Pittsburgh New Music Net

Bellefield Hall Auditorium
Tickets will be available through ProArtsTickets

Music on the Edge kicks off its 2011–12 season with University of Buffalo’s Slee Sinfonietta, professional chamber orchestra in residence at UB and the flagship ensemble of the Robert and Carol Morris Center for 21st Century Music. Slee Sinfonietta will perform Donald Erb’s Sunlit Peaks and Dark Valleys, David Felder’s Another Face, Andrew Rindfleisch’s What Vibes!, and Mathew Rosenblum’s Ancient Eyes.

Music on the Edge wraps up its season this Saturday night with the totally unique Newband performing on instruments invented by the legendary Just Intonation composer Harry Partch. The concert is at the New Hazlett and includes music by Partch himself, Dean Drummond, and a new work by Mathew Rosenblum titled Yonah’s Dream. Details are here,  and you can read the PG’s extensive preview of the concert here. See you at the New Hazlett!

On the Saturday morning that Snowmageddon unleashed its fury on the region I had the pleasure of video chatting with flutist extraordinaire Lindsey J. Goodman about her upcoming Music on the Edge recital at the Warhol. Well known to local new music audiences for her exquisite performances with the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Lindsey will share a recital with Anthony Coleman on February 27. She’ll perform three pieces for flute and electroacoustics—by Mathew Rosenblum, Jacob Ter Veldhuis and Russell Pinkston—and the world premiere of a solo flute piece by Grant Cooper. In the following audio interview, Lindsey talks about the different pieces on the program, her love for electroacoustic elements, and what she looks for when she’s thinking about tackling a new piece. She also gives a little preview on the upcoming PNME season.

As always, I encourage you to listen to the whole interview.

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And here are some excerpts from the full interview. First of all, I asked Lindsey to describe what was on her program.

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When I asked Lindsey about how her affinity for electroacoustic elements developed, her thoughts ranged from being able to perform “chamber music for one person” to how this genre is particularly relevant to our technological society.

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Russell Pinkston’s Lizamander is for flute and MaxMSP and Lindsey discussed both the intense satisfaction and the risks of working with live signal processing.

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Finally, Lindesy gave us a preview of the upcoming PNME season as well as some her new projects which include concerto performances and (maybe, possibly) recording projects.

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For details about the concert visit Music on the Edge at www.music.pitt.edu/mote.

You might think I’m being snarky, but I’m not. Something that grabbed my attention from Mana Saxophone Quartet’s press kit was this:

“A particularly intriguing element in the Mana Quartet’s performances is their use of historical instruments. When the Belgian born inventor, Adolphe Sax, set out to create his newest invention, he envisioned an instrument that would reconcile the timbres of the standard orchestra. The result was a tone that was highly praised by composers such as Berlioz, Rossini, and Meyerbeer. Over the years, the saxophone has undergone acoustical changes which have given the instrument a different character. Audiences today readily notice these tonal differences and find the “vintage” sound delightful.”

Now if we could  just get them to release a recording on vinyl. The Mana Saxophone Quartet performs Tuesday night, October 13 at Bellefield Auditorium as part of Pitt’s Music on the Edge. Included on their program is Mathew Rosenblum’s Möbius Loop and a world premiere by David Mecionis. These guys are good. Come hear them Tuesday night so that when they are really big you can say, “I remember when Mana was first starting out and I heard them in Pittsburgh…” Full press release is here.