[indieclassical]

SCRAPE Quartet & Jherek Bischoff perform Bischoff’s piece “Cistern” at Second Inversion.

[indieclassical]

Stream yMusic performing Andrew Norman's "Music in Circles" live performance

WQXR - New York Public Radio

Listen at the link or use Q2 Music’s nifty new app download that allows you to play tracks on demand on your mobile device.

[indieclassical]

Download: David Lang Distills Late Friends in 'Memory Pieces'

WQXR - New York Public Radio

“Join us backstage with the composer and in the audience at Le Poisson Rouge to hear pianist Andrew Zolinsky perform the Memory Pieces "Cage" and ‘Spartan Arcs.’”

Download or stream the recent performance from LPR.

[lprnyc]

Colin Stetson has put together an incredible ensemble for his SORROW, a reimagining of Gorecki’s 3rd Symphony concert at LPR on Monday, April 18th! Tickets are selling fast, get yours here!

Colin Stetson: Alto, Tenor, Bass Saxophones; Contrabass Clarinet; Lyricon Dan Bennett: Tenor, Baritone Saxophones; Clarinet Greg Fox: Drums Grey Mcmurray: Guitar Gyda Valtysdottir: Cello Justin Walter: Keyboards, EVI Matt Bauder: Tenor, Baritone Saxophones; Clarinet Megan Stetson: Voice Rebecca Foon: Cello Ryan Ferreira: Guitar Sarah Neufeld: Violin Shahzad Ismaily: Synth

[indieclassical]

William Ryan Fritch Preps 'New Words for Old Wounds,' Premieres 'Awake'

Prolific composer/songwriter William Ryan Fritch will be releasing the 11th and final release in his bold subscription series, 'The Leave Me Sessions,' on May 20 via Lost Tribe Sound. The culmination of this intense and beautiful body of work, New Wo...

NEW SONG from DM Stith and brilliant young composer William Ryan Fritch. Click through to listen!

[indieclassical]

THE COLORADO

THE COLORADO is a film about the North American West, a musical tribute to land and water, and a cautionary tale about the environment.

THE COLORADO is a music-based documentary that explores the Colorado River Basin from social and ecological perspectives across history. The project is conceived as equal parts documentary film, live performance, and an educational tool with a full-length textbook for classrooms. With the intention of being the first in a series of multi-media projects about rivers, the mission of THE COLORADO is to create a crossroads between art, ecology, and regional history, while sensitizing audiences to pressing issues of our times. 

The ninety-minute live performance is an immersive and sensorial experience in which music and images play a central role. Narrated by the great Shakespearean actor Mark Rylance, the project draws on the combined talents of award-winning composers Paola Prestini, John Luther Adams, William Brittelle, Glenn Kotche, and Shara Worden with performances by the GRAMMY-winning vocal group Roomful of Teeth, cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, and percussionist Glenn Kotche. The script is written by conservationist and critically acclaimed author William deBuysand the team of filmmakers includes Sylvestre Campe, David Sarno, and Murat Eyuboglu.

This Kickstarter project features the music of some familiar new music artists and stunning cinematography by a team of three filmmakers.

[indieclassical]

Congratulations to eighth blackbird, Nico Muhly, and Bryce Dessner for their Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance Grammy win tonight for Filament! This was eighth blackbird’s fourth Grammy win.

[gabrielkahane]

Via Second Inversion, here’s a live performance at KING-FM in Seattle of “Bradbury (304 Broadway)” from The Ambassador with string quartet Brooklyn Rider. Many bowls of pho were harmed in the making of this video.  

[davidandrako]

Bang on A Can All-Stars - Ecstatic Music Festival - NYC - 02/06/16

Photos by David Andrako for the Ecstatic Music Festival

[exercisesinhumiliation]

Alondra de la Parra is my new inspiration for everything. 

[indieclassical]

A little off-topic, but too good not to share.

[icareifyoulisten-deactivated201]

5 Questions to Evan Ziporyn about MIT’s Bowie Tribute Concert http://ift.tt/1PAFGLV

[gabrielkahane]

A Brief & Hasty Argument Against Genre

I spent the afternoon talking to a pair of truly intelligent journalists who wanted to know why it is that I so often bristle against discussions of genre, e.g.:

Please, please, please, please, please, stop talking about genre

— Gabriel Kahane (@gabrielkahane)

December 17, 2015

I thought it might be a good idea to lay out, briefly, what it is that I object to about genre as a discourse. Here’s the thing: for the most part, everything that is new is a hybrid of two or more things that came before. This has always been the case. Whether it’s Ligeti marrying the rhythms of West African drumming to the pianism of Debussy (with a little bit of chaos theory thrown in for good measure) in his first étude, “Désordre”,

or Sufjan Stevens blending the ecstatic folksinging of Judee Sill with Philip Glass’s Music in Twelve Parts in “The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades”,

Illinois by Sufjan Stevens

progress is often found in the alchemy of disparate idioms. But the thing is, these sources, and the exoticism engendered by the apparent chasm between them, are only as interesting as the craft that’s brought to bear on their marriage. Anyone can put a hip-hop beat under a twelve-tone row. The question is: is it expressive, and is it in the service of something authentic.

What so often gets lost in the discourse on genre is precisely the issue of craft, and the extent to which craft is or is not present in these hybrid works. I wish that we could start conversations about a work of art from a place of examining its craft, and then, if necessary, work our way back to talking about the component parts or idiomatic reference points that comprise the language of that work. One of the dangers of simply talking about genre qua genre, aside from the fact that hybridity is the order of the day, is that the quality of the work becomes secondary to its stylistic attributes.

But the other thing I find irritating about all these hyphenated-descriptor-laden genre conversations is that I believe they’re alienating to a lot of listeners. If you describe your work as “art pop song”, you threaten to drive away listeners who may not think they’re sophisticated enough to like “art” music, or who generally don’t care for such highfalutin things. As far as my own work as a songwriter is concerned, my credo is to let whatever is sophisticated or complex be a humble and often invisible servant to the primary concern, which is to tell a story or depict a character in as clear and succinct a way as possible. If we just call it songwriting, there’s a better chance that more listeners will give it a chance than if we silo the thing as “art song” or “chamber pop” or what-have-you.

Now I know that descriptors often provide a useful shorthand for letting a reader know what something is going to sound like, but in an era where kids are making playlists that run from Kendrick Lamar to Karlheinz Stockhausen, shouldn’t we allow craft, rather than categorization, to lead the conversation?

[icareifyoulisten-deactivated201]

Vancouver Opera Presents Nico Muhly’s Dark Sisters http://ift.tt/1OQWUZm

[alesario]

Pierre Boulez in front of Saint Michel Observatory. Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, France. © ‪#‎MartineFranck‬/ ‪#‎MagnumPhotos‬.

[indieclassical]

RIP, Pierre Boulez.

[indieclassical]

2015 in review: Memorable Journeys in Modern Classical (Solo/Ensemble/Chamber)

A look back at some of the most memorable journeys in music taken this year in modern classical with an emphasis on solo, ensemble, and chamber compositions. From the delicate and intimate to the ...

Another new music year-end list.

[bnjmngrggs]

[indieclassical]

Ólafur Arnalds and Alice Sara Ott - Verses

[indieclassical]

Lots for new music fans to explore on The Daily Beast's year-end list.