(photo credit: Kavita Bhanot)
Concert 2 Program
Tyler Ogilvie : zero.point.
Joshua Paul Michal, horn
Jerod Sommerfeldt & Paul Schuette : Schuette <> Sommerfeldt Duo
Jerod Sommerfeldt and Paul Schuette, electronics
Lainie Fefferman : White Fire (Rebecca, Lilith, Miriam)
Lainie Fefferman, voice
Vera Ivanova : In the Deep Heart's Core
II. In the Fog
III. Wind
Eunmi Ko, piano
Kris Bendrick : Semi-Human/Semi-Sentient
Kristopher Bendrick, no-input mixer
Janice Misurell-Mitchell : Karawane
Janice Misurell-Mitchell, voice & alto flute
Robert McClure : Not a Haiku
Cameron Leach, percussion
Notes
Jerod Sommerfeldt & Paul Schuette : Schuette <> Sommerfeldt DuoWe believe in making freely improvised music with modular synthesizers because as instruments they are dependent upon interconnected yet entropic networks which magnify the idea that . . . “Improvisation is a game that the mind plays with itself, in which an idea is allowed to enter the playing field, in order to be kicked around in pleasing patterns for a moment before being substituted by another idea. The first idea is unintentional, an error, a wrong note, a fumble in which the ball is momentarily lost, a momentary surfacing of an unconscious impulse normally kept under cover. The play to which it is subjected is the graceful recovery of the fumbled ball, a second ‘wrong’ note that makes the first one seem right, the justification for allowing the idea to be expressed in the first place.” “Improvisation tells us: Anything is possible - anything can be change - now.” -Frederic Rzewski And we need this reminder more than ever. back to program
Lainie Fefferman : White Fire
White Fire is a one-woman electroacoustic feminist-torah-commentary song project that I've been working on for the last few years. It's me singing (with heavy live processing on the vocals to make them sound pretty weird) and playing my home-made MIDI triggers (that I made from cutting out some rubber discs and getting some contact mic's on there) that I use to generate a shifting set of samples live along with a bunch of sounds I've pre-cooked to play as fixed media backing track. The texts are all words I've written as first-person retellings of the Hebrew Bible stories surrounding different foundational female characters; I asked myself "what must Dinah have been thinking when her brother slaughtered her lover?" or "how do I think Miriam felt when she saved her entire tribe from dying of thirst in the desert?" then wrote lyrics in what I imagined to be their voices using modern language. It's a new and already evolving compositional and performance practice for me, and I feel like I'm just getting started! back to program
Vera Ivanova : In the Deep Heart's Core In the Deep Heart’s Core is inspired by four poems joined together by a common theme of contemplation upon human existence and its reflection in nature. For all four poets, the images of nature were not merely an idyll, but a refuge from political oppression, which changed the course of their lives dramatically. Nature reflects their inner thoughts, hidden “in the deep heart’s core” and provides a consolation, expressed through the prism of lyricism, inherited by Pasternak and Akhmatova from the Russian “Silver Age” style, through the elements of psychoanalysis in Hesse’s poem, influenced by Jung’s method, and through the Romantic nationalism of early Yeats The cycle can be performed in any order, completely or partially. The composer’s suggested order, listed on the title page, would be to start with The Echo (after Anna Akhmatova’s poem of the same name) and continue with In the Fog, based on the haunting poem Im Nebel by Hermann Hesse. After that, Wind is a fast movement and includes a loose musical quotation from Johannes Brahms’ “Lullaby” (""Wiegenlied,"" op. 49, No.4), which refers to Boris Pasternak’s imagery of a lullaby, fashioned by the wind. The cycle may conclude with The Lake Isle of Innisfree (after W. B. Yeats’s poem), incorporating in its form the phrasing of an archetypal epic folk-song. back to program
Kristopher Bendrick : Semi-Human/Semi-Sentient
semi-human/semi-sentient is a piece primarily about vulnerability and discomfort. To perform this piece, the vocalist is asked to engage with these concepts. They are asked to make violent, primitive, and vaguely carnal sounds. They are asked to emulate weeping and breathlessness. And they are asked to place a camera in their mouth during the performance so that the inner-flesh and workings of their oral cavity can be projected for all the audience to see. On the flip side of this, it can be discomforting for someone to witness another’s vulnerability. Vulnerability causes people to recoil. People see it as weakness. They see it as a private matter. 'semi-human/semi-sentient' is meant to confront the audience with this discomfort in order to highlight the negative effects it has on our ability to be human in front of one another. back to program
Janice Misurell-Mitchell : Karawane
This performance is based on the poem, “Karawane” (or Caravan), written and first performed by Hugo Ball in February, 1916 at Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich; it is considered to be one of the first sound poems. In that same year Ball wrote the Dada Manifesto, and was one of the prime architects of the Zurich Dadists for about two years. He is the author of numerous Dada poems, some that are sound poems and others that deal with the Dada sensibility abstractly. Shortly after reading through the poem I realized that I could fit many of the lines into the tune, “Caravan”, by Duke Ellington. I’ve created several musical motives for voice and alto flute to highlight this relationship. Ball’s inaugural performance, in a costume resembling the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz, is on Youtube, but apparently, in the performance he was taken over (by design) physically, by several colleagues and completed the poem in a rush of piano noise and shouting; my soundtrack will pay homage to this performance. The performer is required to speak the poem first, and then to interact with the soundtrack using the guidelines of the themes provided and following the musical score, written in graphic notation with a timeline. back to program
Robert McClure : Not a Haiku
Not a Haiku was written after many conversations with Scott Shinbara about the possibility of the composition. The multiple percussion set up consists of the following which were chosen based on Scott’s personal collection of instruments; 4 double-headed toms (8” 10” 12” 14”), pedal bass drum, 2 mini timbales (6” and 8”), 2 woodblocks, log drum, and a wooden-headed tom. The pre-recorded sounds are organized into three categories: metal sounds (opera gongs, nipple gongs, tam- tams, cymbals, metal pipes), electronically produced sounds (static, pitches, clicks), and sounds created from using my own voice (yells, humming, pitches). The piece is constructed in three large parts and breaks down further into a 5-part arch form. I took the ratio 5:7:5 to devise the length of these three large sections. Also, this ratio determines the metric scheme using bars of 5/8, 7/8, and 5/8, which increase exponentially. This scheme is used for the first large section and then run in reverse for the last large section. The ratio also constructs a gong cycle that is run throughout the entire piece, as it would be in traditional gamelan music. And finally, even the instrument selection shows the ratio of 5:7 with wooden instruments to drums respectively. This piece was not inspired by the Japanese form of poetry, “haiku” which has a 5-7-5 syllable structure. It does not try to incite imagery of nature. Despite the numeric connection to the poetic art form, this piece is not a haiku. This piece was written for and is dedicated to Scott Shinbara. back to program
Tyler Ogilvie : zero.point.
zero.point. is composed for solo amplified echo horn, inspired by the scientific work of inventor, Nikola Tesla in his pursuit to harness "free" energy. The music itself is meant to symbolize the constant flow of energy as it exists throughout the universe in abundance.
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Bios
Jerod Sommerfeldt teaches electronic music at the Crane School of Music in Potsdam, NY. His music and sounds explore glitch, microsound, and algorithmic design. jerodsommerfeldt.com back to programPaul Schuette teaches experimental and electronic music at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He curates a concert series, ‘Out of the Box’, which showcases visiting artists working in experimental, electronic, and improvised mediums. Paul is an active composer, sound artist, and improviser. paulschuette.com back to program
Lainie Fefferman is a composer, performer, and experimenter in the performative application of emergent music technologies. Her most recent commissions have been from Tenth Intervention, So Percussion, Make Music NY, Experiments in Opera, ETHEL, Kathleen Supové, TILT Brass, James Moore, Eleonore Oppenheim, JACK Quartet, and Dither. Her one-woman voice & electronics feminist song performance project "White Fire," an electroacoustic meditation on the heroines of the Hebrew Bible, premiered at Merkin Hall in 2016 and she has been touring it internationally ever since. She is a co-founder and director of New Music Gathering, an annual conference/festival hybrid event for the international New Music Community. She got her doctorate in composition from Princeton University and is programming/performing member of Princeton-based laptop ensemble Sideband. She is currently a professor of Music & Technology at Stevens Institute of Technology and an artist in residence at Nokia Bell Labs. For more info, visit: http://lainiefefferman.com back to program
Vera Ivanova's compositions have been described as "... humanistic and deeply felt works ..." (John Bilotta, Society of Composers, Inc.), "the humor takes on a harder, sardonic edge recalling the composer's roots in the work of Shostakovich and Schnittke" (Ted Ayala, Crescenta Valley Weekly), and “the greatest power of her brief, angular, crystalline music lies in its power to provoke the gods of symmetry" (Laurence Vittes, Lark Gallery Online Blog). After teaching as Assistant Professor of Theory and Composition at the Setnor School of Music of Syracuse University (NY), she was appointed as Associate Professor of Music in the College of Performing Arts at Chapman University (Orange, CA). Dr. Ivanova is also teaching at the Colburn Academy. Her music is available in print from Universal Edition and Theodore Front Music Literature, Inc.,SCI Journal of Music Scores, on CD's from Ablaze Records, Quartz Music, Ltd., PARMA Recordings, Musiques & Recherches, Centaur Records, and on her website at: www.veraivanova.com. back to program
Eunmi Ko is hailed as “kaleidoscopic“ (San Francisco Classical Voice), “excellent” (Gramophone), and “exceedingly interesting and original” (New York Concert Review), pianist Eunmi Ko recently appeared in the Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall, Herbst Theatre, Festival de Musica Contemporanea (Madrid), among others.
As an active collaborator, she has worked with composer Hilary Tann, Lansing McLoskey, David Liptak, Chihchun Chi-Sun Lee, among others. Currently, she is co-founder and co-director of new music ensemble Strings & Hammers and the resident artist for McCormick Percussion Group. Their recordings include Kid Stuff (Ravello Records) and Places & Times (Innova Recordings). Ko holds graduate degrees (MM and DMA) from the Eastman School of Music. She is Assistant Professor of Piano and co-advisor of the New-Music Consortium at the University of South Florida. She is the director of international new music festival Dot The Line (Korea). eunmiko.com back to program
Kristopher Bendrick’s acoustic and electronic compositions explore a balance between the seriousness of academic processes and the levity of absurdism. Often working in extremes, he asks his performers to create complex sounds with flailing gestures while his electronic music works with shaping harsh noise aggregation, which, at times, grates against the comfort level of his audience. back to program
Janice Misurell-Mitchell, composer, flutist and vocal artist, teaches at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has taught and performed in the US, Europe, Mexico, Morocco, Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Taiwan and China. For 25 years she performed in Chicago as a member of CUBE Contemporary Chamber Ensemble, where, with Patricia Morehead, she was Co-Artistic Director. Her honors include grants from Meet the Composer, the Illinois Arts Council, the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, and residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Ragdale Foundation. Speaking about her 2013 CD, Vanishing Points, New Music Box’s Frank Oteri says, “[she] seamlessly [weaves] elements from high modernism with jazz, Latin, blues, and modernism with jazz, Latin, blues, and even funk into an amalgam that is completely its own thing...” Her solo CDs are on Southport Records; other recordings are on MMC, OPUS ONE, Capstone, meerenaishim.com, Arizona University Recordings. www.jmisurell-mitchell.com back to program
Robert McClure’s music attempts to discover beauty in unconventional places using non-traditional means. His work has been featured at festivals including NYCEMF, Beijing Modern Music Festival, ISCM, TIES, SEAMUS, and ICMC.
His works may be found through ADJ•ective New Music, Bachovich Music Publications, Resolute Music Publications, and Tapspace Publications as well as on ABLAZE, Albany, and New Focus Record labels. Robert received his doctorate from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music. Robert has previously held positions at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and Soochow University in Suzhou, China. He serves as Assistant Professor of Composition/Theory at Ohio University. back to program
American percussionist Cameron Leach is a bold performer recognized for his expressive virtuosity, musical athleticism, and daring interpretations. As a soloist and chamber musician, Leach has concertized in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia. He has appeared at some of the world’s finest institutions, including the Royal Danish Academy of Music, Royal Northern College of Music, Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, Sibelius Academy, and the Norwegian Academy of Music, and notable halls such as the Lila Cockrell Theater, Ohio Theatre, Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre, and China’s National Centre for the Performing Arts. Leach is the winner of both the Percussive Arts Society International Solo Artist Competition and Yamaha Young Performing Artist Competition, and was awarded the prestigious Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music. He is a member of the Northern California-based percussion quartet Orphic Percussion, and one half of the Leach | Peters Percussion Duo. Along with his active touring schedule, Leach regularly performs with the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, and the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. An in-demand educator, Leach recently held a professorship at Kent State University’s Hugh A. Glauser School of Music, and now teaches exclusively as a guest artist at universities across the United States. Leach proudly endorses Black Swamp Percussion, Beetle Percussion, Sabian Cymbals, and Malletech. back to program
Tyler Ogilve recieved his bachelor degree in music education and masters degree in horn performance from Ithaca College in Ithaca, NY. Currently, Mr. Ogilvie teaches on the music faculties of Susquehanna University and Dickinson College where he teaches horn performance studies, chamber music, music theory, and brass methods. Ogilvie is principal horn of the Orchestra of the Southern Finger Lakes and regularly performs with the former Syracuse Symphony known now as Symphoria. In addition to his freelance work, Mr. Ogilvie regularly performs his own electroacoustic compositions for horn that utilize sound effect processors, prerecorded soundtracks, and visual multimedia elements (www.tyviemusic.com).
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Dr. Joshua Michal is Assistant Professor of Horn at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and is a faculty member at the Interlochen Summer Arts Academy in Michigan. He is a member of the Rhode Island Philharmonic and Hartford Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the Chicago Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, Boston Lyric Opera, Boston Philharmonic, United States Coast Guard Band, Columbus Symphony, Albany Symphony, Portland Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic, Charleston Symphony, Breckenridge Music Festival, Le Orchestre de la Francophonie Canadienne, and the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra. Dr. Michal has recently presented master-classes and recitals at the Hartt School of Music, University of Wisconsin, University of Georgia, The Ohio State University, Bowling Green State University, the New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival, and the International Horn Society Conference. His principal teachers include Jeff Nelsen, Gail Williams, and Bruce Henniss and he holds degrees from Indiana University, Northwestern University, and The Ohio State University.
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