The London show last Friday was a wonderful evening. Here's what we heard:
John Adams: The Chairman Dances (Foxtrot for orchestra) Julia Wolfe: Flower Power (UK premiere) Interval Martland: Horses of instruction Philip Glass: Symphony No.3 for string orchestra
The London show last Friday was a wonderful evening. Here's what we heard:
John Adams: The Chairman Dances (Foxtrot for orchestra) Julia Wolfe: Flower Power (UK premiere) Interval Martland: Horses of instruction Philip Glass: Symphony No.3 for string orchestra
Thanks, it seems to have been quite a special evening.
Unfortunately Denmark is to small a country to attract an event like this. (I think)
- As a Cantaloupe at Bandcamp subscriber, there's newsletters coming my way now and again:
We’re especially excited to bring you these two new titles this May,
each of which marks a significant milestone in the history of Cantaloupe
Music.
Michael Gordon’s poignant choral work Anonymous Man, performed by The
Crossing, is essentially a memoir about his New York City neighborhood.
From “It’s Julie Passing Through Town,” a love song that tells the story
of how Gordon met his wife, composer Julia Wolfe, to “I First Noticed
Robinson,” which recounts, in rhythmically charged fashion, Gordon’s
conversations with a homeless man living on his block, Anonymous Man
tells a story that’s intimate, engaging and viscerally real.
Meanwhile, Meredith Monk’s MEMORY GAME, a monumental team-up with
Meredith Monk, her Vocal Ensemble, and the Bang on a Can All-Stars, is a
bristling collection — part retrospective, part sonic blast into the
future — that showcases the vocal prowess of an indefatigable master of
experimental music. Monk and the All-Stars will present MEMORY GAME in
its entirety at this year’s Big Ears Festival in Knoxville (March 29),
and again at the inaugural Long Play Festival in NYC (May 1). We hope
you can join us!
Until next time, we thank you, as always, for your support!!!
I really enjoy my Cantaloupe subscription, especially when a subscriber exclusive like this one shows up:
released June 5, 2020
When I am alone was commissioned by the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in
Saint Louis for the reopening of the redesign of their building in 2015.
It was originally written for ‘mumbling choir’ and was performed by
hundreds of singers from the Saint Louis Symphony Chorus, the Webster
University Chorus, and the Saint Louis Children’s Choir.
The solo version of when I am alone, sung by Caroline Shaw, was adapted
with the help of my frequent collaborator Jody Elff, specifically for
use by the artist Suzanne Bocanegra in her installation Poorly Watched
Girls at the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia, in 2019
Composed improvisation by Christine Southworth and Evan Ziporyn,
performed at Bang on a Can Summer Institute of Music @ Mass MoCA, North
Adams, Massachusetts. Christine Southworth performs Highland Bagpipes
with The Drone Zone in a new composed improvisation (led by Southworth
and Ziporyn) based on music by LaMonte Young and Arnold Dreyblatt, for
bagpipe, baritone saxophones, and strings.
(b. 1959, Chicago) makes music at the crossroads between
genres and cultures, east and west. He studied at Eastman, Yale & UC
Berkeley with Joseph Schwantner, Martin Bresnick, & Gerard Grisey.
He first traveled to Bali in 1981, studying with Madé Lebah, Colin
McPhee's 1930s musical informant. He returned on a Fulbright in 1987.
Earlier that year, he performed a clarinet solo at the First Bang on a
Can Marathon in New York. His involvement with BOAC continued for 25
years: in 1992 he co-founded the Bang on a Can All-stars (Musical
America's 2005 Ensemble of the Year), with whom he toured the globe and
premiered over 100 commissioned works, collaborating with Nik Bartsch,
Iva Bittova, Don Byron, Ornette Coleman, Brian Eno, Philip Glass,
Meredith Monk, Thurston Moore, Terry Riley and Tan Dun. He co-produced
their seminal 1996 recording of Brian Eno's Music for Airports, as well
as their most recent CD, Big Beautiful Dark & Scary (2012). . . .
When asked about three of his signature orchestral works — the
Grammy-winning Become Ocean, its sequel Become Desert, and the original
source Become River (previously unreleased as an official recording
until now) — composer John Luther Adams refers to them collectively as
“a trilogy that I never set out to write.”
Become River, composed for chamber orchestra, was the first of the
three, although it began while Adams was working on Become Ocean for the
Seattle Symphony. “Steven Schick and I were having dinner together,” he
recalls, “and I went on at length about the music I’d begun to imagine.
‘So you’re already composing a symphonic ocean,’ Steve said. ‘Maybe for
a smaller orchestra you could go ahead and compose that river in
delta.’ He had me, and I knew it. Within a week I’d begun work on Become
River.”
Collected here for the first time, with newly remastered versions of
Become Ocean and Become Desert by acclaimed engineer Nathaniel Reichman,
The Become Trilogy pays tribute to a magical partnership between Adams,
conductor Ludovic Morlot and the renowned Seattle Symphony. As a whole,
the music speaks both to the meditative solace of solitude, and the
universally shared experience of living, giving and interacting as a
citizen of the world.
I see BOAC have another Marathon tomorrow. As ever the time difference will stop me from listening live which is a shame. Are these performances available to stream later? I know that the live stream is free / NYOP I wouldn't mind paying to listen on demand.
Looking at the archive site canland.org there appears to be no highlights after summer 2018.
Gabriel Kahane commissioned with support from Raulee Marcus & Stephen Block
Rohan Chander commissioned with support from Maria & Robert A. Skirnick
Alvin Lucier commissioned with support from Jane & Dick Stewart
Jakhongir Shakur commissioned with support from Liz & Greg Lutz and Pamela Drexler
Joel Thompson commissioned with support from Dave Lake & Linda Wright
Jennifer Walshe commissioned with support from Richard Ferrante
María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir commissioned with the support of the Carl Meier Family
Matthew Shipp commissioned with the support of Jack Homer & Emily Hartzog
Eve Beglarian commissioned with the support of Oscar Gerardo
And a notice from Ethan Iverson (no longer with Bad Plus) about William Robin's book on BOAC:
Industry: Bang on a Can and New Music in the Marketplace by William Robin is a riveting history of art and business in the 80’s and 90’s. It reads like a thriller: recommended.
While reading I also caught up with more of the extensive repertoire composed and curated by David Lang, Michael Gordon, and Julia Wolfe, that was good to do as well.
Robin occasionally pans out from BOAC to the larger spectrum; the chapter how the hit recording of Henryk Górecki’s Third Symphony affected the record industry was revelatory.
Comments
Here's what we heard:
John Adams: The Chairman Dances (Foxtrot for orchestra)
Julia Wolfe: Flower Power (UK premiere)
Interval
Martland: Horses of instruction
Philip Glass: Symphony No.3 for string orchestra
Michael Gordon’s poignant choral work Anonymous Man, performed by The Crossing, is essentially a memoir about his New York City neighborhood. From “It’s Julie Passing Through Town,” a love song that tells the story of how Gordon met his wife, composer Julia Wolfe, to “I First Noticed Robinson,” which recounts, in rhythmically charged fashion, Gordon’s conversations with a homeless man living on his block, Anonymous Man tells a story that’s intimate, engaging and viscerally real.
Meanwhile, Meredith Monk’s MEMORY GAME, a monumental team-up with Meredith Monk, her Vocal Ensemble, and the Bang on a Can All-Stars, is a bristling collection — part retrospective, part sonic blast into the future — that showcases the vocal prowess of an indefatigable master of experimental music. Monk and the All-Stars will present MEMORY GAME in its entirety at this year’s Big Ears Festival in Knoxville (March 29), and again at the inaugural Long Play Festival in NYC (May 1). We hope you can join us!
Until next time, we thank you, as always, for your support!!!
Adam, Bill, & Cassie
The solo version of when I am alone, sung by Caroline Shaw, was adapted with the help of my frequent collaborator Jody Elff, specifically for use by the artist Suzanne Bocanegra in her installation Poorly Watched Girls at the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia, in 2019
Earlier that year, he performed a clarinet solo at the First Bang on a Can Marathon in New York. His involvement with BOAC continued for 25 years: in 1992 he co-founded the Bang on a Can All-stars (Musical America's 2005 Ensemble of the Year), with whom he toured the globe and premiered over 100 commissioned works, collaborating with Nik Bartsch, Iva Bittova, Don Byron, Ornette Coleman, Brian Eno, Philip Glass, Meredith Monk, Thurston Moore, Terry Riley and Tan Dun. He co-produced their seminal 1996 recording of Brian Eno's Music for Airports, as well as their most recent CD, Big Beautiful Dark & Scary (2012). . . .
Become River, composed for chamber orchestra, was the first of the three, although it began while Adams was working on Become Ocean for the Seattle Symphony. “Steven Schick and I were having dinner together,” he recalls, “and I went on at length about the music I’d begun to imagine. ‘So you’re already composing a symphonic ocean,’ Steve said. ‘Maybe for a smaller orchestra you could go ahead and compose that river in delta.’ He had me, and I knew it. Within a week I’d begun work on Become River.”
Collected here for the first time, with newly remastered versions of Become Ocean and Become Desert by acclaimed engineer Nathaniel Reichman, The Become Trilogy pays tribute to a magical partnership between Adams, conductor Ludovic Morlot and the renowned Seattle Symphony. As a whole, the music speaks both to the meditative solace of solitude, and the universally shared experience of living, giving and interacting as a citizen of the world.
PROGRAM
(order to be determined)
ALVIN LUCIER new work performed by MARK STEWART
AMIR ELSAFFAR new work performed by KEN THOMSON
BORA YOON new work performed by herself
EVE BEGLARIAN new work performed by LARA DOWNES
GABRIEL KAHANE new work performed by ARLEN HLUSKO
GREGORY SPEARS new work performed by DAVID BYRD-MARROW
INGRID LAUBROCK new work performed by herself
JAKHONGIR SHUKUR new work performed by ROBERT BLACK
JENNIFER WALSHE new work performed by herself
JOEL THOMPSON new work performed by ANTHONY ROTH COSTANZO
JOHN HOLLENBECK new work performed by DAVID COSSIN
KRISTINA WOLFE new work performed by MOLLY BARTH
MARÍA HULD MARKAN SIGFÚSDÓTTIR new work performed by CHI-CHI NWANOKU
MATTHEW SHIPP new work performed by himself
MOLLY HERRON new work performed by MAYA STONE
ROHAN CHANDER new work performed by VICKY CHOW
PROGRAM
(subject to change – check back for updates)
JAKHONGIR SHUKUR Potter’s Wheel, performed by ROBERT BLACK
JENNIFER WALSHE Happiness Starts Right Now
MARIA HULD MARKAN SIGFUSDOTTIR Pending, performed by CHI-CHI NWANOKU OBE
GABRIEL KAHANE Hollywood & Vine, performed by ARLEN HLUSKO
GREGORY SPEARS A Distant Ridge of Earth, performed by DAVID BYRD-MARROW
KRISTINA WOLFE new work performed by MOLLY BARTH
AMIR ELSAFFAR Thaw, for bass clarinet solo, performed by KEN THOMSON
BORA YOON Postcards from the Pacific
MATTHEW SHIPP Spaceman’s Blues
JOEL THOMPSON Supplication and Compensation, performed by ANTHONY ROTH COSTANZO
ROHAN CHANDER △ or THE TRAGEDY OF HIKKOMORI LOVELESS from FINAL//FANTASY, performed by VICKY CHOW
DAVID COSSIN A. C. T.
EVE BEGLARIAN A Solemn Shyness, performed by LARA DOWNES
INGRID LAUBROCK Inkblots
MOLLY HERRON Canon No. 4, performed by MAYA STONE
ALVIN LUCIER Weirs for electric guitar and resonant objects, performed by MARK STEWART
**********************************************************************************************Gabriel Kahane commissioned with support from Raulee Marcus & Stephen Block
Rohan Chander commissioned with support from Maria & Robert A. Skirnick
Alvin Lucier commissioned with support from Jane & Dick Stewart
Jakhongir Shakur commissioned with support from Liz & Greg Lutz and Pamela Drexler
Joel Thompson commissioned with support from Dave Lake & Linda Wright
Jennifer Walshe commissioned with support from Richard Ferrante
María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir commissioned with the support of the Carl Meier Family
Matthew Shipp commissioned with the support of Jack Homer & Emily Hartzog
Eve Beglarian commissioned with the support of Oscar Gerardo
Industry: Bang on a Can and New Music in the Marketplace by William Robin is a riveting history of art and business in the 80’s and 90’s. It reads like a thriller: recommended.
While reading I also caught up with more of the extensive repertoire composed and curated by David Lang, Michael Gordon, and Julia Wolfe, that was good to do as well.
Robin occasionally pans out from BOAC to the larger spectrum; the chapter how the hit recording of Henryk Górecki’s Third Symphony affected the record industry was revelatory.
Alex Ross has more on Industry, as does the relevant Robin webpage.
BANG ON A CAN MARATHON
APRIL 18, 2021
1-5PM ET