Pittsburgh New Music Net

While most of the media attention this week is deservedly on the PSO’s “Special Concerts” with John Adams, there’s still more new music happening over the weekend. Music on the Edge presents the remarkable clarinetist Jean Kopperud and the equally remarkable Stephen Gosling on piano. The duo will perform an entire recital of premieres, including a new piece by Eric Moe and several short pieces by David Felder for clarinet, bass clarinet, and processed sound. If you were at the MOTE concert honoring Eugene Phillips last January, you may remember that Felder was also featured as Lehar composer-in-residence and his sonically rich works for acoustic instruments and live electronics were very well received.

Also, MOTE is offering everyone who shows up a free cup of hot chocolate (even though by Saturday the forecast is calling for a high of 18° …woohoo!) so how can you go wrong?

(Full disclosure: promoting MOTE is part of my job at Pitt, and I also like hot chocolate.)

The PSO has done an excellent job of making John Adams available to the public through guest lectures at concerts, talks with composers, and interviews in print and video. In anticipation of this weekend’s “Special Concerts” with John Adams at Heinz Hall, Pittsburgh blogger Cynthia Closkey has posted an extensive interview with John Adams in four parts. You can read part one here and you’ll be linked to successive installments.

Also, don’t miss Andy Druckenbrod’s article about On the Transmigration of Souls in the P-G and Mark Kanny’s preview of this weekend’s concerts.

If HiTEC and/or Elliott Sharp and the Sirius String Quartet left you wanting more improvisation-oriented performances, you’ll enjoy tonight’s program by percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani. You can get a taste of what Nakatani’s gongs sound like here.

Frick Fine Arts Auditorium

Tickets are $10 at the door. With special guest Margaret Cox. 
This concert is co-sponsored with Music on the Edge.

No Triangle are a Berlin-based trio of improvisers which includes Magda Mayas (inside piano), Anthea Caddy (cello) and Annette Krebs (guitar and electronics). Their abstract sound is characterized by precise shifts, accelerations and disruptions, spanning the genres of chamber music, noise, musique concrete, and improvisation. Developing their own idiosyncratic language – based on the articulation of gesamtklang (total sound), as opposed to just pitch and harmony -the trio explores texture, space and instrument, generating a intertwining relationship of the electronic and the acoustic. (more…)

Duquesne’s PNC Recital Hall

David Stock conducts the Duquesne Contemporary Ensemble in premieres of works by Resa Vali, Randy Woolf, David Cutler, and David Stock.

Featuring soprano Kathy Soroka

$10 suggested donation

Update: This concert was originally posted as March 16 rather than April 16. Sorry for the mixup, and now it’s time to create a category called “Good Help is Hard to Find.” –The Management

Carnegie Music Hall

The Duquesne University Symphony Orchestra and flutist Alberto Almarza will premiere David Stock’s Flute Concerto.

$10 suggested donation

Duquesne University’s PNC Recital Hall

David Stock conducts the Duquesne Contemporary Ensemble in premieres by Andrew Kaiser and Paul Richards.

$10 suggested donation

Lots of good media coverage today about new music happenings this weekend. Pittsburgh City Paper has an article about HiTEC’s Friday night performance at the New Hazlett.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette  features an extensive interview with Elliott Sharp, performing on Saturday night with the Sirius String Quartet at the Warhol in the first concert from the new Music on the Edge Warhol partnership (and don’t forget that Elliott Sharp will speak at Pitt at 1 p.m. on Saturday).

And finally, Pittsburgh City Paper profiled (drum roll…) Pittsburgh New Music Net, which, come to think of it, can provide you with you with more information about each of the above events. Just click the Events category and you’ll find information about all of these programs and more.

Carnegie Library Music Hall

Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra present PSO Composer of the Year John Adams for and Author Talk and Book Signing based on his new autobiography Hallelujah Junction: Composing an American Life.

$15 General admission, $5 students with ID. Order online or call 412-622-8866

The New Hazlett Theater

As the first installment of Pittsburgh Chamber Music Society Bridges Festival, the Biava Quartet will give the world premiere of David Stock’s 8th String Quartet. The Biava will also perform  Shostakovich String Quartet No. 8 in c minor, Op. 110 and Mendelssohn String Quartet in f minor, Op. 80.

Updated Ticket Information

There have been a number of schedule and venue changes to the Bridges Festival which you can read about here. I’ll be posting the rest of the new info to the Events calendar soon.