Category: Headlines

From Groupmuse to the BSO: Show-hopping in Boston

Posted on May 12, 2015 by Will Roseliep - Field Reports, Headlines

If you come to Boston to see only one orchestra, you’ll come for the Boston Symphony. The BSO is as much a part of Boston’s identity as the Red Sox, lobster rolls, and organized crime.

The orchestra operates out of Symphony Hall near downtown, and on nights when the fluorescent “BSO” sign lights up, the people flock to it.

Right now Boston classical fans are very high on new BSO music director Andris Nelsons. Given the right timeline, the right money, and the desire, Nelsons could be on pace for city legend status like Russell or Bird, Ted Williams or Bobby Orr. L.A. has Gustavo Dudamel; Boston now has Andris Nelsons.

The BSO can be pricey, but the orchestra makes exceptions for younger people, and so for only $20 each my friend and I got into a show. We weaved our way through the patrons, ushers, and classical nerds and found our seats. My friend was put on immediate warning by the woman next to him: his leg was too far to the right. Noted. People were swarming. The official capacity of Symphony Hall is 2,625. This show wasn’t a sellout, but it was close.

They played a world premiere organ concerto by Michael Gandolfi and Mahler’s Sixth Symphony. Afterwards the crowd roared. Even after a long stint wedged into cramped chairs (think economy-class plane seats) everyone was ecstatic. That triumph carried over into the lobby and out to the street as brave patrons played Frogger with Massachusetts Avenue traffic.

There will always be a need for this dressed-up symphony experience, but that’s just the beginning of the story in Boston. Outside the walls of Symphony Hall, an impressive and diverse classical scene has shaped up on its own.

The city can only stamp its name on one orchestra, and that deal was done in 1881. But other organizations—orchestras, chamber groups—are doing Boston proud, taking risks and reinventing the audience experience. The product being cooked up in these rogue classical laboratories is flooding the streets. There’s never been a better time to be a classical fan.

*It’s hard to get an accurate count of the orchestras and chamber groups in metro Boston since many fly under the radar. Some habitually shift personnel, others work intermittently.

You can start with mainstays like the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and the wildly popular Video Game Orchestra. Other groups are in a building-and-expansion phase. The Boston New Music Initiative prizes works by living composers. Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra of Boston is a self-governed freelance collective. A Far Cry is an edgy ensemble with peerless talent and ambitious programming.

When you add in pick-up orchestras, and informal and invite-only arrangements, you begin to get a sense of the city’s appetite for classical music.

It adds up. A 2014 ArtsBoston report estimated the city’s annual arts spending—spread across music, ballet, museums, and theater—was $1.4 billion. Two key factors make that possible.

The first is the willingness of the audience to pony up. Attendees spent $450 million beyond admission price at museums and shows. The second factor as it relates to classical music is the talent pipeline. The area is home to top-flight schools like New England Conservatory, Boston Conservatory, and the Berklee College of Music. The city is flush with talent. Orchestras hire young guns with musical chops for days. Students, in turn, get on-the-job mentoring.

I decided to see firsthand how it all worked. I dropped in on a show where ace percussionists tackled brand-new music; a choral concert where the music was served with a side of social justice; and a house show where the Bach and the PBR flowed like water.

*Tuesday, April 7, 2015. 8:00 p.m.

NEC Percussion Ensemble

Jordan Hall, New England Conservatory

Price: Free

New England Conservatory is housed just a block from Symphony Hall. It’s backed up against the Orange Line train tracks, and sits so close to the adjacent YMCA you might assume they’re housed in the same building.

On this rainy night—we had over nine feet of snow this winter; rain will never again faze us—a hundred people settled into wooden, leather-backed chairs in Jordan Hall to hear the NEC Percussion Ensemble.

We started with a flourish: the first movement from Nebojsa Zivkovic’s Trio per Uno. The piece was unrelenting, the playing inspired.

https://www.instagram.com/p/1MkEH-wfXL/

Next was Steve Reich’s Six Marimbas. The performers were gleeful and reckless. (Were they shooting 5-hour ENERGY backstage? Only the stagehands could say for sure.) Reich’s music can sink even steely performers, but these players barely broke a sweat.

The focal point of the night was composer Larry Wallach’s Winter Music. It was a world premiere, and there was a lot to like:

Percussionists wearing telemarketer headsets.
A multitude of percussive goodies deployed across the stage.
A conductor wearing a suit with a Tracy McGrady thing going on (an undeniable joy—this summer’s hottest look).
Two players upstage on accordion and celeste, never looking away from the conductor.

Wallach evokes the long slog of winter with uneasy patter, interspersed with moments of space and calm. In the second movement Wallach had players hoarsely whisper lines into the aforementioned headsets from Wallace Stevens’s famous poem “The Snowman.” (“One must have a mind of winter/ to regard the frost and the boughs/ of the pine-trees crusted with snow.”)

In the third movement Winter Music found its groove with banging unison parts. When the players clanged to a finish there were woops, hollers, and applause. That was just the end of the first half.

By the end of the night we’d heard an impressive program highlighted by a world premiere. The show was driven by young talent with an appetite for tricky music, and an impulse to get it note-perfect. It was free, and exciting, and there would be more shows like it before the week was out.

*Saturday, April 11, 2015. 8:00 p.m.

Boston Conservatory Women’s Chorus, Boston City Singers

“The Bard Sings”

Seully Hall, Boston Conservatory

Price: Free

Like many cities, Boston has a diversity problem in its classical scene. There are too few people of color in orchestras, especially considering Boston is a majority-minority city. The problem isn’t just racial or ethnic underrepresentation, but social, economic, and geographic divisions, too. So it was a little shocking to see that problem addressed, at least in part, at a show I went to at the Boston Conservatory.

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This Boston Conservatory Women’s Chorus emanated pure power, and you would’ve gotten your wig blown back sitting in the first few rows. The concert’s premise was the intersection of Shakespeare’s written word with music written about the Bard himself. So we heard James MacMillan’s Sonnet, Amy Beach’s Three Shakespeare Choruses, as well as Brahms’s Vier Gesänge with harp and double-barrel French horns.

But the swerve came when the BCWC exited mid-set. Co-conductor Daniel Mahoney told the crowd that groups like his needed to get out of their “ivory towers” and work outside the conservatory walls. Mahoney said BCWC had much to learn from up-and-coming outfits. With that he yielded the stage to the Boston City Singers.

The City Singers were young and fearless, and their mission statement—“training and inspiring the musician…to support personal development, celebrate diversity, and foster good will”—reads like a blueprint for Boston’s future arts scene. They did a traditional Maori song, and “Gloria” from György Orbán’s Mass No. 6. They even did show tunes. It was bizarre and glorious.

Boston is a city of tradition. There is a deep vein of historical religiousness that carries through to the present. We’ve still got “blue laws” on the books to ensure Bostonians’ moral compasses point true North.

But there’s an equal measure of revolutionary spirit here. Phony or not, we’re all a little taken with the original rebels, those 18th-century punks that talked a good game about liberty and freedom.

For a minute I saw both sides at once. I’ve never been to a show where the conductor questioned his group’s own mission. It was scripted, of course, but there was thunderous applause for the Boston City Singers, the BCWC, and the change they foretold. Music schools are churning out exceptional performers, but it doesn’t mean much if the music can’t escape those hallowed halls. Tonight it did. And some new ideas snuck back in, too.

*Friday, April 10, 2015. 8:30 p.m.

Groupmuse/Boston Young Composers Ensemble

“Bach, Bates, and Birds”

Price: Free ($10 donation)

This show arguably said the most about where Boston’s classical and new music scene is headed. Music schools are hotbeds for experimentation, but outfits like Groupmuse take this proposition to a whole other place.

Groupmuse is a Boston startup that pairs generous house- and apartment-dwellers with musicians looking to play intimate shows. The premise completely deflates the typical, uber-formal classical music concert.

The musicians get an opportunity to play for beer-drinking, toe-tapping, head-nodding living-room audiences. As a fan—no matter what level—you can link up with no-frills classical music seven nights a week without putting a hurt on your wallet. It feels a bit like speed-dating, but no one wears name tags.

I rolled up on this Groupmuse drinking Arnold Palmers in honor of the Masters, which was in progress.

As I parked at the top of a hill I saw a young-ish man walk by staring hard into his cell phone. Without looking up he took a decisive 90-degree turn and continued on. Navigating by phone. Bingo. Partygoer.

The thing about Groupmuse is that you’re inviting yourself into a stranger’s domestic situation for a house party. You’re in a room with a small cadre of people. There are Solo cups filled with mystery liquids, jury-rigged seats, and people who are painfully kind. It’s jarring the first time around.

There wasn’t much pre-show chatter here, just handshakes and smiles. Someone talked about how Andris Nelsons looks off-balance conducting. He added: “I like him a lot.” The musicians—violin, cello, clarinet, flute, some of them members of the Boston Young Composers Ensemble—took their seats in the living room.

They played movements from Bach’s The Art of the Fugue, and we clapped between each (a Groupmuse directive). Then they took on Mason Bates’s The Life of Birds. You could tell they’d performed it before, handling tricky ensemble passages with ease. Toward the end the bench I sat on got a little uncomfortable, but the music didn’t.

As an encore an audience member grabbed his sax and performed a piece by Ian Dicke called Straphanger. It was angular, multi-metered, metallic, and hard. A different kind of encore, but it worked—like playing Gary Numan songs to achieve peak pre-bedtime chill.

It’s been said Groupmuse is like Airbnb for classical house shows, and I think that’s a good characterization. What the setting lacks in opulence (this being a normal apartment like yours or mine) it makes up for in comfort, atmosphere, and alcohol.

Every attendee I talked to was a musician. (One was an assistant to the great Gunther Schuller.) Maybe Groupmuse hasn’t caught on with less-adventurous folks. But it will. For the price of a donation and some socializing, it’s a seductive classical fix.

Taken as a whole, these shows don’t constitute musical upheaval. They don’t foretell the demise of the BSO or any establishment-type groups that still serve a vital purpose—entertaining high volumes of people.

What they do show us is that Boston is serious about its music and willing to get behind wild new ideas. Not every group is destined for all-time greatness. Some fail. That’s the nature of the beast.

But we’re a city with a mean classical habit, and on any given night you can luck into cool chamber music showcases or solo recitals, most of which are—crucially—inexpensive. The groups come and go, but the audiences hang on, and they’re ready for the next show.

***

Will Roseliep is a producer for Boston Public Radio, and media director for the Cambridge Philharmonic. He’s the author of The Libertine’s Guide to the Classical Music Revolution. He hosts the Classical Dark Arts podcast, and writes the weekly Classical Dark Arts newsletter.

Killsonic: L.A.’s wild, war-painted musical incubator

Posted on April 29, 2015 by October Crifasi - Field Reports, Headlines

It was late July of 2010, and we stood lined up in pairs just outside the lobby of the REDCAT Theater in downtown Los Angeles. I found myself constantly adjusting the bottom layer of the tattered green-black garbage bag dress that was my costume as a member of the Tongues Bloody Tongues women’s choir. We were a wild-looking gang of women, specifically placed at the end of a long and windy procession of musicians, with our hair teased out and plastered into swoops and swirls on top of our heads, black liquid eyeliner streaked in an arc of tears from the lower lid of one eye, fashioned to look like oil. As we waited, the accordion players in front of us made jokes amongst themselves while members of the drum core twirled sticks deftly in one hand or stood quietly, waiting for the cue to move.

A friend of our troupe burst out of the lobby doors and into the REDCAT parking structure where we waited, exclaiming, “It’s sold out! They can’t fit any more people into the lobby.” Excited chatter rose from the line. The tension between us all grew thick and the garage seemed to grow warmer. A few of my fellow choir members checked the batteries of their bullhorns, pressing the red button in and out in a series of audible clicks.

In five minutes the Los Angeles-based music collective and marching band known as Killsonic (KS) was about to make its REDCAT debut, literally and sonically invading the cramped lobby with a bombastic cacophony of horns, accordions, full drum core, Amazonian war cries and amplified shrieks. We were to make our way through the center of the crowd and divide into two lines, furies on one side and musicians on the other, and we were to engage in a full-on sound battle. The audience could not escape, were not meant to escape. They were now both full participant and witness to this musical frenzy, showered in sound and confusion only to then be escorted into the theater space itself surrounded by both band and choir.

It was a moment that in many ways symbolized the creative culmination of the long-time and ever-evolving sound of the band and the city it hailed from. By the time the band had made its way to the New Original Works Festival there that July, it had grown from a little-known smallish avant-garde jazz ensemble made up of primarily music students into a sought-after 30-plus person marching band with a membership comprised of people representing all walks of life, music training, education, financial, and occupational backgrounds.

My introduction to the group happened in the early ‘00s when good friend, composer, and KS founding member Brian Walsh heard me doing vocal warm ups in between teaching students at the music store where we both taught in the San Fernando Valley. He asked me if the sounds he had heard emanating from my studio had come from me. Not quite sure how to interpret the question, I answered with a sheepish, “Yes, why? Was it too loud?” Brian just smiled and asked me if I’d like to sing in a new project he was involved in.

Over a series of many Tuesday evenings we would all cram together in the living room of a small house in Highland Park and run through song after song. We endured long, sometimes agonizing breaks in between while Brian and KS founders contrabassist Michael Ibarra, drummer “Princess Frank” Luis, guitarist Minh Pham, and percussionist Dominique “Chief” Rodriguez would debate arrangements and timing.

It was during these various rehearsal cycles with KS, in all its shapes and variations, that my foundational understanding and approach to creating music was challenged and ultimately blasted apart. I realized quickly that being a part of this group was not going to lead to the makings of singer-songwriter-y stuff. I would not be singing with my guitar, and the sounds demanded of me as a vocalist would not be the gentle, soft, and harmony-laden sound so often associated with the music of Southern California. It would instead demand growls and guttural sounds in some places, whispering and soft crooning the next. It would demand that I surrender all I knew about “verse chorus verse” and be an active creator and listener of something completely foreign to my classically trained ears and thinking. Creating the material needed for the choir’s parts in Tongues Bloody Tongues meant turning the traditional song form on its head, breaking it down, and patching it back together in a way that would create a sonic picture of a sandstorm in the desert or the call of tropical birds in the jungle. At times we were provided with only a verbal description of a feeling or landscape and other times we were introduced to the cues and symbols used in John Zorn’s game pieces. The process summoned both the beautiful and ugly from us vocally and coupled it with the ceremonial make up of either chanteuse or madwoman, depending on the performance.

Los Angeles itself is a city of duality. At first glance one may see only the gorgeous and sprawling campus of venues such as the Walt Disney Concert Hall and the LA Opera atop Bunker Hill in downtown L.A. These are spaces where the classic canon of high art is performed on a regular basis. One may see that audiences for such places and repertoire is often comprised of a rather homogeneous community: older adults of a certain income bracket, education, and experience of life and art. Yet one only has to walk a few blocks down the hill from such revered centers of culture to experience the truth and reality of downtown L.A.: an endless stream of homeless men and women sleeping in doorways and sidewalks, many bussed in and dumped from facilities and towns unable to contain or rehabilitate them.

Killsonic held the right musical pedigree to play the more refined stages of Bunker Hill, but it was from the less glamorous part of the city that the band declared itself musically. With its sinister horn parts and rapid-fire percussion, the group took to the streets and subways of downtown L.A., to those seen but unspoken of places and energies, and created music that erupted in frenzied harmonies and dissonance only to then melt into a slinky groove or Latin-infused rhythm of the neighborhoods they lived and worked in. Killsonic at UCLA’s Royce Hall

As the band grew in popularity and exposure, it refused to change its tone and approach, instead bringing these truths into more open public spaces. The band eventually took its work right into the spaces it rebelled against: outside on the plaza of UCLA’s Royce Hall, around and through the art and sculpture of LACMA, the slick and hip art galleries on the Sunset Strip. In 2010, Killsonic marched itself straight into the audience of the black box theater of Walt Disney Concert Hall to tell a wild music tale of the history of Iraq.

Los Angeles is also a city that is easy to hide away or get lost in. The sense of community that can be found in other creative towns such as Chicago or San Francisco is much less present here. You have to work to find your tribe, and you have to remain dedicated to sustaining and maintaining it. You have to be fierce in your creative work, because the number of people here pursuing similar endeavors is exponential and there is much audience fatigue—too many people performing in too many spaces with all the prospective audiences generally too wrapped up in the reason they moved here themselves to take time out to go see your show or play or gig or reading. That Killsonic was able to create a growing and loyal musical community and space for itself in a town where such things are difficult is truly incredible.

The performance at REDCAT signaled the beginning of the group’s dissolution. This was not because of conflict, but because over the course of its ten year history, a varied and colorful collective of musicians, composers, music educators, filmmakers, visual, and performance artists had grown in confidence and talent through the continued supportive environment of the collective itself. The time had come for its members to reinvent themselves once again, much like the ongoing reconstruction of Los Angeles itself.

El-Haru Kuroi—a trio made up of Michael A. Ibarra on bass, Eddicka Organista on vocals and guitar, and Dominique “Chief” Rodriguez on percussion—emerged around the time of Tongues Bloody Tongues performances. The group has since garnered a substantial fan base for and acclaim for itself, carrying the Mexican and African rhythms often referenced in KS music into a more intimate and guitar-based setting.

Dominique also joined up with several KS horn players and another music store colleague, Charles de Castro, to create a group called the California Feetwarmers, a musical ensemble that came together to share their mutual love of ‘20s music and bring it to a public audience. The group recently found itself walking the red carpet at the 2014 57th Annual Grammy ceremony as nominees for Best American Roots Performance on Keb Mo’s “The Old Me Better” and appearing on the BBC.

And the person responsible for bringing me into this tribe, Brian Walsh, has and continues to compose and play in a wide variety of avant-garde jazz and new music projects, most recently in the group Gnarwhallaby, the Brian Walsh Set Trio, and upcoming performances at the 2015 Hear Now Music Festival this May with Brightwork newmusic.

In terms of my own work, the aleatoric approach to creating song and sound has crept into every aspect of my creative outlets, whether it be writing lyrics for a new rock-based project or creating textural landscapes for electric and acoustic guitar. It eventually snuck its way into my column for Acoustic Guitar magazine this past year, with a step-by-step explanation of how to write a song by chance using using backgammon dice and online random sound generators. How very curious I have been to find out what happened to the folks that read that article and took the risk to attempt it.

***

October Crifasi is a songwriter, musician, educator, and writer with extensive experience teaching and performing nationwide, including several years on the faculty at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago and as guitar coach for projects on the Great American Country Channel (GAC), MTV, and Lifetime Networks. She is a regular columnist for Acoustic Guitar and Classical Guitar magazines and also directs a private guitar studio for girls and women in the San Fernando Valley called Girls Guitar School. In addition to music, October lives a parallel life as professional comics writer and overall nerd. She can be found online at www.rocktober.org or on Twitter @OctoberCrifasi.

Attend NewMusicBox LIVE on May 19

Posted on April 21, 2015 by New Music USA - Headlines

There’s something special about stories told by musicians. Whether they’re reminiscing about family history, sharing the memory of meeting a favorite collaborator, or revealing the impetus behind an important work, artists offer compelling insights into their lives and the work they create—and often the broader world at large.

For almost 16 years, NewMusicBox has showcased the artist’s voice and the stories behind the music for an online audience. Through profile interviews and articles, the magazine explores the lives and work of music makers, and the intersections between the two. With its first-ever live event, hosted by NewMusicBox Editors Frank J. Oteri and Molly Sheridan, NewMusicBox LIVE showcases three very different artists each telling their own stories through words and music.

Saxophonist/sound experimentalist Matana Roberts, who has been a member of both the Black Rock Coalition and the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), is perhaps best known for her ongoing Coin Coin project, which has forged new conceptual approaches to considering narrative, history, and political expression within improvisatory structures. Grammy and Grawemeyer Award-winning composer Joan Tower, co-founder and original pianist for the Da Capo Chamber Players, has been described in The New Yorker as “one of the most successful woman composers of all time.” Polystylistic singer/songwriter Gabriel Kahane’s works range from a song cycle based on Craigslist ads to the Public Theater-commissioned musical February House inspired by the 1940s Brooklyn house where W.H. Auden, Paul and Jane Bowles, Benjamin Britten, Gypsy Rose Lee, and Carson McCullers all lived together communally. Visitors to NewMusicBox can, on a daily basis, explore the wide variety of approaches to music-making that these three artists exemplify, but it is rare for an audience to be able to interact with this range of artists side-by-side in the same room in real time.

NewMusicBox LIVE takes place at SubCulture (45 Bleecker St., NYC) on May 19, 2015 at 7 p.m. and will also feature performances by acclaimed pianist Ursula Oppens and violinist Bella Hristova. Please visit newmusicusa.org/nmblive to reserve your free ticket.

Julia Wolfe Wins 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Music

Posted on April 20, 2015 by Frank J. Oteri - Headlines, Ledes

[UPDATED APRIL 21, 2015]

Julia Wolfe (Photo by Peter Serling)

Anthracite Fields by Julia Wolfe has been awarded the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Music. The work (which was commissioned through Meet the Composer’s Commissioning Music/USA program and is published by Red Poppy Music/G. Schirmer, Inc. ASCAP) premiered on April 26, 2014 in Philadelphia in a performance by the Bang on a Can All-Stars and the Mendelssohn Club Chorus. The Pulitzer citation describes the work as “a powerful oratorio for chorus and sextet evoking Pennsylvania coal-mining life around the turn of the 20th Century.” The prize is for a “distinguished musical composition by an American that has had its first performance or recording in the United States” during the previous calendar year and comes with a cash award of ten thousand dollars.

The score of Anthracite Fields is featured below.

Winning the Pulitzer Prize has had a variety of ramifications for composers. For emerging composers, the accolade can be a door opener that leads to major performance opportunities and commissions. For more established composers, it can be a confirmation of a life’s work. Yet for some composers, its impact can be negligible.

“I really don’t know,” wrote Wolfe in an email correspondence following a telephone conversation. “I do what I do. As an artist you are used to plowing through, carving your own path. Sometimes no one answers your call or email and then sometimes someone shines a light on you or says hey that’s interesting or moving or cool. I am always challenging myself – reaching for something, in a way trying to understand something human in the reach. It’s glorious to write music. I feel so lucky to work with so many great musicians. It takes a village as they say, and especially in music. The village I am in is a beautiful one.”

Asked about how and why she came to compose Anthracite Fields, Wolfe added the following observations:

Anthracite Fields was commissioned by the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia. I was born in Philadelphia and am from a small town about an hour north of the city. When [Mendelssohn Club Artistic Director] Alan Harler called me about writing a piece I thought that I would look to the region. Where I grew up, if you took the long country road up to the highway, route 309, and turned right you’d be heading toward Philadelphia. If you turned left, which we hardly ever did, you would head in the direction of Wilkes-Barre and Scranton–coal country. We hardly ever turned left, maybe once in a while to go to a diner. So I thought that rather than looking toward the big city I’d look the other way. The Mendelssohn Club was incredible in setting me up with a guide to the region. Theater artist Laurie McCants, who has a company in Bloomsburg, PA became my guide. She had a library full of books on the region, about life in coal country. She took me to some amazing small local historical museums that depicted everything about the miners–from the tools they used to the medical facilities, to the disasters. For over a year I read a lot, interviewed miners and children of miners, gathered information, and went down into the mines. It’s a vast subject to cover, but powerful themes emerged and called out to be in the piece. Anthracite Fields is about this industry and the life surrounding it. The piece is not directly narrative, but looks at the subject from different angles. My intention was to honor the people that lived and worked there, this dangerous work that fueled the nation.

Also nominated as finalists in for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Music were: Xiaoxiang by Lei Liang, premiered on March 28, 2014, in Boston by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, a concerto for alto saxophone and orchestra, inspired by a widow’s wail and blending the curious sensations of grief and exhilaration (Schott Music Corporation); and The Aristos by John Zorn, premiered on December 21, 2014, in New York City, which the jury described as “a parade of stylistically diverse sounds for violin, cello and piano that create a vivid demonstration of the brain in fluid, unpredictable action.”

Pulitzer Prizes have been awarded annually since 1917. The Music Prize was added in 1943 when William Schuman’s Secular Cantata No. 2, “A Free Song” received the first honor. Past prize winning works include Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring (1945), Charles Ives’s Symphony No. 3 (1947, awarded 30 years after its composition), Samuel Barber’s opera Vanessa (1958), Elliott Carter’s String Quartets Nos. 2 (1960) and 3 (1973), Charles Wuorinen’s electronic music composition Time’s Encomium (1970), Ellen Taaffe Zwilich’s Symphony No. 1 – Three Movements for Orchestra (1983), Wynton Marsalis’s oratorio Blood on the Fields (1997), John Adams’s September 11, 2001 memorial On The Transmigration of Souls (2003), David Lang’s The Little Match Girl Passion (2008), Jennifer Higdon’s Violin Concerto (2010), and John Luther Adams’s Become Ocean (2014).

Anyone–not only the composer or publisher of the work–can submit a work to be considered for the Pulitzer Prize in Music provided it is accompanied by a $50 entry fee and meets the qualifications of being composed by an American and having had its first performance or recording in the United States during the previous calendar year. As is the case with all Pulitzer prize-winners, the awarded pieces of music are chosen through a two panel process. Each year a different jury–typically consisting of five professionals in the field and which usually includes at least one previous winner of the award–is convened and selects a total of three finalists from works received for consideration. (The jury for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Music consisted of only four people and did not include a previous winner of the award.) The three finalists are then submitted to the 20-member Pulitzer board, consisting mostly of major newspaper editors and executives as well as a few academics. (The board elects its own members who individually serve three-year terms.) The winner is determined by a majority vote of the board. It is possible for the jury not to choose any of the finalists–as was the case for the Music award in the years 1964, 1965, and 1981 resulting in no prize being given. The board can also demand that the jury selects a different work, as was the case in 1992 when the only work the jury submitted to the board was Ralph Shapey’s Concerto Fantastique. (The work which was ultimately awarded the prize that year was Wayne Peterson’s The Face of the Night.) Since 2004, in an effort to broaden the purview of the award, premiere recordings issued on commercial recorded releases from the previous calendar year have also been eligible. Thus far, two works that have appeared on recordings have thus far been awarded the prize: Ornette Coleman’s Sound Grammar (2007) and Caroline Shaw’s Partita (2013). In addition, over the years, lifetime citations have been awarded–most of them posthumously. Citation honorees thus far have been Roger Sessions (1974), Scott Joplin (1976 posth.), William Schuman (1985) George Gershwin (1998 posth.), Duke Ellington (1999 posth.), Thelonious Monk (2006 posth.), John Coltrane (2007 posth.), Bob Dylan (2008), and Hank Williams (2010 posth.).

The jurors for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Music were: Carol Oja, William Powell Mason Professor of Music, Harvard University (Chair); Steven Mackey, composer, professor and chair, department of music, Princeton University; Maria Schneider, composer and orchestra leader, New York, NY; and Mark Swed, music critic, Los Angeles Times. A complete list of the 2015 Pulitzer board is here.

Pulitzer Administrator Mike Pride announced the 2015 Pulitzer Prize winners at a press conference held in the Pulitzer World Room in Pulitzer Hall, Columbia University at 3pm eastern time on April 20, 2015 that was streamed live on YouTube.

2015-2016 Rome Prize Recipients Announced

Posted on April 20, 2015 by NewMusicBox Staff - Headlines, Ledes

Composers Nina C. Young and Christopher Cerrone

Composers Christopher Cerrone and Nina C. Young have been named recipients of the of the 2015-2016 Rome Prize. They—along with 29 other artists and scholars in the fields of ancient studies, architecture, design, historic preservation and conservation, landscape architecture, literature, medieval studies, modern Italian studies, renaissance and early modern studies, and visual arts—will be provided with a fellowship that includes a stipend, a study or studio, and room and board for a period of six months to two years in Rome.

The winners are selected by independent juries through a national competition process, and approximately thirty individuals working in the arts and humanities are invited to Rome to expand their own professional, artistic, or scholarly pursuits, while drawing on their colleagues’ knowledge and experience and on the resources that Italy, Europe, and the academy have to offer. The annual application deadline is November 1. The academy community also includes a selected group of residents, affiliated fellows, and visiting artists and scholars.

OPERA American Awards $100,000 to 7 Female Composers

Posted on April 17, 2015 by NewMusicBox Staff - Headlines, Ledes

(l to r): Jing Jing Luo, Odaline de la Martinez, Kitty Brazelton, Kamala Sankaram, Su Lian Tan, Patricia Leonard, and Laura Karpman.

OPERA America has announced the recipients of Discovery Grants from the Opera Grants for Female Composers program, made possible through The Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation. From among 61 eligible applicants, an independent adjudication panel selected seven composers to receive a total of $100,000 to support the development of their opera compositions.

The recipients of Discovery Grants are:

Kitty Brazelton for The Art of Memory
Laura Karpman for Balls
Patricia Leonard for My Dearest Friend
Jing Jing Luo for Ashima
Odaline de la Martinez for Imoinda
Kamala Sankaram for The Privacy Show
Su Lian Tan for Lotus Lives

The Opera Grants for Female Composers program, launched in December 2013, is implemented in two-year cycles. The focus of the program alternates between Discovery Grants, which are awarded directly to composers, and Commissioning Grants, which are given to opera companies. This recent group of Discovery Grants initiates the second cycle of granting. Discovery Grants aim to identify, support, and help develop the work of female composers writing for the operatic medium, raising their visibility and promoting awareness of their compositions. In addition to receiving financial assistance, grant recipients will be introduced to leaders in the field through a feature in Opera America Magazine and at future New Works Forum meetings and annual conferences. Supported works will be considered for presentation at future annual conference New Works Samplers.

The independent adjudication panelists for the Discovery Grants included director Sam Helfrich, composer Laura Kaminsky, composer Libby Larsen, mezzo-soprano Margaret Lattimore, conductor Anne Manson, and coach/conductor Laurie Rogers.

Information for the second round of Commissioning Grant applications will be announced in December 2015.

(–from the press release)

Four Composers Chosen for 2nd Berkeley Symphony EarShot Readings

Posted on April 16, 2015 by NewMusicBox Staff - Headlines, Ledes

Headshots of the four 2015 Berkeley EarShot composers

The four 2015 Berkeley EatShot composers (pictured from left to right): Ryan Carter, Emily Cooley, Natalie Williams, and Michael Laurello.

EarShot (the National Orchestral Composition Discovery Network) and the Berkeley Symphony continue their partnership for the 2014-2015 Under Construction Program, designed as an opportunity for emerging composers to develop their works with a professional orchestra. This season, four composers will have a new symphonic work workshopped and read by Berkeley Symphony at the Osher Studio in Berkeley on May 2, 2015 at 3pm (the first public unveiling of the composers’ works) and on May 3, 2015 at 7pm (a run-through of the completed pieces). The selected composers and their works, which were chosen from a national pool of applicants, are:

Ryan Carter (b. 1980): The Clock Behind Me
Emily Cooley (b. 1990): Green Go to Me
Michael Laurello (b. 1981): Promises
Natalie Williams (b. 1977): Les Chants du Maldoror

Under Construction has served as an incubator for emerging composers for more than 20 years, offering the unique opportunity to develop skills and gain practical experience in writing for a professional orchestra. Each selected composer has completed a symphonic work to be presented at two separate readings, allowing composers the chance to hear their concepts realized and audiences the opportunity to have a window into the creative process. They will receive feedback and mentoring from composers Ken Ueno and Derek Bermel in private and small group sessions, as well as from Music Director Joana Carneiro and key orchestra members. This program is the result of a new partnership with EarShot, a nationwide network of new music readings and composer-development programs. As the nation’s first ongoing, systematic program for identifying emerging orchestral composers, EarShot provides professional-level working experience with orchestras from every region of the country and increases awareness of these composers and access to their music throughout the industry. The program is administered by the American Composers Orchestra (ACO) in partnership with the American Composers Forum, the League of American Orchestras, and New Music USA.

In addition to Under Construction with Berkeley Symphony, EarShot partnerships have included the New York Philharmonic, Detroit Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Colorado Symphony Orchestra, Memphis Symphony Orchestra, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, Pioneer Valley Symphony (MA), New York Youth Symphony, and the San Diego Symphony. To date, over fifty composers have been selected for New Music Readings with orchestras. For more details, visit the EarShot website.

(–from the press release)

2015 Guggenheim Fellowship Awards Announced

Posted on April 15, 2015 by NewMusicBox Staff - Headlines, Ledes

In its ninety-first competition for the United States and Canada, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation has awarded 173 Fellowships (including two joint Fellowships) to a diverse group of 175 scholars, artists, and scientists. Appointed on the basis of prior achievement and exceptional promise, the successful candidates were chosen from a group of over 3,100 applicants. There are 11 composers among this year’s awardees:

Darcy James Argue
Matthew Barnson
Richard Carrick
Etienne Charles
Chihchun Chi-sun Lee
Steve Lehman
George E. Lewis
Andreia Pinto-Correia
Sean Shepherd
Rand Steiger
Amy Williams

Two additional music-related fellowships have also been awarded to music critic Alex Ross in the category of general non-fiction and University of Chicago-based music theorist Thomas Christensen in the field of music research. For a complete list of 2015 Guggenheim fellows, please visit the Guggenheim website.

Postcard from Pittsburgh: Contemporary Chamber Music Thrives in the Steel City

Posted on April 14, 2015 by Linda Kernohan - Field Reports, Headlines

A view of the Pittsburgh skyline at night

“Reflections of Pittsburgh” Photo by Michael Righi via Wikimedia Commons

If you fly into Pittsburgh International Airport for the purpose of visiting the city itself, chances are you’ll pass through the Fort Pitt Tunnel, the subterranean stretch that bores through Mount Washington and connects Pittsburgh’s western residential neighborhoods with its downtown business and cultural district. The contrast between one end of the tunnel and the other is stark; after traversing several miles of typical suburban freeway lined with rolling hills and trees, you burst out into a majestic tangle of bridges and skyscrapers at the confluence of three rivers. The impact is heightened if you emerge from the tunnel at night, when the illuminated cityscape is complemented by color-coded lights scaling the tracks of Mount Washington’s two funicular railroads, known in local parlance as “inclines”: red for the Duquesne, blue for the Monongahela. Pittsburgh’s surprisingly rich visual welcome is an apt metaphor for my experience of the new music scene here: unexpected, somewhat hidden until you’re right on top of it, and reflective of the region’s distinctive topography and history.

I came to Pittsburgh in 2012, when my husband, a physician, began a fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. We moved here from Boston, where he had done his residency and where I was happily ensconced as director of music at an Episcopal church and co-producer of the concert series it hosted. I found opportunities to perform, have my music played, and of course, attend many concerts of music old and new. I was sad to leave, and uncertain of what I’d find once we moved. I knew of a couple contemporary music ensembles in town, but I just couldn’t envision the Steel City as a place with a thriving new music community, nor did I expect the classical music scene as a whole to match what I was leaving. I assumed I’d need to travel frequently in order to remain active as a composer, and rely heavily on the internet as my source for hearing new music.

Three years later, I am happy to report that I couldn’t have been more wrong. Pittsburgh has more going on in new music, and the arts in general, than you would expect for its size (around 300,000 people in the city, and 2.4 million in the metro area). This is due in part to a high density of universities with good music programs located along a four-mile stretch of Forbes Avenue, including Carnegie Mellon and University of Pittsburgh–both with strong composition programs–and Duquesne University, which turns out great performers. New music events aren’t confined to the academic year, though; when summer comes and many cities offer little in the way of classical music besides orchestral pops, Pittsburgh has more modern sounds than you can shake a 4th of July sparkler at.

It was fortuitous, then, that I moved to town on July 1, just in time for the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble’s season, four consecutive summer weekends in the small black-box space at City Theatre on the South Side. I knew of the ensemble through their long-running Harvey Gaul composition competition, but I wasn’t aware of their inventive approach to presenting new music. Their concerts are so much more than a dutiful succession of chamber works for varying subsets of their Pierrot-plus-percussion instrumentation. They use imaginative staging, lighting, and thematic programming to create a seamless aesthetic experience–what artistic director Kevin Noe calls a “theatre of music.” The results are revelatory for those of us already in the new music fold, while creating a point of entry for listeners less familiar with our musical subspecialty. My favorite moment of the 2012 season was on a program titled “To the Earth,” when Quartet for the End of Time was followed without pause by 4’33”. Experiencing Cage’s meditation on silence immediately after the ecstatic journey of the Messiaen made both works all the more profound. The highlight of the 2014 season was “Drunken Moon,” a staged reimagining of Pierrot lunaire, where Schoenberg’s knotty cycle narrates a dark romance. Two singers divided up the vocal line (in English translation), navigating a shifting balance of power as their gender roles transformed, and a piece that too often seems like contemporary music’s peculiar prized heirloom became an engaging dramatic event. (Disclosure: I became the newest member of the ensemble’s board of directors in October 2014.)

Members of the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble in a staged performance with dancers and a projected image of the moon

The Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. Photo by Danielle Brewer via Wikimedia Commons

2014 also saw the launch of the Pittsburgh Festival of New Music, produced by Alia Musica, an organization that helps shape Pittsburgh’s new music landscape year-round. Led by Artistic Director Federico Garcia-De Castro, this multifaceted group was founded by seven local composers as a vehicle for promoting new works, both homegrown and imported. In addition to performances by its eleven-member chamber ensemble, Alia Musica produces events featuring new music luminaries from around the country and beyond, and according to Mr. Garcia-De Castro, they plan to make the Festival of New Music a biennial occurrence. The 2014 festival opened on the morning of May 22, as New York-based collective Varispeed brought their version of Perfect Lives, Robert Ashley’s television opera, to the streets of Pittsburgh, performing at seven locations over a span of twelve hours. On May 24, an afternoon-long event called Soundpike gathered an impressive slate of local chamber ensembles, and the ticket price declined the longer you stayed–a far more rewarding experience than driving the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Later that evening, while the Pittsburgh Pirates were busy beating the Washington Nationals at PNC Park, Frederic Rzewski gave a recital of his piano music half a mile away at the New Hazlett Theater, and was received as enthusiastically as Andrew McCutchen at bat.

Now, anyone who knows me knows that working in a baseball reference is a Herculean task for me (when Facebook asked me for my favorite sports team and wouldn’t take the Pittsburgh Symphony as my answer, I was miffed!), but this nerd does her homework. I wanted to find out if my newcomer’s impression of Pittsburgh’s new music scene jibed with that of folks who’ve been here longer, so I asked the members of one of Pittsburgh’s up-and-coming chamber groups for their thoughts: the Trillium Ensemble, made up of pianist Katie Palumbo, a native Pittsburgher; clarinetist Rachael Stutzman, a graduate of Carnegie Mellon; and flutist Elise DePasquale, a transplant to the area. Pittsburgh has experienced “a new music growth spurt that we’ve noticed in the past fifteen years,” says Ms. Palumbo, with “young composers who are writing interesting music for young ensembles,” and “artists who are hard working, determined, and entrepreneurial.” Though it’s no longer a mill town, evidence of Pittsburgh’s blue-collar roots remain. The Trillium Ensemble members describe their audiences as “curious, unpretentious, and not just other musicians.” “Composers bring elements of Pittsburgh pride into their music, and even transplants feel a strong connection to the city,” says Ms. DePasquale.

The three members of the Trillium Ensemble: standing and leaning on a fence.

The Trillium Ensemble: Photo by Christopher Ruth.

Some of the factors contributing to artistic growth relate to the area’s long history as a center of industry–for example, the continued existence of philanthropic funding, courtesy of names like Carnegie and Heinz. The economic challenges of recent years didn’t hit this area quite as hard as others, and the local economy had already rebuilt and diversified after the decline of the steel industry in the 1980s. The air pollution that used to keep the streetlamps on all day is long gone, and Pittsburgh is now known for education, healthcare, and high tech. Google has an office in what used to be the Nabisco factory.

Other former industrial spaces have been put to good use, too. “Alternative performance and art spaces have been reclaimed from closed-down factories and mills,” Ms. Stutzman observes. The Westinghouse Air Brake factory building in the Strip District is now owned by the Pittsburgh Opera, and has enough room for offices, practice studios, a performance space for chamber opera and dance, and a rehearsal space large enough to hold the sets used in its productions downtown. A North Shore warehouse built in 1911 was reborn in 1994 as the Andy Warhol Museum, dedicated to preserving the legacy of Pittsburgh’s most famous native-born visual artist.

The Warhol Museum serves as a resource for new music as well: the Jack Quartet played to a capacity crowd in its theater in March 2014, and in February of this year, it was one of the venues for the Beyond Microtonal Music Festival, co-directed by composer and University of Pittsburgh faculty member Mathew Rosenblum. Rosenblum is an ardent proponent of microtonal music, but the festival’s definition of the concept was generous; one evening featured Mantra Percussion playing Michael Gordon’s Timber in the Warhol’s entrance space. I think the image of that performance, for amplified wooden 2x4s and light installation, might be the perfect distillation of new music in Pittsburgh: it brought together newcomers and long-term residents, it combined raw materials and the latest technology, and what it produced was both durable and beautiful.

The six percussionists of Mantra performing on wooden planks in a semicircle with various lights underneath them.

Mantra Percussion performing Michael Gordon’s Timber at the Warhol Museum, from Mantra’s Facebook page

***

Linda Kernohan

Linda Kernohan, a.k.a. Miss Music Nerd, is a composer, pianist, educator and writer. She teaches music appreciation to unsuspecting college students and private piano lessons to adorable K-12 kids. She is a contributor to Burgh Vivant, Pittsburgh’s cultural talk magazine, and was the classical blogger for the Grammy Awards for five years. She has had her music performed across the U.S.A. and Europe, and has performed as a pianist and organist in a wide variety of venues, from a West Hollywood nightclub to the Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican.

Missing the Gig: Remembering Clark Terry (1920-2015)

Posted on April 3, 2015 by Marcus McLaurine - Headlines, Memorials

Clark Terry. Photo courtesy Marcus McLaurine.

[Ed. Note: Composer, trumpeter, flugelhornist, band leader, and jazz educator Clark Terry died on February 21, 2015 just two months after his 94th birthday. An NEA Jazz Masters inductee who recorded over 100 albums in his own name and appeared as a sideman on over 750 others, Terry had a profound impact on countless musicians, among them composer, bassist, and band leader Marcus McLaurine who performed with Terry for more than 30 years. We asked McLaurine to share his memories of this iconic American artist.–FJO]

To be a real leader, one must possess certain traits such as dignity, integrity, and a sense of fairness, all of which Clark Terry embodied. I personally learned about who the man Clark Terry was many years ago, after being in his band just a short time. I was driving a 1965 Rambler at the time, and it so happened that I was having car trouble this one particular week. So the evening of a gig with Clark’s group, I needed a ride into Manhattan to perform at a club called the “Village West.” I figured since my car was not running I would just call a cab and I should be able to make it on time. The only problem was that every cab company that I called said that they had no available drivers. Now I really started to panic, because I wanted to make a good impression with Clark, as far as being on time was concerned. I realized that I did not have much time and if I didn’t get a cab soon I would be in hot water.

Lo and behold, I did finally reach a taxi service that was able to come and get me and my bass, but the trip would not be an easy endeavor. I lived in Jamaica, Queens and to get to Manhattan from my house when the traffic was good would be about thirty minutes, but now the cabdriver would have to deal with the tail end of rush hour. I knew that there was no way that I was going to make the performance on time. (This was before cell phones were available.) . After much bobbing and weaving through the traffic, the cabby finally made it to the lower west side of Manhattan where the club was located. I paid the driver and hurried inside, but to my surprise the band had started without me and another bassist was on stage performing.

My heart sank into my stomach, because my worst fear was now being realized and I would surely be fired. So I patiently waited until they finished the first set. Clark caught my glance as he was leaving the bandstand and with a gleam in his eye he said, “You really blew it, didn’t you!” Thinking to myself, “Yes, I know that I did,” he then stated emphatically, “Where were you this afternoon for the gig that we had in Midtown Manhattan?” The reality of the situation hit me like a ton of bricks. I had totally forgotten about a job that we had that afternoon. Words cannot fully express the sense of depression that swept over my whole body. Clark casually walked away with some of his friends and the rest of the band, as they made their way back to the band’s dressing room. The whole time back there Clark completely ignored me and I can remember the drummer at the time, Charles Braugham, trying to console me, but to no avail. Well, the time was fast approaching for the band to return for the next set and because I had not spoken to Clark during the entire break, my fate was left in limbo. (Would he fire me or would he let me stay?)

Clark was very clever in how he dealt with the situation, because I think he wanted to see how I would react to what had just transpired. The moment of truth finally arrived and Clark came over to me and said, “This is what we’ll do: You pay the bassist who did the first set and you come and finish up the gig.” The sense of relief that I experienced was overwhelming and I truly could not believe what I was hearing. That day I realized that I was dealing with someone who was of extraordinary character, because the average person would have given me my walking papers. From that day on I became a huge fan of Mr. Clark Terry and he could do no wrong in my eyes. Clark, thank you for giving me the opportunity to be associated with your extraordinary legacy.

Clark Terry and Marcus McLaurine sitting together.

Clark Terry and Marcus McLaurine. Photo courtesy Marcus McLaurine.

Performing with Clark Terry was a pure joy and very challenging at the same time, because his mere presence on the bandstand raised the bar exponentially. His knowledge of the American songbook and of more contemporary composers was extremely vast. I can remember performing at the Village Vanguard with Clark and he began playing a piece impromptu. Clark would do this every now and then, which really forced everyone in the band to learn as many songs as possible. I had no idea what the piece was and was having a great deal of difficulty with the song. Needless to say, this was a very uncomfortable situation to be in. I later found out that the song was “Sweet Lorraine” and I am sure Clark played the song in honor of Lorraine Gordon, who was the wife of Max Gordon, the owner of the Village Vanguard.

Clark Terry was also noted for his highly identifiable sound, which was very rich, warm, and full. All you needed to hear were just a couple of bars of him playing and you knew immediately that it was Clark Terry! His sense of time, rhythm, and melodies were impeccable, and it seemed that Clark was always trying to push himself beyond the envelope, to do things on the horn that no one else had done, such as playing two horns at once or playing the trumpet or flugelhorn upside down. It was a true marvel to watch how he would gradually flip the flugelhorn upside down while never letting the horn leave his lips—all of this while still playing. Pure magic!

Another identifying quality of Clark’s was this language that he had created called Mumbles. I first heard this routine at the University of Nebraska’s student center in 1972, where Clark was performing with the university’s jazz ensemble. I remember laughing so hard that my face was aching. The language sounded like gibberish, but he would do it with inflections from other countries, such as Germany, France, and Italy. You could not understand a word of what he was saying, but you felt as though you understood every word. Clark made a recording with Oscar Peterson called Oscar Peterson Trio + One and, as legend has it, Clark performed this mumbles language over the blues. After listening to the playback Oscar Peterson thought this new language that Clark had created was hilarious and hence “Mumbles” made it on the recording and the rest is history!

Clark was the consummate entertainer on the bandstand with a style that harkened back to the days of Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and countless others. He always engaged the audience and had this uncanny ability to know just what material to perform next. Clark was also noted for being one of the first jazz educators and was always more than ready to help young musicians who were eager for knowledge. A couple of Clark’s earliest students were Miles Davis and Quincy Jones, who later became jazz icons in their own right.

I was very fortunate in that Clark asked me to be a part of his jazz camps and this was where I was able to learn his method of teaching, where he stressed a system of phrasing that he called the Doodle System, which was phrased “daddle, deedle, dawdle, dowdle, doodle.” The idea would be to sing this phrase very slowly and then, once you had mastered it, gradually increase the tempo, so that you could develop good phrasing for your solos. When you hear Clark performing you can hear him utilizing this system of phrasing in his solos.

Clark also had a great sense of humor and always maintained that feeling of being positive on and off the bandstand. Anyone who was fortunate enough to come in contact with him quickly recognized this and would always cherish the moments spent with him. I personally feel blessed to have had the opportunity to be associated with Clark for more than 30 years. Clark was more than an employer to the members in his bands, he was a true friend for life and we all will miss him dearly. We have truly lost one of the giants. Godspeed, CT!!!

Marcus McLaurine

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