Musical Chairs: Chuck Corey on Classical KING FM

Posted on September 27, 2017 by maestrobeats

Chuck Corey has a pretty cool job. Some of his daily duties include playing microtonal music, making repairs on handmade instruments, tuning hundreds of strings—oh, and curating concerts of Harry Partch’s music.

Chuck is the Director the Harry Partch Instrumentarium, currently in residence at the University of Washington. Partch was a pioneer of new music, and one of the first 20th century composers to work extensively with microtonal scales. He created dozens of incredible instruments specifically for the performance of his musical texts and corporeal theatre works.

Chuck shares recordings of his favorite Partch pieces (and other composers that have inspired him) this Friday at 7pm on Classical KING FM 98.1’s Musical Chairs program. Click here to tune in, and take our photo tour of the instruments below!

: Harry Partch’s Chromelodeon. Photo by Maggie Molloy.

All photos by Maggie Molloy.

Curious what the instruments sound like? Get a sneak peek when you watch the videos below of Chuck performing on Partch’s handmade creations:

LIVE VIDEO STREAM: A Far Cry on Friday, September 22 at 5pm PT / 8pm ET

Posted on September 22, 2017 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

Philip Glass and J.S. Bach have a lot more in common than you might think. Cascading arpeggios, rapid scales, ever-shifting counterpoint—a transcendent, almost spiritual quality to their music. It comes as no surprise to learn that Glass studied the work of Bach closely under his famous teacher Nadia Boulanger.

But don’t just take our word for it: you can listen to both composers performed LIVE right here on Second Inversion tonight by the Boston-based chamber ensemble A Far Cry. Visit this page tonight, Friday, September 22 at 5pm PT / 8pm ET for a live video of A Far Cry’s 2017-2018 season opener, streaming right here:

Check out the program below, and click here for program notes.

Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, BWV 1048
Glass: Symphony No. 3
Bach: Concerto for Keyboard and Strings in G minor, BWV 1058

To learn more about our live-streaming video broadcasts of A Far Cry, click here.

Photo by Yoon S. Byun.

Please note: Due to restrictions, the live video stream will not include Simone Dinnerstein’s performance of Philip Glass’s Piano Concerto No. 3. Thank you for your understanding.

Second Inversion & A Far Cry

Posted on September 19, 2017 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

Philip Glass, Caroline Shaw, and Sarah Kirkland Snider are just a few of the composers you’ll see on the Boston-based A Far Cry‘s star-studded 2017-2018 season. This year Simone Dinnerstein premieres a new Glass piano concerto, the Miró Quartet breathes new life into Kevin Puts’ Credo, Luciana Souza lends her luminary voice to a new commission by five of today’s top women composers—and you can watch it all unfold on Second Inversion.

We are thrilled to continue our media partnership with A Far Cry this season, presenting live video streams on our website of each of their performances at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall!

Take a peek at the programs below and mark your calendars now:

Friday, September 22, 5pm PT / 8pm ET: Dinnerstein Premieres Glass
featuring Simone Dinnerstein, piano

Philip Glass: Symphony No. 3
J.S. Bach: Concerto for Keyboard and Strings in G minor, BWV 1058
Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, BWV 1048
Glass: Piano Concerto No. 3 (New AFC Commission)

Friday, November 10, 5pm PT / 8pm ET: The Blue Hour
featuring Luciana Souza, voice

The Blue Hour, a new AFC commission by Rachel Grimes, Angélica Negrón, Shara Nova, Caroline Shaw, and Sarah Kirkland Snider, is an evening-length song cycle based on the poem “On Earth,” by Carolyn Forché. Delivering the vocals with A Far Cry is the luminous young jazz vocalist Luciana Souza.

Friday, January 19, 5pm PT / 8pm ET: Albion
featuring Nicholas Phan, tenor

Matthew Locke & Henry Purcell: Selections from The Tempest and The Fairy-Queen
Ralph Vaughan Williams: Concerto Grosso
Benjamin Britten: Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings, Op. 31

Friday, March 30, 5pm PT / 8pm ET: Loss and Resurrection
featuring the Miró Quartet

Ludwig van Beethoven: String Quartet, Op. 135 (arr. AFC)
Kevin Puts: Credo (arr. AFC)
Richard Strauss: Metamorphosen, study for 23 solo strings

Friday, May 18, 5pm PT / 8pm ET: Next Generation
featuring Alexander Korsantia, piano

W. A. Mozart / Ethan Wood: Variations on “Ah! vous dirais-je, Maman”
Galina Ustvolskaya: Concerto for Piano, String Orchestra, and Timpani
Benjamin Britten: Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, Op. 10

Seattle New Music Happy Hour: Tuesday, September 19 at 5:30pm

Posted on September 18, 2017 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

There’s nothing like a cold beer and a crowd of new music enthusiasts to keep you company while you wait out the rush hour traffic.

Join us Tuesday, September 19 at 5:30pm at Queen Anne Beerhall for our favorite after-work pick-me-up: New Music Happy Hour, co-hosted by Second Inversion and the Live Music Project. Bring a friend, make a friend, have a drink, and discover connections with fellow new music lovers from all over Seattle!

Click here to RSVP and invite your friends. Plus, sign up for alerts for future happy hour dates and day-before reminders so you’ll never miss a beer—er, beat.

CONCERT BROADCAST: Gabriel Kahane with Northwest Sinfonietta

Posted on August 25, 2017 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

The immortal melodies of Mozart share the stage with the modern musical musings of Gabriel Kahane in tonight’s concert broadcast on Classical KING FM.

Tune in to KING FM online or at 98.1 tonight at 9pm to hear Northwest Sinfonietta perform Mozart’s ethereal Requiem in D Minor alongside Gabriel Kahane’s sprawling Crane Palimpsest, with the singer-songwriter himself center stage. Both performances are conducted by Eric Jacobsen.

Kahane’s eclectic musical language merges with the modernist poetry of Hart Crane in this grooving, musing, pop-meets-classical meditation on New York City.

In the composer’s own words:

Crane Palimpsest is a love letter to New York, in the form of a meditation on the Brooklyn Bridge, juxtaposing settings of stanzas from Hart Crane’s Proem: To Brooklyn Bridge with songs set to my own lyrics in response to Crane’s poem. I’ve literalized the idea of “the bridge” in the sense that two distinct musical vocabularies are in play and cross paths; the first being the more formal language heard in the introduction and first several stanzas of the Crane, the second being the vernacular or pop-based harmonic language in the songs with my own words.

As the piece reaches a kind of peripeteia around the line “O Harp and Altar”, it is as if the two languages, crudely speaking, meet on the bridge and are exchanged: the final song with my own lyrics begins in a dense and dissonant setting before giving way to the final stanzas of the Crane poem which are set in an unapologetically open harmonic atmosphere.

Want a sneak preview? Check out our in-studio video of Gabriel Kahane performing his Los Angeles-inspired piece “Bradbury (304 Broadway)” with Brooklyn Rider: