Pittsburgh New Music Net

The American University Sax Quartet

Two fine new music concerts coming up starting tomorrow:

First, the Phillips family plays music of Eugene Phillips

The Phillips Family will perform a concert featuring two new works by Pittsburgh composer Eugene Phillips: Quintetto Concertante for soprano, flute, two violins and viola, plus his Suite for Viola and Bass Flute. Both works were written at the request of the Phillips family and are being premiered here in Pittsburgh. The Suite for Viola and Bass Flute features the newly invented bass flute, a giant flute sounding two octaves below the standard instrument.

Second, The American University Sax Quartet plays Brooks

The American University Saxophone Quartet is visiting Pittsburgh from Washington DC. They will be joined by University of Pittsburgh faculty and student performers Roger Zahab (violin/viola), Jonghee Kang (piano), and Eric Wiegandt (percussion) for a program that will feature works by George Tsontakis, Michael Torke, Paul Hindemith, Elliott Carter, Aaron Brooks, and Roger Zahab.

The American University Saxophone Quartet is a premier ensemble at American University in Washington DC. Regularly featured at university events, the quartet is committed to the study and performance of contemporary music for classical saxophone. This past semester the group commissioned and premiered a piece by Pittsburgh composer, Aaron Brooks. The work will be performed again at the University of Pittsburgh in May as part of a university exchange. In 2010 the group also premiered THAWST II by Katerina Stamatelos at the International Saxophone Symposium at George Mason University. Coached by Dr. Noah Getz, the quartet consists of Helen West, a recent graduate in music performance and economics; Vincent Guerrero, a junior studying music performance and education; Peter Jones, a senior studying accounting; and Charley Fogel, a recent graduate in psychology.

L-R: Linda Fisher, bassoon; Robin Driscoll, oboe; Rob Frankenberry, piano

Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Free

Animé BOP! will present a concert of recent works by composers with Pittsburgh roots. The program will include Nancy Galbraith’s Incantation & Allegro, James Ogburn’s Complements and Collisions, the premieres of eX (e to the x) by Mark S. Fromm, Semplicemente by Noah Rectenwald, and Robert Frankenberry’s arrangement of Daron Aric Hagen’s Tryst. Animé BOP! will also screen Will Zavala’s short film Virgil Cantini: The Artist in Public while performing Philip Thompson’s score live.

Anime’ BOP! is the result of three colleagues exploring the exciting repertoire possibilities of piano and double reeds. The ensemble is devoted to performing a wide array of musical periods and styles, as well as discovering new compositions through arrangement and commissions. Its members are:

Bassoonist Linda Morton Fisher is currently principal with the Pittsburgh Opera, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre, Civic Light Opera, the Lancaster (OH) Festival Orchestra and the Westmoreland Symphony, as well as the instructor of bassoon at the University of Pittsburgh.

Oboist Robin Driscoll is principal oboe with the Pittsburgh Opera and Ballet as well as with the Wheeling Symphony.  He appears throughout the United States as a soloist and has played with the Cleveland Orchestra and Pittsburgh Symphony. Mr. Driscoll is a member of the faculties of University of Pittsburgh and the North Carolina School of the Arts.

Pianist Robert Frankenberry leads a multi-faceted career as a tenor, pianist, and conductor, performing regularly in Chicago, New York and Pittsburgh. Robert is currently artistic administrator for the Opera Theatre of Pittsburgh, and is a member of the IonSound Project and Music on the Edge Chamber Ensemble.

I’ve been so busy putting together the video interviews with Robert Dick that I’ve neglected a couple things that are happening real soon.

First off, there’s a noise/post-rock/ambient… show happening at Garfield Artworks featuring Aidan Baker and Insect Ark (AKA Dana Schecter) happening at Garfield Artworks TONIGHT at 8 p.m., so check it out if you can.

Second, in between his performances with Alia Musica, Robert Dick is giving a free lecture at Pitt on Friday at 4 p.m. It’s titled Successful Composition with Extended Techniques, sumpin’ he knows a little about. Come on over to Pitt to hear him.

Sot there is a lot going on this weekend, and by this weekend I mean starting with two concerts Thursday night: The PSO, IonSound Project, and the Warhol have teamed up to present a concert of music curated by Mason Bates, including two of his own pieces. Meanwhile, back at Duquesne (and how often do you get to write that phrase?), NOW Ensemble is going to perform music by student composers from Duquesne and Pitt at PNC Recital Hall (8 pm and free). Friday through Sunday the PSO will perform Bates’ B-Sides. Saturday Night, MOTE present NOW at the Warhol and the program will include a the premiere of Rounder Songs by our own Patrick Burke and Emily Pinkerton. Soooooo… It’s going to be good! Oh yeah, and if you mention that you’re an IonSound supporter at the Warhol, the tickets are only $10 bucks for the Thursday night show. Check out the Events Calendar thusly ———>

Bellefield Hall Auditorium, Free

IonSound Project, Pitt’s Ensemble in Residence, performs new compositions by Pitt graduate composers Aaron Brooks, Chris Capizzi, Bomi Jang, Charles Lwanga, Sookyung Sul, and Jeremy Woodruff.

Frick Fine Arts Auditorium
Tickets: $15 at the door. $10 advance at Paul’s CDs, Caliban Books, William Pitt Union Box Office, Dave’s Music  Mine, and The Exchange (Squirrel Hill, Downtown).

Wednesday October 19 is a triple threat New Music/avant-garde jazz night for three great reasons:

Cliff Colnot

Tonight, Cliff Colnot and other outstanding guest conductors will lead Alia Music Pittsburgh in works by Jimenez, Garcia, Heap, Gillespie, and Livengood. It’s at Synod hall at 8. Full details here. And if you’re near New York City tonight, Talujon Percussion is celebrating an evening of premieres, including Eric Moe’s Danger: Giant Frogs, which, ya know, be prepared! Here’s the skinny on that concert.

Wednesday October 19 is a triple threat New Music/avant-garde jazz night for three great reasons:

1) It’s the first appearance in Pittsburgh in over a decade for
NYC-based multi-reedist Ned Rothenberg. Over the past three decades, Rothenberg has worked with the likes of Fred Frith, Evan Parker, John Zorn, Marc Ribot, and Elliott Sharp. Now he’s on tour with the Mivos Quartet, a string ensemble specializing in contemporary composition. The five musicians will perform his Quintet for Clarinet and Strings which was released on John Zorn’s Tzadik Records in 2010: http://www.tzadik.com/index.php?catalog=7267
For information on Rothenberg, check:

http://www.nedrothenberg.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ned_Rothenberg

2) Local saxophonist Ben Opie will open the evening with
his own ensemble. It was Opie who organized the entire
visit of legendary MacArthur Genius Grant-winning composer
and saxophonist Anthony Braxton to Pittsburgh in 2008. In addition to recording a double CD with Opie, playing with his Septet at the Manchester Craftsman Guild, with CAPA High School’s Antithesis Ensemble and with the birds at the Aviary, Braxton conducted a group of local musicians (“The Three Rivers Tri-Centric Ensemble”) in one of his compositions. The results were recorded, and will be released on October 19 as a limited edition (300 copies) vinyl LP on stalwart local experimental label SSS Records (as catalog # SSS-60). This concert is the release party – you’ll definitely want to pick it up.

3) This concert is sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh’s
award-winning college radio station, WPTS-FM. Although the station has been known for many years for bringing great
indie bands to campus (ranging from the Silver Jews to
Of Montreal), this is the first time it has stood solidly behind
an avant-garde jazz/New Music event. Here’s hoping they
do so regularly in the future.

Here are the event details:
Ned Rothenberg & Mivos Quartet
Ben Opie Ensemble
Anthony Braxton LP release
Wednesday October 19 8 pm all ages welcome
Frick Fine Arts Auditorium, University of Pittsburgh
$15 at the door. $10 advance at Paul’s CDs, Caliban
Books, William Pitt Union Box Office, Dave’s Music
Mine, and The Exchange (Squirrel Hill, Downtown).

Please note that the Cliff Colnot’s Lecture at Pitt is on September 28 at 1 p.m., not September 30. Good help is hard to find. Here is the full and correct information from the Pitt Music Department Web site.

http://www.music.pitt.edu/events/lecture-conductor-cliff-colnot110830

Pitt’s Music Building, Room 132

CORRECTION: THIS LECTURE IS ON SEPTEMBER 28, not September 30 as originally posted.

New music conductor extraordinaire Cliff Colnot will give a lecture for Pitt’s Department of Music in conjunction with the Alia Music Conductor’s Festival (also on September 30th the concert is on September 30, not the lecture). In the past decade Cliff Colnot has emerged as a distinguished conductor and a musician of uncommon range. One of few musicians to have studied orchestral repertory with Daniel Barenboim, Colnot has served as assistant conductor for Barenboim’s West-Eastern Divan Workshops for young musicians from Israel, Egypt, Syria, and other Middle Eastern countries. Colnot has also worked extensively with Pierre Boulez and has served as assistant conductor to Boulez at the Lucerne Festival Academy. He regularly conducts the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), with whom he recently recorded Richard Wernick’s The Name of the Game for Bridge Records, and he collaborates regularly with the internationally acclaimed contemporary music ensemble eighth blackbird. Colnot has been principal conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s contemporary MusicNOW series since its inception and is principal conductor of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, an orchestra he has conducted since 1994. Colnot also conducts Contempo at the University of Chicago, the DePaul University Symphony Orchestra and Wind Ensemble, and orchestras at Indiana University. He has appeared as a guest conductor with the San Antonio Symphony Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Utah Symphony.

Over the years he has devoted to the performance of new music with many ensembles around the world, Maestro Colnot has collected a series of notation guidelines for scores to be the most efficient and faithful vehicle for the realization of the composer’s vision. In this lecture he will share these guidelines and the experiences behind them, touching also on orchestration and rehearsal practices that conductors, performers, and composers will benefit from.

Find out more…