Pittsburgh New Music Net

What a great concert last night with the Bugallo-Williams piano duo—a great wrap up for Music on the Edge’s 2011-12 season. Pittsburgh’s new music scene is really moving along!

In fact, I’m excited to announce the Hear/Now festival on April 13 and 14. It’s coproduced by the Kelly Strayhorn Theater and Alia Musica.—I’m really honored to have helped curate a pretty cool line-up for this first time.

I don’t even know where to start mentioning the highlights and keeping the list short without leaving out some of the coolest stuff! Performers include eighth blackbird’s Tim Munro, DJ Spooky, Attack Theater’s Dave Eggar, PNME’s Conor Hanik, Pittsburgh’s own Eric Moe and Michael Johnsen… there are numbers by Alia Musica, ELCO, OvreArts, and Freya Quartet, multimedia acts by Chris McGlumphy, Alisha Wormsley, and a party at the Shadow Lounge with Ben Opie and DJ Soy Sos.

And the music that is being played! We’ll get to hear Varèse (Alia Musica is playing Octandre), Cage (in Tim Munro’s own solo-flute version of the Aria for solo voice), Feldman and Worinen played by PNME’s Conor Hanik, a Philip Glass quartet performed by Freya Quartet… I get to premiere a piece by George Tsontakis with Alia Musica too

Not to mention the plenty of music by Pittsburgh composers: Mathew Rosenblum’s wonderful Circadian Rhythms, piano music by him and Eric Moe (performed by Eric himself), John Newkom’s string quartet, a premiere by John Arrigo-Nelson, the music of Luke Mayernik…

For details and discount tickets visit the Kelly Strayhorn website. The event is also announced on Facebook, so make sure to like the organizations involved!

Gia Cacalano presents
THE SPACE UPSTAIRS

This Friday and Saturday, Gia Cacalano will premiere new pieces that combine choreography and improvisation in dance with music by vibraphonist Jeff Berman and (ahem) myself, David Bernabo.  The four dancers will do a few group pieces, some solos, and a very great duo.  We’ll be performing five pieces each night, and (if I can say so) it is turning out very nicely.  There is a nice article in this week’s Pittsburgh City Paper that discusses the motivations for the dance, so I’ll mention a few things about the music.  The first piece, which lasts roughly 30 minutes, combines electronic soundscapes, text, and freely improvised sections for vibraphone and amplified objects.  The electronic score was assembled from closed-circuit electronics that I recorded in 2004.  The text piece is a newer piece where each word is slowed down by 1% until the ending text is deep bass rumbling.  And of course, there is much more…

Hope to see you there.  Details below:

Friday, August 20 and Saturday, August 21, 2010
8PM, $12 students, $15 general admission
@ THE SPACE UPSTAIRS
214 N. Lexington St (above Construction Junction)
Point Breeze, Pittsburgh, PA
$15, $12 Students
More info: 4120758-3265

Gia Cacalano / Movement / Choreography / Concepts
Allie Greene / Movement
Jasmine Hearn / Movement
Beth Ratas / Movement
Jeff Berman / Vibraphone
David Bernabo / Electronics, Percussion