Morgan Krauss has quickly emerged as a prolific and preternaturally talented composer, recently receiving 1st prize at the 2013 Orkest de ereprijs YCM competition. She describes her work as aiming to "produce tactile explorations based on ones physical awareness and elements of sensuality."
Her pieces live up to this description, hovering at the edge of incredible expectation here...
...and with this overwhelming texture of obscured language and secret messages:
Deep grooves and beautifully resonant harmonies typify David Skidmore's "Common Patterns in Uncommon Time", which you can hear an amazing clip of on here. It's not every day that you find a performer capable of playing in a group as busy, cohesive and polished as Third Coast Percussion that also finds time to write excellent music. We can't wait to see what he'll do once he gets his hands on the string quartet!
Oh, and check him out in action with Third Coast here...this is awesome:
Museum of Modern Art - John Cage Day - Third Coast Percussion - August 9, 2012 from Third Coast Percussion on Vimeo.
Sarah Ritch is the closest of close friends to the Spektral Quartet. Before we'd even fully formed as a quartet, Aurelien and I got together on a Tuesday afternoon to read duets, drink a little vodka, and get to know each other. Sarah was there, and the first to let us know that we had a long way to go if we were going to learn to match sounds in a string quartet. Why was she there? Oh yeah, she's married to Aurelien.
She's a savvy tech-expert and capable of wearing many hats: from composer, to Google Glass pioneer, to Director of Educational Outreach at the Beethoven Festival...and she gives a great interview involving music and technology. Plus, here's another interview between her and another good buddy of the quartet, Andrew Tham.
I think this duo (with a very old-school Aurelien look going on) depicts how she may have hoped Aurelien and my reading session had ended:
It's an honor to include the Pulitzer Prize-winning Bernard Rands in the killer stable of composers for our Mobile Miniatures project. He's worked with countless top artists, lauded in the press and received countless awards. But, the most exciting part of working with him on this project is to experience his great sensitivity to line and poetic sensibilities as we develop his miniature musical moment.
2014 marks Bernard's 80th birthday, and we also have performances of his Second String Quartet to look forward to. This is a finely sculpted piece with a great understanding of the quartet as a medium. To hear a masterful composer in full command of a genre and wringing deep expression from string instruments, take a listen. We can't wait to learn it!
I've known Julia Holter since my undergraduate years at the University of Michigan. While I didn't know her well back then, I've followed her amazing progression into an indie sensation after her move to Los Angeles for grad school at Cal Arts.
Among several good friends of the quartet (and in the spirit of full disclosure: fellow Michigan alums Chris F-L and on our blog Alex Temple), long discussions were had about her intriguing and labyrinthine song Marienbad. And I've been nothing short of enthralled with her new album Loud City Song. I'm pretty confident I've listened to Into The Green Wild at least 30 times. Check it out now:
I first became acquainted with Jen Wang's music in Darmstadt last summer. As a recipient of a "Staubach Honorarium", she had composed a new work for New York's excellent Talea Ensemble. It was a great moment in the festival from my perspective as it showed that even in a place as famously rarified as Darmstadt, the zeitgeist has shifted toward acceptance of a wide range of musical aesthetics.
I've kept an eye on what she's been up to ever since with keen interest in what's happening in the Bay Area. Jen is incredibly active as a composer and administrator as a co-Director of the Wild Rumpus collective and as curator at the Center For New Music.
A wonderfully sonically aware composer, Jen's sense for the development of sounds is on full display in this wonderful percussion quartet (make sure to click through to the second half):
I've known Jay Alan Yim since my time as a graduate student at Northwestern University. I had a fantastic time in his "Music Since 1975" class, including sprawling conversations about aesthetic issues that somehow wound up talking about initially unrelated issues and being forced to engage with music I thought (and continue to think, in some cases) that I hated.
Jay is a composer of incredible intellect and wide-ranging interests. His scores can range from the carefully constructed and sculptural "Blue Voice of Air" (that you can check out below) to this spacious multi-layered structure with elements of improvisation I was a part of performing back in 2009.
I always imagine a bold, geometrically bristling modern sculpture when I hear this piece. Also, fish making music...c'mon!
We've gotten to know Liza White well since this last spring. We premiered her "Zin Zin Zin Zin" (a raucous short work based on a scat by Mos Def) back in May, and had a fantastic time getting all its moving parts and criss-crossing lines into place for our debut disc. You can look forward to the full piece then, and in the meantime we'll be working with her on a brand new ringtone.
Were you wondering if Liza knows how to put together an exciting and energetic piece of music? If so, you haven't heard "Zin", but check out "Freestyle" on her website...each section of this barn-burner is based on different hip-hop dance moves!
And, because great music is great, check out Mos Def with The Roots...ZIN ZIN ZIN ZIN!
On a personal level, I am nothing short of squealing with joy that Ted Hearne agreed to be a part of our Mobile Miniatures project. I've listened to his album under the guise of R WE WHO R WE, his project with Philip White, countless times. Check out the project and his music...two things I'm independently and mutually pumped about!
Check out the madness live, linked above, or listen to what may be my favorite cover of all time: his version of Mariah Carey's Emotions. Y'know that original is pretty darn good too...
Hark! I bring you tidings of great joy! Spektral Quartet and Parlour Tapes+ have all six pieces on Spektral's debut album on tape!
Our final session.
I'm so excited about this record, and couldn't be prouder to have recorded such challenging, intelligent and expressive music for our first disc. Here are some things I can tell you:
-Recording Ben Hjertmann's piece on Friday and Eliza Brown's on Saturday was one of the biggest challenges this quartet has ever faced. Both pieces are incredibly difficult individually and for the ensemble, and in drastically different ways: the wild virtuosity and rapid-fire changes of Ben's piece versus the intricately interwoven web of microtonal harmony, pulsating rhythms and subtle timbres in Eliza's work.
-The record is titled "Chambers", a nod to Marcos Balter's piece on the album, the unique sound world of each piece, and that thing the four of us do every day.
-I am a danger to my instrument...after breaking my good violin during our first collaboration with Julien Labro (that video has me playing on a second-rate loaner after I ripped the top off my fiddle with a bow whip), I've proved once again "why we can't have nice things". Luckily, I was using my secondary violin to play the guitar-picking sections of Ben Hjertmann's piece in our session on Friday. Check out the sound of me knocking the bridge off my instrument with a big hit behind the bridge:
Also, things get a little loopy when we're hunkering down in the studio. Our coping mechanism seems to be extreme wackiness...thanks to Jenna Lyle for taking notes on our silliness during Friday's session:
“And THAT’s why they call him ol’ One Take Armbrust!”-Austin
“What do we want?? Time travel!! When do we want it?? That's irrelevant!!”-Aurelien
“Are there any shorter chairs? I can’t hunch over the way I like with these.” -Austin
“Bar 60 was the best we’ve ever done it that time.”-Russ
“Yeah, seriously. Speed it up, do a little pitch correction in post... It’ll be great.”-Doyle
“Why Guitar Players Have Frets: Part 800”-Austin
“Ya know, it should be more like ‘da-doo-dat-doo-dat--dat’”-Russ
“Well that was definitely tragic.”-Russ
“Ca-Kaww!”-Austin/Aurelien
“There’s the performing phase, and there’s the judging phase. And when you go too long....one takes over...How about 5. Take 5?” -Russ
I've never been the kind of musician (or music fan) who feels the need to be exclusive in my tastes. While it may surprise some of you who are more familiar with me writing about Haas or Carter, I'm just as likely to listen to Ke$ha or Chick Corea's "My Spanish Heart" without the slightest tinge of irony.
If I spend too long playing strictly concert hall music, I get a bit itchy. I'm certainly listening to other stuff, like my recent obsession from an amazing super-group.
That's why the the beginnings of our collaboration with Julien Labro for an album on Azica Records have brought me musical energy just when I thought I was burnt out from a long concert season.
First of all, Julien sent us a new arrangement of this scorcher a few months back to start work on:
Given the mixed meters and quicksilver solo lines, it's a good thing we've had some time to absorb the tune.
I'll be honest, I'd never heard of any of the artists on this track before Julien sent it our way. And, it's more of the same with a few other composers and tunes on the record. That includes the thorny hubbub of Fernando Otero's "De Ahora en Màs" and a couple tunes by the incredibly talented Diego Schissi, whose adventures in nuevo tango have a flavor of Stravinsky.
It's not like I've never listened to Latin jazz before, but diving into the styles and listening with actually playing these different moods and grooves in mind has been an adventure in uncovering some really special musical personalities.
Our first shows with the new material are on Tuesday at the Clark Street location of Uncommon Ground and on the Pittsburgh Chamber Music Society the following day. Look for more shows this fall, and the album later in the concert season!
But, it's not our first time playing together and we'll be bringing back some familiar arrangements from familiar names:
This past Tuesday morning, we made the trek down Lakeshore drive to the Performance Hall in the Logan Center at U. Chicago. Our friends from Parlour Tapes+ were already mostly finished in their setup as we warmed up and got situated. We came into this session feeling confident about our preparation and eager to get Hans Thomalla's "Albumblatt" on tape. It may be the piece we've played the most over our first three seasons as a quartet.
Adjusting to the incredibly clear acoustic of the hall took some time, but once we started playing full takes of the piece we began getting in a rhythm. Once the initial concern about getting it perfect wore away, it came down to playing the piece the way we know how...microphones be damned.
Having Hans' exacting ears there for the session was a boon, helping tweak our dynamics and articulations for the room and the microphones.
As the session wore on and it came down to making sure we were happy with everything, we realized we were better off having a coffee than continuing the session. We're looking forward to refining the sound of the recording the same way we've tweaked our conception of the piece over the last year.
A first foray into any realm of great importance is best made with friends. So, as we programmed our debut album it was self-evident that we record works by our composing comrades here in Chicago. And when we were approached by our pals Jenna Lyle and Kyle Vegter (who have teamed up with more amazing people in Andrew Tham and Ellen McSweeney) to be part of launching their new record label the choice was clear: an album of Chicago composers on a Chicago label.
We're thrilled to be a part of the birth of the first Chicago label devoted entirely to contemporary art music, Parlour Tapes+. You can come see the label take its first public steps at "The Guilty Party" on May 16, an evening of music and mystery. We'll be there, helping to score the action as we unmask the "killer" of Third Coast Percussion's David Skidmore!
And the good news is, this recording is really happening! We already have Chris Fisher-Lochhead's "Dig Absolutely" in the can, and recently recorded Marcos Balter's "Chambers" in Northwestern University's reverberant and spacious Alice Millar Chapel.
Check it out.
Getting the mics set with our inimitable producer Kyle Vegter:
In case you were wondering, this place is pretty majestic. We had mics getting room sound up there...
Doyle preaches the good news of the viola to the congregation:
This Friday, Spektral takes to the road for a day of masterclass and performance at Augustana College in Rock Island, IL. We're very much looking forward to premiering a new work by Jacob Bancks, entitled Canticle, who I've known for several years since he was a student at the University of Chicago and I played Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time with his wife Kara, an excellent clarinetist. Here are some thoughts from him about his personal approach to composition and the string quartet genre.
JAW: In approaching a new work for string quartet, do you find the tradition of the repertoire inspiring or encumbering? What are your favorite quartets and did you draw any inspiration from them for this work?
JB: A lot of composers talk about being weighted down by Mozart, Shostakovich, whomever, when writing string quartets. Honestly, I never let old, famous works in any genre get in my way; that would be like my three-year-old daughter getting her crayons jumbled by the specter of Picasso. And plenty of people can't tell the difference between the two anyway. There are however a few canonical string quartets that I'm constantly engaging, in this project and elsewhere. As a nerdy undergrad I went up to Performers' Music on Michigan Ave. and devoutly bought that red faux-leather volume of the complete Bartók quartets like it was the Book of Common Prayer. Every couple of years I go back to those, and my mind is newly-blown; they're like six new works each time I hear them. Of late I've also become an unwitting fan of Joseph Haydn's quartets. I tell my theory students, Haydn's like your dad: you think he's boring now, but the older you get, the more grotesquely fascinating he will become. And I always go back to Beethoven, especially Op. 130 (B-flat Major) which is personally very sentimental to me, and Op. 131 (C-sharp Minor), which I find both exhilarating and baffling. But my real string quartet fetishes of late, which might be obvious from the new work for Spektral, have been Ravel and Debussy. They each wrote only one quartet: why mess with perfection?
JAW: How did you approach putting pen to paper for this work? Did you begin with an idea of the piece as a whole or smaller moments?
JB: In this particular piece, I started with several musical images that I attempted to shape into a cohesive whole. The centerpiece of the work is this temperamental, bold, coarse cello solo, which has the other instruments responding in various stages of confusion and amazement. The rest of the piece centers on two basic ideas, both of which are transformed through the lens of the cello solo: excruciatingly slow, solemn polyphony; and uncontrollable, quietly nervous flickering.
JAW: How has life as a composer changed with your new role as a faculty member, compared to your past life as a composition student at University of Chicago?
JB: I loved UChicago, so leaving was hard. I was actually teaching for two terms before I came back to defend my dissertation, which was when it struck me that I had spent the last six years around some of the most brilliant musical minds on earth. But Augustana has been an ideal gig for so many reasons: I have excellent colleagues, I enjoy my students, my class sizes are small, and I have been able to build a composition program essentially from scratch. And I can swim to Iowa any time I want. Teaching has, without question, made me a better composer. For one, I nag my students enough about their productivity that I've started expecting more out of myself as well. And I love teaching undergraduates from all kinds of backgrounds: there's nothing like playing Firebird for someone who's never heard it before, or helping a student progress from barely reading notes to beginning to digest works of Berio and Feldman within a couple of years. More than anything, teaching keeps me constantly working toward expressing only the most worthwhile ideas with clarity, passion, and coherence, which is exactly what I hope for in my music as well.