STAFF PICKS: Friday Faves

Posted on September 7, 2018 by maestrobeats

Second Inversion hosts share a favorite selection from their weekly playlist. Tune in on Friday, September 7 to hear these pieces and plenty of other new and unusual music from all corners of the classical genre!

Dawn of Midi: “Ymir” (Thirsty Ear)

This is one of my new favorite things. As literally every reviewer ever has noted, the ensemble Dawn of Midi is comprised of the same arrangement as any traditional jazz trio (drum kit, grand piano, and upright bass), but the way they use their instruments is more in line with the connotations of the ensemble’s name. This music sounds closer to Tycho, “15 Step” by Radiohead, or the minimal aspects of Aphex Twin than it does to any jazz you’ve ever heard. It’s a tight, taught, surely-not-made-by humans kind of sound, with rhythms set in cool, precise geometric shapes for your ears. And it kinda makes me want to dance. Or at least to try to. – Dacia Clay

Tune in to Second Inversion in the 2pm hour today to hear this piece.

Meredith Monk: Dolmen Music (ECM Records)
Meredith Monk, Julius Eastman, Andrea Goodman, Robert Een, Monica Solem, & Paul Langland, voices

Meredith Monk has secured a place in history as one of the most singular voices of the 20^th and 21^st centuries. For nearly six decades, she has redefined and revolutionized contemporary vocal music and performance, seamlessly weaving in elements of theatre and dance to create visceral musical experiences that transcend the confines of the classical tradition.

Her 20-minute masterwork Dolmen Music is an iconic example of her ability to merge ancient and modern musical ideas. In this piece, abstract vocalizations, primal rhythms, hypnotic dances, and ritualistic soundscapes come together in an intimate embrace of the human experience. – Maggie Molloy

Tune in to Second Inversion in the 4pm hour today to hear this piece.

Caroline Shaw: “Really Craft When You” (Cantaloupe Music)
Bang on a Can All-Stars

Caroline Shaw’s “Really Craft When You” is best described as a sonic quilt. It’s a chamber piece that stitches together vibrantly textured patches of chamber music with recorded interviews of quilters from North Carolina and Virginia in the 1970s. The result is a cheeky and heartfelt patchwork of found sounds and sonic squares expertly colored by the Bang on a Can All-Stars—and as it turns out, the quilters offer some pretty good musical advice too. – Maggie Molloy

Tune in to Second Inversion in the 7pm hour today to hear this piece.

Sneak Peek Audio Leak: Ken Thomson’s Sextet

Posted on September 5, 2018 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

Photo by Naomi White.

Ken Thomson’s music dances at the crossroads of contemporary classical and jazz—filled with boundless verve, blistering improvisations, and contrapuntal complexity. When he’s performing, his energy shines onstage—and when he’s writing music, it leaps off the page.

Though the clarinetist and saxophonist is perhaps best known as one of the Bang on a Can All-Stars, Thomson’s new album of original compositions, titled Sextet, features him performing alongside a hand-picked cast of jazz all-stars: saxophonist Anna Webber, trumpeter Russ Johnson, trombonist Alan Ferber, bassist Adam Armstrong, and drummer Daniel Dor.

The album begins with Thomson’s own arrangement of György Ligeti’s melancholic Passacaglia Ungherese before spiraling through a collection of six original groove-driven compositions that float freely between the rigor of through-composed music and the spontaneity of improvised solos.

We’re excited to premiere a track from the brand new album ahead of its September 7 release date. Click below to hear Thomson’s “Phantom Vibration Syndrome.”

<a href="http://kenthomson.bandcamp.com/album/sextet">Sextet by Ken Thomson</a>

Learn more about the music from the performers themselves in the trailer below!

Ken Thomson’s Sextet comes out September 7 on New Focus Recordings. Click here to pre-order the digital album.

New Sounds for Changing Seasons: September in Seattle

Posted on September 1, 2018 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

Second Inversion and the Live Music Project create a monthly calendar featuring contemporary classical, cross-genre, and experimental performances in Seattle, the Eastside, Tacoma, and places in between!

Keep an eye out for our this flyer in concert programs and coffee shops around town. Feel free to download, print, and distribute it yourself! If you’d like to be included on this list, submit your event to the Live Music Project at least 6 weeks prior to the event and tag it with “new music.”

Wayward Music Series
Concerts of contemporary composition, free improvisation, electroacoustic music, and sonic experiments. This month: dismantled sounds, distorted guitar, improvised quartets, analog electronics, and more.
Various days, 7:30/8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $5-$15

Racer Sessions: CHA
This brand new improvising trio takes its title from the names of its members: Carol Levin on electric harp, Heather Bentley on violin, viola, and electronics, and Amelia Love Clearheart on vocals and movement. See their spontaneous improvisations in action and bring an instrument, as groups of three are encouraged to improvise following CHA’s performance.
Sun, 9/2, 8pm, Café Racer | FREE

Karen Bentley Pollick
Slip into a hypnotic sound world of violin and electronics in Karen Bentley Pollick’s performance of wide-ranging works by David A. Jaffe, Constantin Basica, Nina C. Young, Milica Parasonic, Melanie Mitrano, and more.
Thurs, 9/6, 8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $5-$15

Ladies Musical Club: Zelos Saxophone Quartet
It’s not everyday you hear Bach performed by saxophone quartet—but there are three chances to hear it this month. The Zelos Quartet performs saxophone arrangements of Bach, Gershwin, Glazunov, and more. Plus, tune in to hear them perform on Classical KING FM’s NW Focus LIVE.
Sun, 9/9, 1pm, Church of the Redeemer (Kenmore) | FREE
Thurs, 9/13, 7pm, Seattle Central Library | FREE
Fri, 9/14, 8pm, NW Focus LIVE on Classical KING FM 98.1 | FREE

Distant Worlds: Music From ‘Final Fantasy’ with the Seattle Symphony
Final Fantasy composer Nobuo Uematsu will be in attendance at this multimedia concert featuring the Seattle Symphony performing music from the critically-acclaimed video game series. Grammy Award-winner Arnie Roth conducts.
Wed-Thurs, 9/12-9/13, 7:30pm, Benaroya Hall | $35-$150

Composer Paul Wiancko.

Emerald City Music: Four Seasons
Travel from Paul Wiancko’s intercontinental American Haiku through Astor Piazzolla’s intoxicating Four Seasons of Buenos Aires in this evening of virtuosic duets from across history. Tartini’s Devil’s Trill and Bottesini’s Gran Duo Concertante complete the program.
Fri, 9/14, 8pm, 415 Westlake | $45
Sat, 9/15, 7:30pm, The Minnaert Center (Olympia) | $28-$43

The Sound Ensemble: ‘L’histoire du soldat’
In Stravinsky’s timeless Soldier’s Tale, a young man trades his violin to the devil in exchange for wealth and learns a thing or two about the relationship between money and happiness. Hear the Sound Ensemble perform the classic tale with narrator as part of their season opener.
Sat, 9/15, 7pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $20

Opera on Tap: ‘Aide’ to ‘Zaide’
Local singers let their hair down and sing their hearts out, performing famous operatic masterpieces and hidden musical gems from ‘A’ to ‘Z’ in a friendly, relaxed atmosphere.
Sun, 9/16, 7:30pm, Blue Moon Tavern | $5

The Westerlies, photo by Shervin Lainez.

Westerlies Fest
The Seattle-bred, New York-based brass quartet returns home to host their first ever Westerlies Fest, a four-day music festival combining performances with daytime workshops for young players. In the evenings, catch the Westerlies performing alongside guest stars ranging from poets Troy Osaki and Azura Tyabji to Grammy-nominated vocalist Theo Bleckmann, TORCH chamber ensemble, and more.

Vocalist Theo Bleckmann.

Troy Osaki, Azura Tyuabji, The Westerlies
Thurs, 9/20, 7:30pm, Wing Luke Museum | FREE

TORCH, The Westerlies
Fri, 9/21, 7:30pm, Nickerson Studios | $15-$20

Theo Bleckmann, Kate Davis, The Westerlies
Sat, 9/22, 7:30pm, First Free Methodist Church | $15-$25

The Westerlies, Workshop Students
Sun, 9/23, 4pm, Nickerson Studios | FREE

Seattle Symphony: Morlot Conducts Ravel
French composers past and present are featured in this concert of shimmering musical colors. Ludovic Morlot conducts the Seattle Symphony in performances of Marc-André Dalbavie’s exquisite La source d’un regard alongside Ravel’s rapturous Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2 and his sultry Piano Concerto in G Major featuring soloist Steven Osborne. Debussy’s mystical Printemps completes the program.
Thurs-Sat, 9/27-9/29, Various times, Benaroya Hall | $22-$92

Ilha Formosa: Music of Taiwan
Philharmonia Northwest is joined by Taiwanese choirs from Seattle, Vancouver B.C., and Taiwan for a rare performance of Tyzen Hsiao’s Ilha Formosa: Requiem for Formosa’s Martyrs, a piece dedicated to Taiwanese victims of the White Terror. The program also features Shui-Long Ma’s musical portrayal of the legendary Taiwanese Robin Hood figure Liao Tian-Ding, plus violinist Tien-Hsin Cindy Wu, cellist Felix Fan, and pianist Angelo Rondello join the orchestra for a performance of Gordon Chin’s theatrical Triple Concerto.
Sat, 9/29, 2pm, Benaroya Hall | $25-$50

Live at Benaroya Hall: Gabriel Royal
Cellist Gabriel Royal got his start as a busker on the New York City subway, but has since grown into a globe-trotting singer-songwriter who layers cello and voice into lush serenades.
Sun, 9/30, 7:30pm, Nordstrom Recital Hall | $40-$50

Cellist Gabriel Royal.

ALBUM REVIEW: Michael Gordon’s ‘Clouded Yellow’

Posted on August 20, 2018 by maestrobeats

by Gabriela Tedeschi

Michael Gordon. Photo by Peter Serling.

After throwing out a piece he’d been working on seriously for months, Michael Gordon sat down for just nine days to create something new, something uninhibited where “all the colors are flying.” That piece became “Clouded Yellow,” titled after the smudged, colorful wing patterns of the clouded yellow butterfly. It also became the title track for his new album, a collection of string quartets where blurred, distorted, and layered sounds coalesce into a vibrant, fluttering haze.

Gordon, one of the three co-founders of Bang on a Can, has a passion for exploring ways in which classical chamber works can be warped with electronic effects and guitar pedals. His latest album is the product of a decades-long collaboration with the Kronos Quartet, an ensemble comprised of violinists David Harrington and John Sherba, violist Hank Dutt, and cellist Sunny Yang that is committed to stretching the limits of string quartet music. Clouded Yellow features four works that revel in blurred harmonies and melodies, shedding light on the beauty of opaqueness.

Kronos Quartet. Photo by Jay Blakesburg.

The title piece, “Clouded Yellow” creates this blurred effect with driving melodic lines and overlapping rhythms that obscure the beat. Chromatic movement with slides and trills encompasses much of the violin lines, developing dark, intricate harmonies that flutter restlessly around the listener.

Similarly, “Potassium” layers different sliding lines of sustained notes and uses a fuzz box to distort the strings, creating a mysterious cloud of sound. The piece alternates between slower, melancholic sliding sections, dramatic periods where the violins slide rapidly above driving viola and cello accompaniment, and conventionally beautiful sections with tender, lyrical melodies. As these contradictory elements are woven together, “Potassium” becomes an ornate musical web that is impossible to untangle.

The album’s blurred aesthetic brilliantly suits the thematic content in “Sad Park,” a four-part piece that layers the quartet’s music under sentences from toddlers who were asked to explain the events of 9/11. Following the pattern laid out by the previous tracks, the piece features electronic sounds, slides, and complex, interlocking patterns that intentionally disorient the listener. As the young children’s words are replayed over and over, they are electronically warped, becoming eerie non-verbal sounds—almost like wails of pain at some moments. The children’s confused words and the distortion of both their voices and the instruments reflects the confusion, pain, and helplessness felt in the wake of 9/11.

“Exalted,” the final track, serves as a response to the mourning of “Sad Park.” Featuring the Young People’s Chorus of New York City, the piece sets the opening of the Kaddish, a prayer sequence recited for the dead in the Jewish faith. The voices layer chromatic, descending lines over a rhythmic violin pattern and the slides of the cello and viola. While the dark intensity of the piece never diminishes, it begins to move over time toward a quiet finality that offers a sense of peace. “Exalted” both captures the complexity of mourning and artfully juxtaposes something ancient and religious with the immediacy of modern sounds.

Clouded Yellow documents Gordon and the Kronos Quartet’s innovative experimentation with electronics, clashing layers, and disorienting rhythmic patterns. The resulting music is intricate, dramatic, and thought-provoking: it speaks powerfully to the confusion we all experience when so much of the world around us is blurred.

All Tomorrow’s Parties: Paying Homage while Looking Ahead with Nadia Shpachenko

Posted on August 15, 2018 by maestrobeats

Photo by Albert Chang.

by Dacia Clay

Nadia Shpachenko is a multiple Grammy-nominated pianist and Professor of Music at Cal Poly Pomona University who has never stopped playing with her toys.

Shpachenko’s love of playing—both with toys and on her piano, and sometimes, with her toy piano—is part of what makes her new album, Quotations and Homages, so much fun to listen to. She’s got this wide-open sense of adventure that comes across not only in her playing, but in the pieces she commissions and the composers from whom she commissions them. (Shpachenko seems to choose composers by their willingness to be co-conspirators in her exploits as much as for their compositional aptitude.) An album of pieces that pay homage to everyone from Messiaen to the Velvet Underground? Yes! A piece inspired by Stravinsky called “Igor to Please” written for 6 pianists on 2 toy pianos, 2 pianos, and electronics? Yay! Let’s do it!

In this interview, Nadia talks about why she’s such an advocate for new classical music, about the ideas that inspired this new album and the pieces therein, and about breaking piano strings.