writes music with emotional immediacy that explores aching vulnerability with consummate eloquence. His Violin Concerto is like a wound still raw. Soloist Patricia Kopatchinskaja ramps up the intensity, as does ICE, conducted here by Tino Muñoz, rendering the work’s first and third movements with bracing strength and its second with fragile uneasiness. This emotion returns, amplified by high-lying solos and echoing attacks from the ensemble, to provide
Read more