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Vicki Ray talks Rivers of Time

Vicki Ray

On Wednesday night pianist Vicki Ray and visual artist Carole Kim combine forces at REDCAT for two huge new works for piano, electronics, and projections. The evening includes the world premiere of Ben Phelps’s exponentially expanding Sometimes I feel like my time ain’t long, based on the Alan Lomax recording of the eponymous tune. Also featured is Daniel Lentz’s Yellowstone-inspired River of 1000 Streams, which was named a top recording pick of 2017 by Alex Ross in The New Yorker

Vicki has been a major player in the LA scene for years as a pianist, improviser, composer, and teacher. With all she does I’m glad she had a few minutes to answer some questions about this show. Tickets and full details are available at redcat.org/event/vicki-ray-and-carole-kim-rivers-time.

Rivers of Time focuses on two “monumental” new works. How do you approach large scale pieces, as both performer and concert programmer?

In terms of programming it really depends on the piece(s). Usually with one long work I’ll put something contrasting on the other half of the concert like miniatures or just feature the single work itself. But this concert is different. Each piece is almost exactly a half hour. They seemed like perfect book ends. And then there is the thematic linkage between the pieces in terms of their focus on time. So it seemed a natural pairing. As a performer my approach has to vary depending on the demands of the piece. Ben’s piece is very rigorous – it is extremely mercurial and there are many fast shifts of tempo and mood. It’s technically virtuosic. A lot of the challenge is about knowing what’s going to happen next.  Daniel’s piece is equally demanding but in a completely different way – it uses an almost constant tremolo which can be really exhausting for the body. So I had to work up to complete run-throughs of it…sort of like training for a marathon. With this piece it’s about staying relaxed (well, when isn’t it?) and keeping the long arch of the piece always in the forefront of my mind.

What really excites me about this Wednesday night’s concert at REDCAT is the opportunity to share Ben Phelps’ new work Sometimes I Feel Like My Time Ain’t Long. It has been a total pleasure to learn this piece, or I should say continue learning this work. Like all great pieces it has layers to uncover and explore and everytime I sit down to work on it I find something new. Technically and musically it’s incredibly satisfying. The way Ben exponentially expands the piano part in correspondence with the time-stretched folk tune is ingenious. But rather than be some kind of purely cerebral exercise the totality of the piece is quite mystical and haunting.  I feel very honored to get to give the premiere and I hope to play it many more times. 

Could you discuss your collaboration with Carol for this project?

I started hearing about Carole’s work years ago when she was at CalArts. And then shortly after that she did some work with my brother, Scot, up in Montana. He was raving about her work and I saw some clips from the evening that blew me away. Finally here in Los Angeles I had several opportunities to see her work, most notably at an Open Gate Concert with some stellar improvisers. What impressed me was how she is able to join the musical conversation by weaving visuals into the texture without dominating it. It’s incredibly unique and thoughtful. Elegant. For this concert she’ll be projecting onto scrims that envelop the piano.

Your career as a soloist, collaborative pianist, improviser, composer, teacher is, to put it mildly, wildly diverse. How do your various musical practices inform each other? Is balance a challenge, or are they more like different aspects of the same work and interests?

I don’t really see it “various musical practices.” When I was a kid I played pop music, I sang in choirs, I acted in plays, I wrote little tunes, I improvised, and I learned classical pieces. They weren’t all squared away in separate boxes. So I’ve always been that sort of player even though there was a long stretch during my college years where a lot of the improvising and composing got put on a back burner. I feel much more creatively energized when I can work both as a creator and a re-creator.

You began in Los Angeles as a graduate student at USC. You’re now the head of keyboard studies at Cal Arts. To some extent, I view these schools as existing on completely opposite ends of the musical spectrum, at least aesthetically. Could you comment a bit on this dichotomy in the LA scene, if it even is one?

I can’t really comment on USC. I graduated from there a million years ago and I’m sure it’s changed since then. But what I do know without a doubt is that I wouldn’t be the artist I am if it weren’t for my years at CalArts. The place has had an enormous impact on me. My colleagues and my students are so  gifted and interesting that I often feel like a permanent student rather than faculty. I’m so grateful to be a part of it. It continues to stretch and challenge me every day.

How has the new music scene in Los Angeles changed over your career thus far? I know we’re quite proud of ourselves in recent years, with good reason, and wonder if that has always been the case or if this is the renaissance it seems to be.

It’s definitely a great city to be in right now if you’re into new music! There’s so much going on and yes, much more than when I first arrived in the 80’s. Back in the 80’s and 90’s there was the EAR Unit and Xtet. The Green Umbrella concerts were always great. And the Monday Evening Concerts were there too of course! And there was always something interesting going on at the Schoenberg Institute at USC. Also there used to be those fantastic soirees at Betty Freeman’s house…wow…those were incredible evenings. But in terms of the number of groups playing and the diversity of musics being offered right now – it’s fantastic. I just wish we had a few more good, small to mid-size venues that were dedicated to new music (AND had a good piano…!)

What was your favorite concert you’ve attended or played on in the past year?

Oh that’s too hard! But the first thing that comes to mind is hearing Andrew McIntosh’s piece Shasta on the Green Umbrella. Just gorgeous. [editor: I too have that piece near the top of my list.]

What’s next for you after this show?

Next up is Feldman’s For John Cage with violinist Tom Chiu and dancers Oguri and Roxanne Steinberg. I’m really looking forward to it! February 26 on Piano Spheres.

Anything else you’d like to add?

I just want to thank YOU and all the folks at New Classic LA for what you do!!

Tickets for Rivers of Time are available at redcat.org/event/vicki-ray-and-carole-kim-rivers-time.

P R I S M DAZZLES AT REDCAT

 

Anna Schubert as Bibi in the world premiere of "p r i s m"

Anna Schubert as Bibi in the world premiere of “p r i s m” presented by LA Opera Off Grand. (Photo: Larry Ho / LA Opera)

Sanctuary looms large in Ellen Reid’s  p r i s m, now in its opening run at LA Opera Off Grand at REDCAT. The two-character opera is a taut psychological journey communicated in color, movement, and song. Tenuous moments of security crumble with every act, illuminating the harsh truth of our supposed safe spaces.

Ailing Bibi and her doting mother, Lumee, live together in seclusion — a transparent room onstage that lets light in while conveying to the audience feelings of claustrophobia. Locked away from the world, they ward off dangers with games, mantras, and medicines. The scene is an unnerving mix of fluorescent light and gauzy fabrics; Impressionistic melodies that refuse to settle in their downward trajectory; and flecks of golden yellow for our gilded cage to contrast with the impending danger represented by blue.

Soprano Anna Schubert is convincing as Bibi, capturing her lost innocence in pure, heartbreaking tones. A quartet of dancers plus choir members from Trinity Wall Street add depth to Bibi’s narrative, moving where she cannot and uttering remembrances that have been blotted out for the sake of survival.

Schubert’s acting is first-rate. Opera characters run the risk of being nothing more than caricatures if executed poorly, held together by scenery and costume. Not so with Schubert, whose role demands physical strength coupled with fragility. Whether crawling from bed to chair on her damaged legs or hurtling her weight against dancers holding her aloft, Shubert held nothing back in her emodiment of the protagonist.

Mezzo-soprano Rebecca Jo Loeb provides an excellent foil for Bibi to rebel against as mother Lumee. At turns caring and careless, you want to hate her but can’t quite bring yourself to do so. With a sickening feeling akin to Stockholm syndrome, Reid and librettist Roxie Perkins show the many sides to this mother-daughter bond gone astray.

The music anchors these disparate feelings and propels the narrative forward. Pulling from a wide range of influences, Reid put the ensemble through its paces in a tour-de-force that moved from lush and tender harmonies to urgent whispers and batutto textures, throbbing bass designed to engulf the venue, and glissandi that served to oscillate between soundscapes of hearth and horror.

Ultimately, the choice exists to accept an unfolding past or remain steadfast in one’s current knowledge of the world. In deciding, we learn along with Bibi that rays of truth are not so easy to put back together.

p r i s m closes Sunday, December 2nd at 2pm at REDCAT before moving on to the PROTOYPE festival in New York City for its East Coast premiere in January of 2019.

Partch: Daphne of the Dunes

The 21st annual MicroFest season finale featured a performance of Daphne of the Dunes, by Harry Partch, as well as quartets by Ben Johnston. Every seat was filled at REDCAT for the June 16, 2018 concert, the second of two shows on consecutive days.

The program opened with Johnston’s String Quartet No. 9 (1988), performed by the Lyris Quartet. A one-time Partch apprentice, Johnston absorbed the theory of just intonation, but lacked the practical skills to create new instruments in the manner of his mentor. Johnston, however, successfully applied the new tuning to more traditional forms, and String Quartet No. 9 is one of his later and most accomplished examples.

The first movement, Strong, calm, slow begins appropriately with a long viola tone, soon joined by the other strings in beautiful harmony. A more lively stretch follows, pleasantly complex with some fine counterpoint. The playing by the Lyris Quartet here is characteristically precise and balanced. Strong sustained chords are again heard, and tutti tremolos begin a stretch that includes an uplifting, ethereal harmony at the finish of this long, invigorating movement. Fast, elated, the second movement, has a busy feel in the violins with a nicely syncopated melody in the cello. The violins take up the melody and it acquires an actively strident feel with a faster pace and interleaving parts, all carefully played by the Lyris Quartet.

The third movement, Slow, expressive, is just that, with a smoothly flowing feel reminiscent of an old hymn tune. The harmony is wonderfully balanced and full; Johnston’s mastery of the classical form is on full display. The final movement, Vigorous and defiant, is full of strong tutti phrasing and briskly interwoven passages. A perfect contrast to the reserved third movement, this unleashes the full technical range of the Lyris Quartet. At one point a fugue breaks out among the players as the piece seesaws between resolute declaration and intricate lines among the parts in a rousing finish. String Quartet No. 9 is a masterwork, artfully bridging the brave new world of just intonation with the familiar form of the string quartet – and doing credit to both.

The American premiere of Octet (1999/2000), also by Ben Johnston, followed, and the Lyris quartet was augmented by a flute, clarinet, bassoon and bass. Octet is based on Ashokan Farewell, the 1982 composition by folk musician Jay Unger, and is the tune that gained wide recognition as the theme for The Civil War miniseries, by Ken Burns. The structure of Octet is a straightforward theme with variations, beginning with the familiar melody in a flute solo, accompanied by a low drone in the bass. The melody is picked up by the clarinet with a lovely flute descant and soon the strings enter in a warm harmony. All is soft and sweet as the bassoon enters for an extended variation that adds just a hint of tension. A strong tutti section with new and unusual harmonies is heard, but this flows as a natural extension of the previous variations. The flute, expressively played by Sara Andon,  dominates once again with the opening melody, as the piece quietly concludes. Octet is a masterful combination of formal structure and innovative harmony, grounded in solid fundamentals yet guiding the listener to entirely new, yet comfortably reassuring surroundings.

Daphne of the Dunes (1967), by Harry Partch, followed the intermission on a stage crowded with his amazing musical inventions. There was the Gourd Tree, Cloud Chamber Bowls, Boo and Diamond Marimba as well as many others. Choreographers Casebolt and Smith began with a preamble describing the outlines of the plot, based on a Greco-Roman myth of uncontrolled desire and pursuit. A large screen at the rear of the stage displayed classic paintings relating to the story in a video by Joel Smith. The music begins, full of motion and distress as Apollo, smitten by Cupid’s arrow, begins his quest of Daphne, the beautiful river sprite. The predominance of percussive sounds and the exotic tuning created the perfect primal accompaniment to this ancient story. At the entrance of Daphne, the music becomes more strident and purposeful but turns tentative and solemn as she also receives an arrow from Cupid. The pace picks up again as the chase begins, and the images on the screen are taken from the movie ‘North by Northwest.’ On stage, Daphne is seen disguised as a modern spy, complete with sunglasses and kerchief, moving about and even hiding among the musicians. The chase continues as the two make their way out into the audience and towards the exits.

The musicians, meanwhile, are seen moving from station to station, playing new combinations of instruments. The intriguing colors and textures of the music are always engaging, and the precision in the playing was remarkable given the fast tempos and unfamiliar instruments. As Apollo closes in on Daphne the music becomes tense and anxious. In an inspired bit of staging, Daphne retreats to Partch’s Gourd Tree and, merging herself into the wood of the tree, finally eludes her lustful pursuer. In the poignant final scene, a woman is seen gardening with her husband, and together they are planting small trees. Daphne of the Dunes is an amazing retelling of an old story that succeeds brilliantly with contemporary instrumentation, imagery and choreography. That MicroFest LA could mount a technically complex production of such high quality was recognized by the enthusiastic applause from the big crowd

The concert concluded with Partch’s Barstow: Eight Hitchhiker Inscriptions (1968). Based on Partch’s own experiences as a hobo, Barstow is a colorful account of the challenges and personalities encountered on the open highway. The difficulties and frustrations of a Depression-era tramp would seem better served by dramatic tragedy, but Barstow is full of goodnatured banter and sharply drawn characterizations that are completely absent of malice. The music is surprisingly lively and upbeat, with the narrations and playing perfectly paired. A great cheer went up from the audience upon hearing those immortal words: ”Gentlemen: Go to five-thirty East Lemon Avenue, Monrovia, California, for an easy handout.” Barstow was the perfect ending to an impressive concert of works by two of the pioneers of just intonation.

wasteLAnd presents Wolfgang von Schweinitz’s Cantata, or You are the star in God’s eye

On Wednesday, May 23rd, Los Angeles-based concert series wasteLAnd presented the premiere of Wolfgang von Schweinitz’s piece Cantata, or You are the star in God’s Eye at the REDCAT Theater in downtown Los Angeles. Originally composed for radio broadcast in 2002, Schweinitz recomposed the bulk of the material with an expanded instrumentation for wasteLAnd, featuring conductor Nicholas DeyoeSara Cubarsi on violin, Andrew McIntosh on viola, Scott Worthington on double bass, Matt Barbier on euphonium, Allen Fogle on french horn, Luke Storm on Eb tuba, and soprano Stephanie Aston. Throughout the piece, the ensemble resides within an overarching narration of the libretto, written and recited by poet Friederike Mayrocker.

The piece begins with a short prelude of narration, which is quickly emboldened by an immediately rich texture of contrapuntal gestures as the ensemble enters assertively. Schweinitz’ nuanced rhythmic material and wasteLAnd’s thoughtful phrasing presented the listener with the option to enter a space of fluid and unstable structure, with perhaps once familiar material placed on the far side of a distorted lens. Although aided by amplification, the acoustics of the hall were not entirely suited to the texture of the piece. The brass were often rendered somewhat obscured and the narration occasionally became a dominating presence.

Exceptional instrumental ability was on clear display, with Cubarsi, McIntosh, and Worthington generating a warm and articulate lattice of incredibly precise harmonics and dyads, and the brass trio of Barbier, Fogle, and Storm deftly maneuvering through a jigsaw puzzle of minutely shifting microtones and interlocking gestures. Aston’s vocal line served as an anchor for the instrumental material and voice-over, simultaneously contributing to the existing texture and gently presenting a clear path through the development of the epic 80-minute piece. Her performance was stunningly controlled, well-executed, and emotionally dynamic.

The lengthy piece — eleven distinct sections — was well-paced and generated a captivating environment for the listener and a subtle momentum of narrative that made the piece’s 80 minutes belie a work of smaller proportion. The intimacy of REDCAT seemed to engender a willingness in the audience to stay with the ensemble intently, which I believe contributed greatly to the overall experience feeling not only like entertainment but also somehow artistic productivity.

The world of the piece seemed to behave contrary to entropy, gradually accruing order like a system trending toward a viscerally satisfying cosmic architecture. It feels massive in scope — like it’s operating within a greater universal logic rather than some simpler earthly system. The title’s imagery of star and god fit neatly in that universal logic, and imply scale more biblical than contemporary. During the seventh aria, the distorted lens shifted sharply into focus. Heralded by Cubarsi’s violin, the ensemble presented an incredibly effective moment that wouldn’t be inaccurately described as triumphant, but still in a manner distinct to Schweinitz’ refreshingly idiosyncratic and effective voice.

When the piece ended, the audience sat silently, taking a moment to shift from the flow-state of the piece back to reality.

 

An Interview with Braden Diotte and Ulrich Krieger: EXO//ENDO

On November 17 at REDCAT, the EXO//ENDO ensemble will be performing works by composers Braden Diotte and Ulrich Krieger, both of whom are known for pushing boundaries with their music. The ensemble will perform Braden Diotte’s General Manifest, a 48-minute musical meditation on freedom, using memories of soundscapes along with field recordings from a twenty-year period traveling through the American west. Composer Ulrich Krieger’s Black Sun Rebirth combines elements of contemporary chamber music, dark ambient, doom metal and microsound aesthetics, telling a story of destruction and creation, the demise of the cosmos and the rebirth from the oceans. The piece is inspired by Ragnarök tetralogy and the first book of the Edda. Both composers will be performing with the ensemble.

I asked Braden Diotte and Ulrich Krieger some questions about their work, views on collaboration, the cross-pollination between rock, metal, and contemporary music, and more. Here’s what they had to say:

Braden Diotte

EXO//ENDO will be performing General Manifest, which, in your own words, pays tribute to the fleeting music witnessed during a twenty-year span riding freight trains about the American West, and is about the broader notion of birthright freedoms. Can you tell us more about this time in your life, riding freight trains and experiencing the underbelly of this part of the country? When/how did you realize you wanted to translate the experience to music, and what was the process of writing General Manifest like? 

General Manifest is the repository for a handful of sonic experiences upon which I made a cohesive connection between the music I was listening to and the sounds bellowing from moving freight trains. My reasons for being aboard those trains in the first place varies from year to year beginning with traveling to punk shows in Berkeley, to attempting to collect food stamps in three states at once, to eventually visiting friends in distant cities and states, and finally to reconnect with a lost sense of independence after the demise of a string of important relationships. On one of my decidedly final journeys, in 2011, I experienced a sound-world on the rails just southeast of the Salton Sea in the Imperial Valley, which fell somewhere between an epiphany and a religious experience. It was in that moment that it became apparent that General Manifest needed to be written.

The writing process for General Manifest was graced with a series of very happy accidents which took quite a while to unfold, evolving from a quasi-minimalist multi-pianist work into an electronic work and finally into its current state as an electro-acoustic work. It may continue to evolve, but at its core the work is getting closer and closer to the true sounds from which its inspiration was drawn. Eventually, General Manifest will exist as a personal tribute to those years and experiences, even after I’ve reached the end of the line.

Composer Braden Diotte

Throughout your career, you’ve collaborated with many well-known artists in the progressive/avant-garde rock scene, such as Faust, Neurosis, and the Locust. What do you enjoy most about the collaboration process?

When it’s truly happening, the collaborative process brings out the best and worst of everyone involved. It is no different than any other intimate relationship, and may be happening with a roomful of people at the same time, which can make things far more complicated. To fully invest in a creative exchange, one should be vulnerable and expose themselves, not withholding passion to save face. Light investment produces light results, like casual dating. Some collaborations have legs, and in my experience the collaborations that have the strongest legs also have the strongest passions, egos, arguments, and so on. There’s a ton of potential for growing in all of it, but the flame that burns twice as bright also tends to burn half as long. So what you’re left with is the artifact: the collaboration in whatever form it was documented. At the end of it all, it’s these artifacts that I get the most enjoyment from.

What do you view as similarities and/or differences between the avant-garde rock scene and the contemporary art music community?

I see the greatest similarities between those two communities existing in the mutual desire to communicate a unique and personal expression built upon the back of their respective lineages. Both worlds tend to be well-informed, and each carries their own discourse surrounding the important mileposts in their lineage. But now, in the 21stcentury, another interesting similarity is the burgeoning crossover between those worlds, with both seemingly pulling from each other’s histories without the concerns that previously kept them divided. As long as that continues to happen, it would be counterproductive to expound upon the differences.

How did you and Ulrich Krieger meet? Do you collaborate often?

I met Ulrich during my stint as a graduate student at CalArts, where he assisted with my 2013 work General Manifest, which was a large part of what I did while there. I was a member of his ensemble Sonic Boom for a period of time, and have performed alongside him in a number of public presentations over the past five years. The collaboration between Ulrich and EXO//ENDO has resulted in numerous collaborative sessions, and has been in development since 2015 – partially due to the “ping-pong” collaboration process that we are using, as well as the fact that none of us live in the same city.

Can you tell us about your experiences with EXO//ENDO, as a founding member and co-director? What do you see for the future of the ensemble?

EXO//ENDO has no future. It is an ensemble that by its very design holds its weight in the present, whenever present that may be. Right now that present involves a collaboration with Ulrich Krieger, as well as several other collaborations that are in various stages of development. Each project has a flavor of its very own, and the personnel are a revolving door of talented soloists and contributors that each brings their wares to any given performance. This – combined with the improvisatory ethos that is the spine of E//E – results in one performance of any given piece varying substantially from any other performance.

Ulrich Krieger

EXO//ENDO will be performing your work, Black Sun Rebirth, which is inspired by the first book of the Edda and tells a story of destruction and creation. On a personal level, what does this work mean to you? What do you hope the audience will get from it?

Using classic Greek themes has since long been a staple in art music: Elektra, Prometeo, etc., but very few composers have looked at Nordic mythology for inspiration. Might it be due to less exposure of it, might it be due to Wagner having seemingly occupied that material, might be due to the misuse of the material by fascists and right-wing groups. This always bothered me. I am German and we didn’t even read the Edda in school but we read Greek and Roman mythology and discussed their culture, but not our ancestors. Christianity has done everything to cover up and discredit these Nordic traditions, because they were a threat to the Christian ideology and much more progressive than Christanity: in Germanic tribes women were sword fighting soldiers, women were land and farm owners, and tribes were organized democratically in the Althing, kind of a parliament of tribes. I am interested in looking into this tradition, my tradition more closely. It holds a lot of interesting material. And I hope that the audience will be exposed to these ideas and will be able to connect to these ideas through the music.

The score for Black Sun Rebirth combines elements from contemporary chamber music, dark ambient, doom metal, and microsounds. How did you arrive at this combination of musical language for this piece?

These are all elements I personally like and I am influenced by. Metal, especially black metal, is the only musical style that since decades shows an interest in this culture and is outspoken about the violent, aggressive and bloody ways Christianity slaughtered and oppressed these traditional pagan Germanic cultures. In chamber music I am mostly interested in the extended soundscapes of timbral music—so ambient or doom is not so far away from this. All these styles work with non-traditional musical material. There is no key signature and often not even a meter in a traditional sense in these styles. It seems perfectly contemporary and at the same time ancient material.

Can you tell us about your interest in the cross-pollination between art music and avant-garde rock? Do you have a background in rock music?

Yes, I do. I have been working with Lee Ranaldo from Sonic Youth, we have the band Text of Light, with Lou Reed (Band and Metal Machine Trio), with the German krautrock band Faust and regularly record saxophone arrangements or soli for rock bands. Just recently I did a 4 contrabass-clarinet arrangement for a doom band in Berlin. I also have my own noise-metal band Blood Oath here in LA. At this moment I see avant-garde rock carrying on the torch of progressive music experimentation more than contemporary chamber music does, which seems as a whole to be in a phase of mannerism and getting conservative and retro. Rock music as well as contemporary art music is based on two main elements: sound and rhythm. Melody and traditional harmony are of minor importance to rock musicians and avant-garde chamber music composers.

Composer Ulrich Krieger

You’re known for pushing the boundaries of saxophone through collaboration with many well-known and respected artists, including Lou Reed, John Zorn, LaMonte Young, and others. What do you enjoy most about the collaboration process?

About collaborations I enjoy mostly that the end result is more than the sum of its elements. The music coming out of collaborations is a music I would have never written alone. It is a group thing and in best cases even transcends the group itself.

What do you see for the future of new music?

This is a deep question, I could fill a book with. I talked about some of it already in the questions above. I think we are at the dawn of a major cultural change. I see contemporary chamber music declining due to its crisis and its clinging to the 20th century. I see rock and pop music, especially metal, hip hop and electronica, getting even stronger and developing, opening up more and more to the experiment. It seems that rock and pop will continue the tradition of experimentation and innovation of 20th century art music. We see this already with noise, doom metal and electronica, which are all non-academic, progressive, experimental styles.

Don’t miss out on the concert November 17. Check out REDCAT for more information and to get your tickets.

Clarence Barlow on his music

Clarence Barlow at the Alphonse Mucha exhibit in Fullerton after the premiere of his piece, )ertur(, on January 28.

On April 8th, REDCAT will host a concert of composer Clarence Barlow’s works of the 21st century, including major ensemble, electronic and intermedia works. Tickets and info for that are at redcat.org/event/clarence-barlow. Full disclosure: I’m a student of Clarence’s, as is my friend Brandon Rolle, who interviewed him for UCSB’s website. The university kindly gave us permission to reprint that interview here ahead of this Saturday’s concert. Here are Brandon and Clarence:

Clarence Barlow is a composer and the Corwin Chair of Composition at the University of California, Santa Barbara. While Barlow is recognized internationally for his contributions to electronic music and his pioneering work in algorithmic composition, his voluminous artistic output defies categorization, breaking boundaries of style, genre, and form. Recently, the dynamic and diverse output of Barlow’s career was celebrated by a three-day festival of his works in Cologne, Germany—a city that introduced Barlow to Bernd Alois Zimmermann, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and the avant-garde music of mid-20th-century Germany from which his distinct compositional trajectory launched. This year Southern California, too, celebrates his career and music: January 28th marked the premiere of his recent major intermedia piece )ertur( in Fullerton, CA, and February 24th saw a program of his early chamber works (from ages 14-22) at UCSB.

Many of your best-known works in the academic community are those which utilize algorithmic processes or your original software, but early on you were an active pianist and conductor and your compositions are markedly more romantic—can you talk a bit about your early musical experience/education?

Well as a young boy, age eight, I used to play in a school band in my then home town Calcutta. Then at the age of 11, I decided to make my own music, though I had no formal teaching. At 13, I got into a general classical mode and at age 15 I got into a historical style at more or less Haydn, Mozart, reaching Rachmaninoff at age 17. Then a music critic heard my stuff and told me I was too conservative, and that there was other music I should listen to—he played me Samuel Barber on the piano—and I did move on. But all of these pieces were written for regular classic acoustic ensembles. My first electronic music was written at age 24, so these early pieces from 50 years ago—of which there will be a concert here at UCSB—are all going to be in styles of Haydn, Mozart, Bartók, etc. There will be two string quartets, and a wind quartet sounding a bit like Prokofiev, or Hindemith. Those pieces are a natural outcome of the process of my historic music development through my teen years and early 20s.

How did that first computer piece at 24 come about?

As one of the few people in India—well, the only one—writing Western contemporary music, I got a scholarship to go to Germany to study composition there. After the interview I was told I could pack already, and it was through this scholarship that I ended up studying with Zimmerman and  Stockhausen. The Cologne school where I started my studies in 1968 was the place to study electronic music—it had the only electronic music studio in a school at the time. So that’s where I made my first electronic pieces at 23 (Studies) and my first serious electronic piece at 24 (Sinophony I), gradually easing myself unwittingly into the very avant-garde contemporary music scene in Cologne, where I found my roots. But all the same, I broke with rules of the avant-garde in crazy ways.

When I started to do computer music—I was 24—it was because I understood there were certain algorithmic things I wanted to do which could probably only be realized by a computer. I remember that at the end of 1972, I drove a night and a day to Stockholm where I worked for two weeks in a studio over the Christmas break making my piece Sinophony II. I realized, a computer could do anything I wanted it to do, if I learned to program it properly.

In your teaching and lectures you talk about algorithms as a means to an end, compositionally. In the beginning, were you primarily experimenting to find new sounds?

No, I knew what I wanted. I could imagine the first stages of the compositional process and said ‘okay, let me work on that and listen to it’. For instance, my piece …or a cherish’d bard… is written for piano, but it’s highly algorithmic. I computer-programmed a first version of the piece, listened to the result and thought ‘boring, what do I have to change?’ I moved my program in a new direction and thought the result was a lot better, but now this gave me new ideas, which changed the process further until I finally said ‘this is it’. I had my piece.

I can’t imagine everything at the beginning, but listening to test results always gives me new ideas. The imagination is always the carrot, and I am the horse following it, as it were. And this holds for my algorithmic piano, ensemble, and electronic music alike. My electronic music is inspired even in its timbre by algorithms—someone told me recently that there is no such thing as algorithmic timbral composition; I said that isn’t true, I do it all the time.

Composer Clarence Barlow

Composer Clarence Barlow

A major component of your teaching, writing, and composing are your theories on tonal and metric functions as a continuum.

I came to Germany at age 22 writing conservative early 20th century music. But at the age of 24 my style broke completely and I became radical. My piano piece Textmusic was unlike anything I had done before; it was accorded a 20-minute response from the audience at Darmstadt—boos and applause; it was one of the big scandals of Darmstadt that year. From then on I was no longer writing in any historical style, unless I wanted to deliberately.

At 29, I first imagined a variably tonal music, not as in the past where it was simply tonal or semi tonal or atonal—I wanted tonality to go from 0% to 100% and back. It became clear that if I wanted to make this variable tonality—and variable metricity—that I had to develop a theoretical fundament. So I got into prime number theory, looked at Pythagoras and Euler and found my way through algebraic formulae which I programmed all summer in Cologne at the Institute of Phonetics. That is how these formulae became the cornerstone of a lot of my work.

Why was it important to be able to move between tonal/atonal styles as a parameter or variable?

One of my great heroes in literature is James Joyce. He absorbed culture into his work, which is not only fantastic literature but is also a commentary on culture. Looking at music culture of the past—tonal, atonal—I wanted to use all of that. I saw tonality as a kind of magnetic field, the strength of which I wanted to change at will. Joyce often writes in historic styles with a twist—I do that too, in my derived music. But in my algorithmic music I also conjure up and generate styles which might or might not make you remember past history.

What about the incorporation of extra-musical elements into your music? 

I have been synesthetically oriented for most of my life. I’m not sure if that has anything to do with it, but I’ve always been very interested in the visual. And language—when learning German at 22, I discovered my great love of language. So I think it is because I love all these things that I start to perceive bridges between them and music.

As a composer for both fixed media and human performers, what is it that you look for in a performance of your acoustic work?

For me it is important to listen to the result—now the humanly played result may not be 100% accurate as in a MIDI rendition, but if it were, it would be without soul. A great human performance has expression, phrasing, nuances. If it comes across as something fresh, something with musical spirit, then I’m happy.

Then do you find it problematic for electronic music that it lacks such human “spirit”?

No, it’s not a problem. It is like being in a planetarium, looking at exact moments in time, exactly placed, with exact frequencies.

Like much modern music, your compositions can be challenging to listen to for many people. Is there ever temptation to adjust the musical language to make the concept more accessible?

I don’t need to be accessible. I believe in the grand body of culture we have behind us, and in the propagation and extension of it. You cannot make it accessible to everyone. You don’t doctor art to propagate it. I love James Joyce: should Joyce have written in a simpler style to be more accessible? I believe very strongly you stick to your guns, you do what you have to do.

So what would you suggest to a listener in order get the most out of your music? Out of modern music in general?

I would say first of all, frequency of listening is very important. You have to listen often. You’ve got to go to lots of events, you’ve got to have an open mind. Get to know the music.

We couldn’t agree with that more. Check out Clarence’s music at REDCAT on Saturday at 7. Tickets and more information are up at redcat.org/event/clarence-barlow

Redcat’s NOW Festival Concludes Impressively with Eclectic Final Program

The 13th annual New Original Works (NOW) festival, presented at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theatre (better known as REDCAT), drew to a convincing close last weekend in a diverse program of Body Demonstration, Music, and Dance.

The hotly anticipated summer festival is a local oasis of artistic innovation in the creatively dry months of the year. The festival of three interdisciplinary programs over as many weeks featured works by early career artists, selected with an eye to new projects in development.

REDCAT Directors Mark Murphy and Edgar Miramontes opened the program with contextualizing remarks, citing the festival’s mandate and methods. “The NOW Festival allows emerging artists to use this theater as a laboratory for taking risks,” Miramontes articulated.

Filling the house to its 200 seat capacity, a decidedly risk-on audience had no objection to being subjects in tests that proved largely successful.

Energetically bounding into view, self-styled performance art ensemble I AM A BOYS CHOIR took the stage for the first, longest, most outrageous work of the program, Demonstrating the Imaginary Body or How I Became an Ice Princess.

Oddly coinciding with the current Summer Olympic games, Ice Princess chronicles the enmeshed paths of three figure skaters competing in the 1992 Winter Olympics through film and the art of “body demonstration,” an experimental genre blurring the boundaries of dance, theater, and spoken word.

The piece unfolds through a series of vignettes, each named and modeled after steps on Kristi Yamaguchi’s checklist for success: “beauty, stamina, fearlessness,” and others. Through funny, rambling stories, neatly choreographed fitness routines, and mock auditions, all reinforced by gender-bending costumes and driving 90s-era disco music, a clear sense of an ice princess culture begins to emerge, “without a narrative” as collective member Adam Rigg stated upfront.

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I AM A BOYS CHOIR at REDCAT’s New Original Works festival

Emotional intensity mounted throughout the work, moving from the cerebral to the emotional in a kind of exploration of Chakras. Communication evolved from ordinary speech, to body language, to sense-defying videography, followed by a hedonistic frenzy of activity complete with animal costumes, nudity, and other-worldly lighting.

Strongly camp informed, the three-member, queer-identified collective knowingly disregards conventional notions of artistic territory. Banal, self-critical chatter punctuated by an intermittent “what time is it now?” among other seeming trivialities, challenged observers to accept a new standard of artistic merit. “Our goal is to present the truth above all, at all times,” recited member Kate D’Arcus Attwell at one juncture in the performance. Audaciously direct, natural, and unrestrained, I AM A BOYS CHOIR convinces on a visceral level, even as it befuddles logically.

Audience analyses percolated up along the pilgrimage for half-time restoratives. A view proliferated that “much did not make sense,” but the collective clearly delivered on its opening claim to “blow your minds.”

Following a leisurely intermission (and extensive cleanup), composer Daniel Corral arrived on stage to perform his new work Comma in an innovative usage of existing technology.

Presenting the only expressly musical work of the festival, Corral faced the dual duty of satisfying artistically, as well as representing the art of music before the NOW audience.

Daniel Corral

Daniel Corral

A darkened hall suddenly flared with iridescent swatches, pulsing and changing with each note in streams of electronic sound reinforced by vigorous minimalist rhythms.

Congruent in purpose with the foregoing Ice Princess, Corral’s Comma reverses traditional musical priorities in a celebration of the Pythagorean comma, the bane of tuning systems since the middle ages.

Pythagoras gets the credit for codifying an intonation based on just fifths, pure and without “beats” (a canceling out of soundwave crest and trough). Beatless fifths are gentle, euphonious harmonies, but the sum of such intervals is greater than their parts, leading to a small but significant inequity in the tuning system. That hair’s breadth of dissonance is the comma (“hair” in Latin), and for centuries, the question was what to do about it.

Today’s intrepid listener accepts the comma, enjoying the dissonant crunch of “wolf intervals,” originally named for the howling of wolves. Comma draws on a pitch vocabulary derived from just-tuned fifths, exploiting their inherent beauty, and cognitively reframes dissonances as sumptuous umami flavors.

Striving for “something that could be experienced on multiple levels,” as Corral notes, a whimsical light show of shifting colors and shapes complements beguiling harmonies and timbres for a “total work of art.” Building on accordion-playing chops, Corral dispatched a dizzyingly intricate drum machine part on Novation’s Launchpad Pro, triggering sound and light with agility and speed.

Comma’s multiple paths of engagement and balanced blend of cooperative elements worked to hold audience attention consistently, slowing time against a steady stream of activity. Enthusiasm for the concluded piece reverberated palpably, as a sense of music’s abiding power to enchant and challenge was affirmed once again.

In the moving finish of both program and festival, dancer and choreographer Wilfried Souly integrated disparate movement traditions and original music in On Becoming, an exploration of identity-evolution.

“Reflecting the way physical history shapes Self across life,” writes Souly, On Becoming reflects influences on Souly’s own history, including African traditional dance, contemporary dance, and Taekwondo, fluidly fusing them for a new, unique genre.

An ensemble of musician from at least three countries collaborated in creating new music through shared improvisation: Boubacar Djiga, from Souly’s West African homeland of Burkina Faso, arranged and recorded traditional Burkinan music. Composers Tom Moose and Julio Montero later created new jazz, blues, and Latin folk-inspired music, taking the original African music as an impetus. A mosaic of styles crystalized, each element retaining its identity while harmoniously supporting the others.

The diverse musical backdrop both drove and reflected movement content on stage. An upbeat swing melody accompanied by shimmering tremolos served as springboard for bouncy gaits and playful turns.

On Becoming

Wilfried Souly: On Becoming

A lyrical ballad for violin, guitar, and recorded media supported a tender episode, featuring intimate close embrace and expressive undulatory gestures. Afro-Blues fusion music pulsed rhythmically in a play on space and number: Dancers merged densely then diffused apart, then bifurcated the stage along a striking diagonal. A later number featured Souly in isolation, divided from the ensemble as soloist, as if satellite reflecting ensemble action. “While the others shared a tender moment together, I preferred to stand apart, on my own,” Souly explained in post-performance conversation. A plaintive soliloquy in spoken word, followed by an episode of descriptive facial expressions and subtle hand gestures brought the piece to an ending point, with ensemble exiting unobtrusively into the audience.

An apt closing number for the evening and season, On Becoming acknowledges the evolving of individual identity and the diversity that shapes it. NOW guests witnessed a moment in that flow of impermanence this season, and can expect new, original works of another variety next summer and beyond.

anatomy theater

Timur (top center) as Ambrose Strang, with (left to right, foreground) Peabody Southwell as Sarah Osborne, Robert Osborne as Baron Peel and Marc Kudisch as Joshua Crouch in the world premiere of David Lang's "anatomy theater." (Photo: Craig T. Mathew / LA Opera)

Timur (top center) as Ambrose Strang, with (left to right, foreground) Peabody Southwell as Sarah Osborne, Robert Osborne as Baron Peel and Marc Kudisch as Joshua Crouch in the world premiere of David Lang’s “anatomy theater.” (Photo: Craig T. Mathew / LA Opera)

Like many operas, David Lang’s anatomy theater (with a libretto by Lang and Mark Dion) – presented by the LA Opera and Beth Morrison Projects – ends with a woman dead on stage. Unlike many operas, said woman is dead when the curtain goes up, and her status has little impact on her ability to sing. Set ambiguously around the start of the 18th Century in England, the premise of the work is that the audience is the audience for a medical dissection. At the time, the only bodies available for dissection were those of executed convicts, and anatomists believed that the organs of a law-breaker were marked by their crimes, turning public dissections into moral spectacles where law-abiding citizens could see purported marks of evil in a criminal’s corpse. (Needless to say, there was also an element of inflicting further punishment on the convict even after death.)

And so we have our criminal: Sarah Osborne (played masterfully by Peabody Southwell) who, in an aria on the gallows before her execution in the lobby before the show proper begins, confesses to murdering her children and abusive husband, defiantly expresses her expectation that God will forgive her and receive her soul into Heaven — or, failing that, “if [her] Lord and Savior will be so cruel to [her] as men and women have been, [she] had rather burn in the flames of Hell.” The executioner is Joshua Crouch (Marc Kudisch), who also happens to be the impresario for the dissection that is to follow. “Don’t you feel safer?” he bellows at the gathered crowd, gesturing at the limp corpse of the hanged Osborne. The crowd — treated to complementary sausages and beer to better recreate the atmosphere of a public execution — laughed nervously, the first of many deliberate disconnects between the attitudes of the 21st–Century Americans we actually were and the 18th–Century Englishmen (and men were the only people allowed at “public” dissections) the characters treated us as. In the theater itself, Crouch is joined by Baron Peel (Robert Osborne) and his assistant Ambrose Strang (Timur). Strang does the work of cutting up the body and extracting its organs, while Peel pontificates about the nature of evil, the balances of the Four Humors, and other such sundries.

Peabody Southwell as Sarah Osborne in the world premiere of David Lang's "anatomy theater." (Photo: Craig T. Mathew / LA Opera)

Peabody Southwell as Sarah Osborne in the world premiere of David Lang’s “anatomy theater.” (Photo: Craig T. Mathew / LA Opera)

Not surprisingly, this is a gristly affair. Most of us would likely find a human dissection unpleasant to watch under the best of circumstances, but here the air is soured still further by the undercurrent of female objectification taken to its most literal extreme; Sarah Osborne’s body is a literal object for men to toy with, cut to pieces, and condemn. And yet, much to Peel’s chagrin, Strang finds each organ removed immaculate, describing Osborne’s stomach, spleen, heart, and uterus in hagiographic terms and utterly thwarting Peel’s quest to find the mark of Satan’s handiwork. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, then, it is only Strang who seems to hear Osborne when she shudders back to a ghostly simulacrum of life towards the opera’s final third.) After Peel concedes failure and departs, Crouch offers to continue the dissection informally “around the back” — for a fee, of course.

Gristly as these proceedings are, the score is a far cry from a relentless stream of horrors. There are certainly moments of strident dissonance, but there are others of transcendent radiance — much of the dissection itself falls somewhere uneasily in between, torn between the marvelous inner workings of the human body and the raging misogyny and hypocrisy that surround this particular exploration of them. The bulk of the music flits lightly between twitchy recitative and more languorous arioso passages, with hints of minimalism and art pop lurking just out of sight, but there are a few moments towards the beginning that seem to veer closer to pastiche: One, Baron Peel’s first introduction, borrowing the caustic updating of early English operetta found in Brecht/Weill’s Threepenny Opera and the other, a long and bizarre ensemble number announcing the pending description of the anatomist’s tools, poking gentle fun at certain excesses of Philip Glass.

Directed by Bob McGrath and Music Director Christopher Rountree (the Artistic Director of wild Up, which served as the pit orchestra for the show), the four singers brought their roles to powerful life. Southwell’s Osborne was by turns defiant, distraught, and desperate, displaying the full range of the human heart and showing with countless subtleties the overpowering forces that might make someone conclude that murder was their best and only means of escape from an unconscionable situation. Crouch, as played by Kudisch, is a lecherous scoundrel, driven by nothing more than the desire to line his own pockets. Timur brought an air of dazed reverence to the role of Strang, a young man, clearly out of his depth, but standing firmly by what he knows to be true in pronouncing each organ unblemished even in the face of Peel’s considerable displeasure. And Robert Osborne, in turn, was a thunderously self-righteous Peel, genuinely convinced of the justness of his cause and unbending in the face of any possible contradictory evidence. In his final aria, he sends the audience away with a dire warning to be on the lookout for omnipresent evil. “Where is evil?” he snarls, “There it is! There it is! There it is!”, jabbing his finger every which way. He points everywhere except himself.

Interview: Nadia Shpachenko on her Piano Spheres debut

Dr. Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman is associate professor of music at Cal Poly Pomona. Photo by Tom Zasadzonski.

Dr. Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman is associate professor of music at Cal Poly Pomona. Photo by Tom Zasadzonski.


Tomorrow (Tuesday) night, pianist Nadia Shpachenko has her Piano Spheres Satellite Series debut at REDCAT. Tickets are available at redcat.org/event/piano-spheres-nadia-shpachenko. We reviewed Nadia’s last album here a few months back, and are stoked both for this concert and the fact that she had a minute to answer some questions about the program via email. Here’s Nadia.

So tell me about your Satellite Series show.

Tomorrow I will be performing a recital that features music written for me by six very talented composers with whom I worked closely on the interpretation of the works. It is an incredibly personal program that I can’t wait to share with LA audiences! The second half of the program will present the world premieres of two architecture-inspired works commissioned by Piano Spheres. Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Lewis Spratlan’s Bangladesh conveys the transformative hope of Louis Kahn’s National Assembly Buildings in Dhaka. Annie Gosfield, whom the New Yorker called “The Carl Nielsen of Second Avenue,” wrote The Dybbuk on Second Avenue for this recital. Annie’s piece reflects the changing mix of influences in one theater in the Lower East Side’s “Jewish Rialto” over the years: from Yiddish theater to burlesque, from Chekhov to William Burroughs. These are the first two works of a project I am completing, to commission and record works inspired by architectural settings. In 2016 I will premiere four more new works by Amy Beth Kirsten, Hannah Lash, James Matheson, and Harold Meltzer at the Piano Spheres series at Boston Court, all illuminating particular architectural phenomena. The first half of the program  will include works written for my albumWoman at the New Piano by Tom Flaherty, James Matheson, Adam Schoenberg, and Peter Yates. I like to humorously call that program Music for a New B’ak’tun, that is music for a newly transformed world, the new 5,125 year cycle according to the Mayan Calendar, which began in 2013 when all those works were written. I will note that the pieces all touch on the themes of transformation, of resonances across time, of cycles of rebirth. Cretic Variations by James Matheson emphasizes lengthy resonances, how momentary events persist, shape new events, and how our memory of the past is revised by events of the now. Whereas Adam Schoenberg’s Picture Etudes take us through a variety of worlds, from placid to energetic, Peter Yates’ Finger Songs take us on a journey through time, playing on our sentiments with flashes and resonances of musics past. Whereas Tom Flaherty’s Airdancing (for which the wonderful Genevieve Feiwen Lee will join me on toy piano) and Adam’s Picture Etudes introduce novel combinations of sound sources, Peter’s Finger Songs feature novel combinations of musical forms and genres. A number of the pieces feature descent into true musical chaos, and emergence into the new – whether momentous, as in the thunder and dawn of Cretic Variations, or thrilling, as in whoops and swirls of Airdancing. I am very excited to perform this program tomorrow!

Here is a sneak peak into the first half repertoire:

Had you selected the In Full Sail piece to begin with, or does the theme really encompass the whole program?

In Full Sail to me means sailing towards my dreams, taking chances and going for it all the way. In Full Sail is also the title of a piece Harold Meltzer is writing for my architecture-inspired program. In Full Sail won’t be premiered until May 2016, but Harold was the first composer I approached for the project and the first one to come up with a title. And thoughIn Full Sail is a critic’s description in particular of the Frank Gehry building to which Harold is responding, the title seems to describe well the theme of the first concert that will feature works from this project (but will also feature works fromWoman at the New Piano), given its wide meaning.

What’s it like being a Satellite Series artist? I’ve heard there’s a bit of mentoring and support from the long-term Piano Spheres mainstays.

I am honored and excited to join Piano Spheres as a Satellite Artist! Vicki Ray has been a wonderful mentor, giving me great advice about programming and career building and I am looking forward to presenting a composition workshop with Vicki this afternoon at Boston Court, together with composers Lewis Spratlan (who just got into town from Massachusetts) and Adam Schoenberg. Vicki’s sparkly personality and infectious energy definitely have a way of rubbing off on me, and all the other Piano Spheres pianists and staff have been very supportive, making my Piano Spheres experience superb!

We’re lucky in LA to have a lot of fantastic pianists. Who else in town inspires you?

I agree, the Los Angeles new music (and older music) scene is thriving! When I go to concerts of new music, I see enthusiastic people of all ages in the audience. There is great appreciation in LA for all things avant-garde, outside the box, with too many wonderful new music ensembles and solo artists to list. Since my twin boys were born 5 years ago, my concert going experience slowed down a bit for a few years, but last year I was able to attend many incredible, inspiring concerts featuring adventurous, innovative music, much of which was actually written by local composers. Since I can’t list everyone who inspires me in town, I would like to focus on the Piano Spheres pianists, who inspire me beyond words. I was fortunate to be able to attend most Piano Spheres concerts last season (and of course the fantastic season opener with Gloria Cheng and Thomas Adès in September). Each of the principal artists, Gloria Cheng, Vicki Ray, Mark Robson and Susan Svrček, presented cohesive, exciting, beautifully-themed programs that featured their exceptional pianism and great imagination in interpreting new works. I was also very impressed by the inaugural Satellite Series last season and still remember vividly Nic Gerpe’s powerful Crumb performance and Aron Kallay’s unforgettable program, which included a piece for speaking pianist and electronics by Vykintas Baltakas, for which Aron recited a text in Lithuanian! I also frequently collaborate with the adventurous pianist Genevieve Feiwen Lee, with whom I recorded two works for my album (Airdancing by Tom Flaherty and Bounce by Adam Schoenberg), and who will be airdancing with me on Tuesdayat REDCAT. I would just like to mention one more pianist who to this day continues to inspire me, my wonderful teacher John Perry, with whom I completed my graduate studies during the late 1990s through mid 2000s. Perry is turning eighty in February and has not slowed down a bit with his teaching and performances, which are moving, powerful and deeply felt. And he just presented a recital at Carnegie Hall to celebrate his 80th birthday!

What’s next after this show?

I have a very exciting season planned, with numerous premieres and exciting collaborations! I will be focusing on two brand new solo programs this season, which I will touring and recording in the near future. One of the programs, which I will start calling The Poetry of Places once it starts presenting only the architecture-inspired works in one recital, will feature six new compositions written for my project mentioned above (two of which I will be premiering). I will be performing these works more than a dozen times this season in California, New York, and Baltimore. For this project I will also be recording Andrew Norman’s Frank’s House for two pianists and two percussionists. Andrew and I were classmates at USC and I am thrilled to collaborate with him on this project! My other program, which I like to call Quotations and Homages will feature new and very recent musical homages by Matthew Elgart, Daniel Felsenfeld, Tom Flaherty, Vera Ivanova, James Matheson, Missy Mazzoli, Nick Norton (you!) and Peter Yates, five of which I will be premiering at Spectrum in New York on December 13. I am also very excited about my upcoming collaborations with Los Angeles Philharmonic’s violinist Vijay Gupta, with whom I will be performing a few local concerts in January, and with Kathleen Supové, with whom I will be performing concerts in three states in December, January and February, including the premiere of Jack Van Zandt’s Regular Division of the Plane for two pianos and a piece selected from ACFLA’s call for scores.

Anything else to add?

For this concert I had the privilege of choosing a beautiful Steinway & Sons concert grand that will be delivered to REDCAT tomorrow! I became a Steinway Artist last February and this was the first time since becoming a Steinway Artist that I had the opportunity to choose an instrument for a specific performance, an instrument that I felt would be a great match for the program on Tuesday. Adam Borecki beautifully filmed the Steinway Selection process, during which I discussed the differences between the instruments and performed short sections from some of the pieces on each piano. You can watch the clip, which was just finished this morning, here:

Review: Missy Mazzoli/LA Opera: Song from the Uproar

I can imagine no better way to be introduced to the LA Opera than by this show. I had no idea what to expect, only hope that it might be a nice way to spend a Friday evening. Of all the shows in LA, I figured I might as well check out something brand new. I was in for a treat.

Isabelle Eberhardt, played by the incredibly talented Abigail Fischer, had several distinct lives and deaths, recollected through cobbled diary pages. Missy Mazzoli wanted to give her a proper homage through equally cobbled yet bleakly beautiful music. Using distorted guitars, stuttering electronic sounds, pure voices, and a wailing cello and flute tell Isabelle’s tragic stories. Videos on transparent scrims add further layers of emotion to the story, complementing the music. The chorus sometimes acted as a reflection of Isabelle, and other times sang duets with her. The musicians and their instruments were as much characters in the story as Isabelle. The cello cried, the flute sang, and clarinet drank coffee and the piano just drank.

One of my favorite moments was when Isabelle moved off her pillow in an opium den and sat with the pianist on his bench. He abandoned her there, and she carried on the tune the best she could. A melody usually implements small intervals for easy singing, but the song in the opium den had enormous intervals, which I imagined represented the highs and lows of drug use. My favorite song overall was “One Hundred Names for God,” when she goes through her religious phase near the beginning. The choreography was stunning, and the many different names dripped like glittering water from Isabelle’s mouth while the instruments lilted along deferentially.

Other songs featured amplified flute signaling a period of exploration, and guitar performing a heartbeat emulating blood rushing to one’s ears in a moment of high tension and fear. At the very end, when Isabelle dies in a flash flood, the guitar swells and grows like a physical presence, and cuts short the instant her life does. This perhaps sounds cliché, and rereading this review sheds light on what made the music so subtly effective in the moment. It’s a silken beauty like seeing the ocean in the moonlight that makes one wax poetic and at the same time fail to find the words. Through such a short but intense opera, the audience falls in love with Isabelle Eberhardt and our hearts break when the music ends her life.

In short, I cannot rave about this opera enough, especially the musicians. It only ran for the one weekend, but there will be many more performances by the LA Opera and from the Beth Morrison Projects this season. Buy your tickets early!