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Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum

It's Too Darn Hot

By Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum
I am tossing coherence out the window in honor of a proper fan, so here are a few random thoughts to underscore this scorcher.

Articles
Frank J. Oteri

Audience Rights

By Frank J. Oteri
If indeed music results more from the audience than the folks supplying what the audience is listening to, what should the role of the audience be and what rights does an audience have?

Articles
DanVisconti

Persistence of Memory?

By Dan Visconti
While technological advances may be balanced out be a corresponding decrease in mental capacity, we may actually come out on top.

Articles
Alexandra Gardner

Working the Visual Angle

By Alexandra Gardner
Capturing photographic images of a working process helps to remind me how different pieces progressed and how the ideas rolled along—those little sketches and lists were crucial in the moment (because if it doesn’t get written down, it will be gone) and a simple image can bring it all back.

Articles
Michael Straus

Ultima Contemporary Music Festival: Two Extremes

Over forty concerts in two-dozen venues scattered throughout Oslo!

Articles
Colin Holter

What's the Meaning of This!?!

By Colin Holter
Rather than ask “what’s really happening?”, we should ask “what purely metaphorical reading of this music might reach a consensus among informed spectators?”

Articles
Molly Sheridan

Mary Halvorson: Saturn Sings

The upcoming release of Saturn Sings (Firehouse 12 Records) featuring the Mary Halvorson Quintet, is very much an outgrowth of Halvorson’s exploratory spirit.

Articles
David Smooke

What I Learned from George Crumb

By David Smooke
Sometimes we get stressed and tired and we hear the same pieces over and over again and we forget the most important thing.

Articles
Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum

Notation, Notation, Notation

By Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum
More and more I find that notation reflects the action of creating new music. Beyond the speed of the creative process, notation can successfully function in many different capacities if its intention is clear.

Articles
Molly Sheridan

Sounds Heard: Music Makes a City

The biggest reason for fans of culture to run out and see Music Makes a City, a new documentary directed by Owsley Brown III and Jerome Hiler, might be the core suggestion it makes: that when times get tough, the talented get bold.

Articles
Frank J. Oteri

That Strange Thing Called Memory

By Frank J. Oteri
Many years ago I realized that I was more likely to remember a passage of my own music if I didn’t write it down than if I did.

Articles
Kevin Puts

Lapse

Suddenly and inexplicably I am lost, Marin Alsop stops conducting, the audience is utterly silent; I think I say, “Sorry, I have to start the third movement again.”

Articles
Elena Kats-Chernin

An Australian in Santa Cruz: An Insider's Report from the 2010 Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music

This was the first time I’ve ever experienced Marin Alsop live in concert and what a dynamic personality she is; the performance is also wonderfully precise.

Articles
Alexandra Gardner

Let It Stew

By Alexandra Gardner
On several occasions I have been gobsmacked by late-arriving inspirations that have rather drastically changed the form or some other aspect of a composition, definitely for the better. The ideas seem so obvious—when they finally show up!

Articles
DanVisconti

Borrowed or Purloined?

By Dan Visconti
Good composers borrow. Great composers steal.

Articles
Michael Straus

Ultima(te) Contemporary Music Festival: Sensory Overload

I really wanted to attend as much of the Ultima Contemporary Music Festival as humanly possible. I picked up an all-access pass (which can be purchased at any local 7-Eleven!) which gets me into eleven non-stop days of music.

Articles
Colin Holter

Perfect Timing

By Colin Holter
Give some thought to your time management strategies: They may just save your hide.

Articles
Ian David Moss

Composing a Life, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dollar

Knowledge is power, and power is not something that composers have historically enjoyed. If you want to be in control of your circumstances instead of letting your circumstances control you, it might well be time for a different kind of education.

Articles
NewMusicBox Staff

Composer Scott Wheeler Among 2010 Classical Recording Foundation Award Winners

Composer Scott Wheeler is among the just-announced winners of the 2010 Classical Recording Foundation Awards. A total of four prizes will be presented at the foundation’s ninth annual awards ceremony and benefit on October 4, 2010, at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall.

Articles
Alexandra Gardner

Sounds Heard: Kathleen Supové—The Exploding Piano

Kathleen Supové’s release on Major Who Media, The Exploding Piano, is aptly titled in that each work includes elements, both electronic and acoustic, that make the piano larger than life.

Articles
Frank J. Oteri

The Morning After

By Frank J. Oteri
What qualities in a performance make it seem faster or slower than its actual duration?

Articles
David Smooke

Making a Scene

By David Smooke
Is Baltimore ready for a new music naissance?

Articles
Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum

Look At This Music

By Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum
The role of great album artwork in enticing a listener into a great recording has changed.

Articles
NewMusicBox Staff

11th Annual Latin Grammy Nominees Announced

The 11th Annual Latin Grammy Award Nominees have been announced, including five composers in the Best Classical Contemporary Composition category: Miguel Del Aguila, Sergio Assad, Lalo Schifrin, Orlando Jacinto Garcia, and Tania Leon.

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NewMusicBox receives major support from the Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts and The ASCAP Foundation.

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NewMusicBox is funded in part by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, and with support from The Aaron Copland Fund for Music and The Amphion Foundation, Inc. Support for New Music USA and its many programs and activities is provided by foundations, corporations, government agencies, and hundreds of individual contributors.

NewMusicBox receives major support from the Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts and The ASCAP Foundation. NewMusicBox is funded in part by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, and with support from The Aaron Copland Fund for Music and The Amphion Foundation, Inc. Support for New Music USA and its many programs and activities is provided by foundations, corporations, government agencies, and hundreds of individual contributors.