Night After Night

Hear, now: Alex Temple.

We've all got a lot on our minds tonight, it seems safe to guess, so I'll keep this brief: I'd been waiting a long time to hear Liebeslied, a delightfully mysterious, frequently sumptuous piece for amplified vocalist and orchestra by Alex Temple, so thank you, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, for making this something of a super Tuesday after all.

Captured on Feb. 1, 2020, the performance features mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard and conductor James Gaffigan. You can watch just the one piece in the clip embedded below, or view the entire concert – including pieces by Mozart, Ravel, and Robert Schumann – on DSO Replay, with a subscription. (The Ravel piece – the intoxicating Shéhérazade, also featuring Leonard – is on YouTube as well.)

(P.S. I would be wholly remiss were I not to add that there are two audio recordings of Liebeslied on Temple's official website, one of them the premiere, with Mellissa Hughes and the American Composers Orchestra.)

Hear, now: loadbang.

Once in a while – more often than I'd like, unfortunately – I'll receive details for an eminently worthy, possibly mind-blowing event juuussstt ever so slightly too late to pitch it for possible inclusion in the Goings On About Town section at the New Yorker, where I beat the drum for such events on a near-weekly basis. Here's a textbook illustration: I recently got a note from Andrew Kozar, trumpeter for loadbang, a busy new-music ensemble well-loved in New York City and points far afield, providing notice of an upcoming concert that just happened to fall during a range of dates already done and dusted.

Now, loadbang is a genius group, as indeed you'd have to be, were you to contemplate making at least part of your living in an ensemble comprising baritone voice, bass clarinet, trumpet, and trombone, a conglomeration that makes Louis Andriessen's Hout lineup seem mundane by comparison. Seriously, there's plenty of recorded evidence attesting to how brilliant this quartet is; you really don't need to take my world for it.

Thing is, pretty much all of the recorded evidence attests to how well the group's four members – Kozar, baritone Jeffrey Gavett, trombonist William Lang, and until recently bass clarinetist Carlos Cordeiro – play together in an almost wholly bespoke canon. That's part of what makes the concert the group is presenting on Wednesday, February 26, at 8pm such a big deal. Titled "Plays Well with Others," the program features new pieces for loadbang and a string ensemble, by Eve Beglarian, Reiko Füting, Paula Matthusen, Heather Stebbins, and Scott Wollschleger. The opportunity to hear loadbang – including the quartet's newest arrival, clarinetist Adrián Sandí – working with other musicians is so rare and unusual, you really wouldn't want to pass it up.

Another part of what makes this concert special: did I mention it includes music by Eve Beglarian, Reiko Füting, Paula Matthusen, Heather Stebbins, and Scott Wollschleger? That is a killer lineup.

One more part of what makes this concert special is the string ensemble. You've got Christopher Otto, Erica Dicker, Conrad Harris, Lauren Cauley Kalal, Andie Springer, and Teagan Farran on violins. The viola section is Hannah Levinson, Carrie Frey, and Leah Asher. Mariel Roberts and Alan Richardson are the cellists, and Evan Runyon plays bass. Steve Beck lends a couple of hands on piano, and Eduardo Leandro conducts.

So, yeah, if you've read this far, then either you should think very seriously about heading waaayy uptown to the Hebrew Tabernacle of Washington Heights (551 Fort Washington Ave., at 185th St.) on Wednesday, Feb. 26, at 8pm, or else you knew about the concert already and you're already planning to be there. If you're in the former category, tickets are available here.

But just in case your disbelief requires suspension, here's proof positive loadbang plays well with others: a video of the group performing Tarantism by Taylor Brook – whose Ouaricon Songs: Volume 2 is included on the quartet's most recent album, old fires catch old buildings – with the Beyond Orchestra, at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Music Hall in 2018.

Hear, now: Cassandra Venaglia.

Monday on Twitter, Dr. Andrea Ramsey posted a straightforward question:

Favorite string quartets composed by women?

— 𝔻𝕣. 𝔸𝕟𝕕𝕣𝕖𝕒 ℝ𝕒𝕞𝕤𝕖𝕪 (@ramseyandrea) February 17, 2020

Dr. Ramsey, a composer, conductor, and teacher based in Kansas City (you know, the one in Missouri), received dozens of enthusiastic responses. I won't lie, I definitely jumped in. But I also trawled the replies, looking for pointers toward unfamiliar composers. This one caught my eye, not least because when folks are tossing around names like Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel and Ruth Crawford-Seeger and Gloria Coates and Julia Wolfe and Caroline Shaw, it takes some actual courage to flag a piece of your own… and I mean that as genuine praise.

I have a neat one! https://t.co/9DAvJwD8Q4

— AdvicetoaGurL (@VenagliaC) February 19, 2020

Cassandra Venaglia is a name I'd not encountered previously, but a recording by the JACK Quartet is incentive enough to investigate. And "neat" is an accurate term, if more than a little bit of an understatement, for Dark and Light, the brief string-quartet work in question. It's deceptively simple and seemingly straightforward, a patient stroll from point A to point B. But I've listened to it at least half a dozen times this evening, and I've found fresh details and nuances to appreciate with each pass.

Venaglia, a composer and soprano, is based presently in Los Angeles, but she pursued at least some of her studies at New York University, where she trained with the aforementioned Julia Wolfe, as well as Joan La Barbara and Robert Honstein. She's got an artist page on Facebook, and maintains a presence on Instagram and Twitter. And happily, she provides several means by which to find at least some of her music online. You can watch her perform Ebb, an enchanting piece for voice and electronics, on her YouTube channel, which also includes a pair of intriguing clips from a one-character opera, Advice to a Girl.

There's more to hear on Venaglia's SoundCloud page, including a MIDI realization of a vocal ensemble piece, Continuum, and a hazy, evocative piece called In the Desert, for chamber orchestra with electronics. There are two accounts of Dark and Light (one is the JACK recording), and two versions of another striking piece, Experiment with Haikus, which evidently started as a duo for flute and piano, and then became an even more ambitious piece for violin and piano. (I could be wrong.)

Also on the SoundCloud page – and on commercial streaming platforms like Spotify, and available for purchase on Bandcamp – is La Figlia che Piange (The Girl Who Cries), a dreamy piece for voices, percussion, and electronics, jointly created by Venaglia and Dante Luna. Whichever site you choose, make a point of hearing it.

Jon Christensen (March 20, 1943–February 18, 2020).

Jon Christensen, a deft, sensitive drummer who embodied the "ECM Sound" and an enormously influential musician, has died at age 76. Read Ethan Iverson's tribute, here, for as beautiful a succinct summary of Christensen's contributions to music as you possibly could want, and then watch this live video of Christensen playing in Keith Jarrett's storied "European" Quartet, recorded in Oslo for Norwegian television in 1974.

Reinbert de Leeuw (Sept. 8, 1938–Feb. 14, 2020).

Reinbert de Leeuw, the great Dutch pianist, conductor, and composer, died on Feb. 14, 2020, at age 81. I've been wracking my brain this evening, trying to recall when I first encountered this brilliant artist, who I sadly never had an opportunity to encounter in live performance. He was closely associated with the music of Erik Satie, of course, and also made numerous important recordings of Louis Andriessen's works. In 1974 he founded the celebrated Schönberg Ensemble, which in time merged with another significant Dutch group, the ASKO Ensemble, becoming ASKO|Schönberg in 2009.

One part of my mind wants to situate discovering de Leeuw somewhere in the vicinity of the other formidable figures of the Dutch avant-garde, including Andriessen, Misha Mengelberg, Han Bennink, and Willem Breuker. Another part insists that I came upon de Leeuw via Messiaen, which is plausible but doesn't seem correct. Still another links him indelibly to Satie, which seems so likely that it surely couldn't be that simple. (I very badly regret missing an opportunity to hear him play Satie with Barbara Hannigan at the Park Avenue Armory a few seasons ago, but at least there's a beautiful documentation of their partnership and project.)

Thinking back on the recordings involving de Leeuw that have meant the most to me, I'm impressed with the sheer variety. His benchmark recording of Lonely Child and other works by Claude Vivier comes to mind immediately; so, too, does the sober eloquence in his account of Harrison Birtwistle's Pulse Shadows. De Leeuw was involved in several volumes of a landmark György Ligeti series on the Teldec label; Volume I (with Pierre-Laurent Aimard in the Piano Concerto) and Volume III (Siegfried Palm in the Cello Concerto, Frank Peter Zimmermann in the Violin Concerto) seem especially essential. And in 2017, De Leeuw was the driving force behind an extraordinary collection of György Kurtág's complete works for ensemble and choir, issued on ECM New Series.

What's clear is that de Leeuw contained multitudes, and touched the lives of countless music lovers. It feels curiously correct, then, to celebrate his memory by turning to one of the more steadfast among his personal passions, the late music of Franz Liszt, via a VPRO video posted to YouTube in 2013.

Hear, now: Nina C. Young.

Going back to the Yeats poem… I would like the audience to think about Project 19 in that way: that they're going to hear 19 new pieces by people who sometimes don't feel like they can have a voice, who are being given an opportunity to have a voice—and for audiences, once again, to tread softly about this living art, and not to dismiss it, because these are our dreams, and if they're not tread upon, then they might live and blossom into other people's dreams.

The New York Philharmonic made a powerful commitment to contemporary music and to artistic equity this season with the announcement of Project 19, a multi-year initiative through which the Philharmonic has commissioned new works from 19 women composers, to commemorate the centenary of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It's one of the boldest, most proactive, and frankly most appealing undertakings the institution has put forward recently—and, speaking personally, I very much hope to hear every piece performed.

This afternoon, the Philharmonic amplified that initiative with the first in a series of video profiles introducing the composers involved with Project 19—and these, too, are being created by women artists. In just under five minutes, the director Veena Rao introduces Nina C. Young, whose Tread Softly is included in Philharmonic concerts on Feb. 5, 6, 8, and 11, inaugurating the series. Young – who's quoted at the top of this post – talks about her earliest sonic memories, the Yeats poem that inspired her ("Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven"), and how she found the text complemented her thoughts about women's suffrage.

Should you wish to hear more of Young's music – and yes: yes, you should – there's plenty to see and hear on YouTube. I'd recommend her chamber-orchestra piece Vestigia Flammae, played in its local premiere by Ensemble Échappé, the new-music sinfonietta Young co-founded. The performance (which I was fortunate to attend) took place on April 20, 2018, at St. Peter's Church, Lexington Avenue.

And, if your travels will take you anywhere near Troy, NY, in March, Young has another fascinating performance ahead. On March 19, the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute presents The Glow That Illuminates, the Glare That Obscures, a evening-length audiovisual performance-installation piece for brass quintet, overhead wave field synthesis, and projections, performed by Young and the American Brass Quintet. You'll find all the details you need here.

Hear, now: counter)induction.

Counterinduction as a term is coined by philosopher and ‘scientific anarchist’ Paul Feyerabend; counterinduction is the opposite of induction, it is not doing something that is illogical; rather it is doing the opposite of what is logical. It is not an ill-advised choice, it is the choice that most strongly stands against all advisements.

Counterinduction articulates an idea that has been a foundational part of c)i’s approach since its inception. We work by small means for large effect; our pianos are forte, silences loud—by this focusing of our action, we will have an impact asymmetrical to its scale.

The new-music ensemble counter)induction was established in 1999, which means the group's existence predates my journalistic trek in New York City by a little more than a year. Thus, they've always been a fixture in the ecosystem I've worked to chronicle, a hardy band of composers and performers, whose labors I've admired individually and collectively.

The passage quoted above comes from a blog entry on the group's website; my best surmise from context is that it was written by Douglas Boyce, one of the group's foundational trio of member composers along with Kyle Bartlett and Ryan Streber. Now, 20 years on, there's a fourth: Jessica Meyer, the group's long-serving violist, has emerged as a composer to be reckoned with.

The version of counter)induction seen and heard in the video embedded above is an extra-large one, practically a chamber orchestra, surrounding the consistently extraordinary violinist Miranda Cuckson in Tethys, a gorgeous concerto-esque composition by Boyce. The performance was filmed in 2016 at Tenri Cultural Center in Manhattan, a regular home base for the ensemble.

In contrast, the complement counter)induction will field this Friday, January 31, for "Against Method," a 20th-anniversary celebration at ShapeShifter Lab in Brooklyn, will be comparatively compact. Bartlett, Boyce, Meyer, and Streber all have pieces on the program, which is completed with Mystic Fragments, by Mark Rimple.

The occasion is an auspicious one—and, whether you saw my New Yorker listing for the concert or not, it's very important to note that, due to last-minute venue issues, the concert will start at 9:30pm, not 7pm as billed.

You'll find further counter)induction performances of compositions by Bartlett and Streber on the group's YouTube channel, and brief, tantalizing snippets from pieces scheduled for this Friday's concert on its Instagram feed.

Neil Peart (Sept. 12, 1952-Jan. 7, 2020).

Various authoritative sources are reporting the death of Rush drummer and lyricist Neil Peart, who died on January 7 in Santa Monica after a closely guarded three-and-a half year battle with glioblastoma. Being an American drummer of a certain age, I can't overstate the impact Peart's spectacular virtuosity and precision had on me and my friends, including one especially dear friend and fellow drummer I lost to cancer just last fall. His lyrical prowess, too, opened many doors for those of us who took Rush to heart. (You didn't have to become an Ayn Rand follower to appreciate Peart's ambition.)

Along the road to fame, Peart endured more than any one man's share of tragedy, persevered, and returned for an extended victory lap. I wish that I'd seen Rush more than the one time I did – August 18, 2004, at Radio City Music Hall, during the band's R30 thirtieth anniversary tour. During my stint at the Boston Globe I assigned myself to review the band's final tour, R40, but then gave away the assignment in order to pursue unrelated activities connected to a book proposal that went nowhere. That decision has felt profoundly misjudged for a few years now, and acutely so today—though I understand and accept that that's me feeling sorry for me.

I'm grateful to Neil Peart for the generosity with which he shared his gifts, and the courage with which he faced the obstacles that arose in his path—his grace under pressure, let's say. I'm glad to learn that he has transcended his final cruel trial, and I plan to celebrate his memory by enjoying what he left behind… two succinct examples being the video above, the point at which Rush first captured the imagination of a then 12-year-old, and the video below, a crowd-sourced multi-camera selection from the one time I saw Rush live.

Roll on, Ghost Rider.

Hear, now: Alex Dowling.

Say hello to my first obsession of 2020: "King of Thumbs," a selection from Reality Rounds, a new album by the composer and vocalist Alex Dowling. I find this realization of a cybernetic vocal consort – created by four singers individually equipped with AutoTune and other effects, and synthesizer accompaniment – completely mesmerizing.

In this specific cut, for instance, I listen again and again just to hear the piquant frisson in the note that Emma O'Halloran sings/produces at 0:37, which makes me shiver every time I hear it. The entire album is flush with moments like that.

Apart from Dowling and O'Halloran – who both were trained in Princeton University's graduate composition program, and who recently announced their engagement (congratulations!) – the group includes two more singing composers, Chris Douthitt and Annika Socolofsky, plus Pascal Le Boeuf on the keyboard. The performances are beautiful, and the production does them justice.

The disc arrives January 31 on the Carrier label, and you can pre-order it now on Bandcamp. To further whet your appetite, you can find three video clips of live performances by varying iterations of this group on YouTube: here, here, and here.

An Ojai postscript.

It was unexpected, and perfectly lovely, to see this note posted to Facebook by Patricia Kopatchinskaja, the brilliant and idiosyncratic violinist who served as music director of the 2018 Ojai Music Festival, on my return home from co-hosting the livestream for that event. The festival was chock full of remarkable things, nearly all of which you can stream on YouTube already – do not miss the superhuman achievement of Markus Hinterhäuser performing all six piano sonatas by Galina Ustvolskaya in unbroken sequence (here) – and it was a great pleasure to speak at length, on camera, with Kopatchinskaja, cellist Jay Campbell, keyboardist Anthony Romaniuk, and Ojai Festival artistic director Tom Morris.

(Click on the photo to see the video on Patricia's Facebook page, or go straight to YouTube, here.)

At one point on Sunday afternoon, I was told after the fact, I'd somehow unwittingly spent literally a full hour talking on camera: alone first, then in the interview with Anthony, and then in conversation with my capable and affable co-host, the pianist and composer Thomas Kotcheff. (I'm glad to know that it went well, and somewhat relieved that such an extended bout of gabbing is not posted on YouTube.) Already I'm looking forward to returning next year for a festival curated by the brilliant soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan – and, with luck and better planning on my part, to bring my family along, instead of arriving with as much homework as I brought this time around.

Among the festival's many fine offerings, a few moments remain indelibly etched on my inner eyelid. (These photos are mine, taken from the anchor desk behind the bowl, except as indicated.)

• A performance of "Horse Sings from Cloud," by Pauline Oliveros, played by Kopatchinskaja, the JACK Quartet, and members of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra on smartphones and tablets while spread throughout Libbey Bowl, the illuminated gadgets and twinkling tones making it seem as if a constellation had descended to sing.

• Jay Campbell, playing in profile in an open alcove above the stage, while the three remaining members of the JACK Quartet bowed illuminated wine goblets upstage in the "God-Music" section of George Crumb's Black Angels, during "Dies Irae," the second of two staged concerts produced by Kopatchinskaja and director Maria Ursprung. (Photograph by Bonnie Wright.)

• The percussionist Fiona Digney hammering with somber vehemence on a black wooden box, carted to the stage by bassists as if they were pallbearers, in Ustvolskaya's singular composition Dies Irae, around which the concert of the same name was built.

• The final image in "Dies Irae" – the thematic concern of which was climate change and an increasingly imperiled planet. After the Ustvolskaya piece, the concert's entire complement spilled like a priestly procession into the aisles to surround the audience, each carrying a handheld light source and a ticking metronome for György Ligeti's Poème symphonique, while simultaneously a recording of the Dies Irae plainchant played on the P.A. (as seen in the photograph, above). One by one, the metronomes stopped and the tiny lights blinked out, until all that remained was Jay Campbell's solitary tick from the stage.

Then the stage lights came up, and Campbell was flanked on either side by children: a young girl, and a younger boy, holding leafy branches. Campbell stopped his metronome, handed it to the girl (photograph by David Bazemore); you caught a fleeting glimpse, and then all lights went down. The meaning could not have been more clear. I was choked up and damp-eyed speaking on camera about that moment immediately afterward—and later that evening as I related it to the host at my guest house, and again a few more times as I told the story repeatedly on Sunday. (And again, just now, as I typed this.) 

A reminder: footage from last year's festival – curated by Vijay Iyer, and including my dream-achieved joint interview with Roscoe Mitchell and the late Muhal Richard Abrams – is also available in perpetuity on YouTube… or, as Thomas and I were referring to it by Day 2 or 3, "Ye Olde YouTube."