Saturday, April 14, 2012, 7:30 pm
Craig Hultgren – Luna Nova (3)
Craig Hultgren, cello
John McMurtery, flute
Adam Bowles, piano

Christ Church Cathedral
1210 Locust St.
St. Louis, Mo 63103

Comprised of cellist Craig Hultgren, flutist John McMurtery and pianist Adam Bowles, LunaNova(3) will perform a program that features both ensemble and solo compositions by modern masters Olivier Messiaen, Toru Takemitsu, Elliott Carter and Chinary Ung. The concert will also include pieces by Robert G. Patterson from Memphis, Justin Merritt from Minnesota and Monroe Golden from Alabama.

Since its formation in 2002, Luna Nova, a group of artists devoted to the music of the 20th and 21st centuries, has performed in colleges, museums, churches, and concert halls across the country. Its repertoire consists of recognized masterworks as well as works by emerging composers. With concerts, masterclasses and private instruction, Luna Nova maintains a strong commitment to the education of performers and listeners, and to the cause of new music.

Detailed program notes are available here (as a PDF file): Luna Nova (3) Program.

Saturday, April 7, 2012, 7:30 pm
Frank Stemper
Composer Frank Stemper’s 60th Birthday Concert
The Altgeld Chamber Players with Lucy Shelton, Soprano

Kranzberg Arts Center
501 N. Grand
St. Louis, MO 63103

Composer Frank Stemper (Carbondale, IL) has been involved with new music for more than 30 years. His music for orchestra, chamber ensemble, voice and computer has been performed throughout the United States (at venues such as Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center) and in England, Germany, Poland, Japan and eight other countries.

Stemper works on the front lines of modern music, uniquely educating not only his university students, but general audiences and performers as well, many of whom are new or resistant to the avant garde, staging performances in untraditional venues, such as local bars.

Lucy Shelton is a highly acclaimed exponent of 20th and 21st century repertory. She has premiered over 100 works by composers such as Elliott Carter, Joseph Schwantner, Mario Davidovsky and Ned Rorem and has appeared with major orchestras worldwide including Amsterdam, Boston, London, New York and St. Louis. She has twice won prestigious Walter W. Naumberg Awards.

“...a new-music diva if there ever was one…“–The Boston Globe

The Altgeld Chamber Players is a “flexible instrumentation” ensemble composed of distinguished SIUC faculty and outstanding graduate students. The repertoire of this dynamic and exciting group ranges from cutting-edge contemporary works to the great classics of chamber music.

Detailed program notes are available here: Frank Stemper’s 60th Birthday Concert.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012, 7:30 pm
Larry Ochs presents KIHNOUA
Larry Ochs — saxophones and compositions
Dohee Lee — vocals
Scott Amendola — drums and electronics
Trevor Dunn — bass

KIHNOUA is a term borrowed from ancient Greek that might have meant “the difference”; or for us now: “the unity of opposites”. This is a San Francisco based ensemble formed by Larry Ochs in 2007 to explore new ideas and directions – on the one hand, oral traditions, and on the other hand, new-jazz spontaneity.

A long-time fan of traditional Korean p’ansori folk-singing and of Korean sinawi improvisation, it is with great anticipation that Larry Ochs presents music that intermingles the very new thoughts, sounds and structures of jazz (or perhaps better phrased as “Western improvised music”) with influences from the ancient sounds of Korea and the folk-music / blues influenced music of Asia, Africa and the USA.

For sound clips, visit the Kihnoua Facebook page.

Kranzberg Arts Center
501 N. Grand
St. Louis, MO 63103

Friday, March 2, 2012, 7:30 pm
John Hollenbeck – The Claudia Quintet + 1

John Hollenbeck – drums/composer/piano
Theo Bleckmann – vocals
Chris Speed – clarinet & tenor sax
Matt Moran – vibraphone
Red Wierenga – accordion/piano
Chris Tordini – bass

The 560 Music Center Ballroom
560 Trinity Ave.
University City, MO 63130

Formed by composer, drummer, and arranger, John Hollenbeck in 1997, the Claudia Quintet explores the outer perimeters of jazz while always maintaining a good sense of playfulness, employing a range of references from surf rock, to chamber jazz and electronica. These references blend together to form a unique musical synthesis, authoratively navigated by Hollenbeck, himself.

Over the past decade, both the group’s recorded and ‘live’ outputs have been critically acclaimed in the jazz world, yet have still found appeal with audiences of widely diverse musical taste.

After receiving degrees in percussion and jazz composition at the Eastman School of Music, Hollenbeck moved to New York City in the early 1990’s and has collaborated with many leading musicians and composers, such as Bob Brookmeyer, Fred Hersch, Tony Malaby, the Village Vanguard Orchestra, Kenny Wheeler, Pablo Ziegler and new music composer, Meredith Monk.

John Hollenbeck has been nominated for multiple GRAMMY Awards, including one in 2009 for his Large Ensemble and in 2011 for Best Instrumental Composition. He is featured in the March 2012 issue of Downbeat magazine.

Below is a two-part video of the Claudia Quintet performing Be Happy. Following that is an excerpt from a documentary where Hollenbeck talks about his approach to composition.

Saturday, January 28, 2012, 7:30 pm
Chris Corsano with Darin Gray and Dave Stone
Pre-show ambience provided by DJ Jeremy Kannapell
Plus free workshop — see below for details.

Chris Corsano, percussion
Dave Stone, reeds
Darin Gray, bass

Kranzberg Arts Center
501 N. Grand
St. Louis, MO 63103

With an expressive palette born from having studied a variety of extended drum techniques, Chris Corsano’s sound has become unique in both its rapidfire aggressiveness and its keen sense of space and tone, displaying a range of qualities not always found in the free music tropes.

Corsano has collaborated with a variety of artists: Björk, Sonic Youth, Jandek and Nels Cline, all the while maintaining ongoing partnerships with the likes of Akira Sakata, Paul Flaherty, Vampire Belt, Joe McPhee and many others.

This concert will find Corsano performing solo pieces as well as collaborating with two fixtures on St. Louis’s experimental music scene, bassist Darin Gray, with whom he has toured Japan (in Akira Sakata’s Trio), and saxophonist, Dave Stone.

Saturday, December 3, 2011, 7:30 pm
Tony Conrad

White Flag Projects
4568 Manchester Ave.
St. Louis, MO 63110

For nearly fifty years, experimental sound and visual performance artist, Tony Conrad, has been making drone music and short films that re-examine and re-invent their form, content and structure.

Conrad was one of the early pioneers of New York minimalism and deep listening microtonal music. He worked in 1962 on LaMonte Young’s “Dream Music” project with the likes of John Cale and Angus MacLise (both moving on later to form The Velvet Underground). Since then, he has remained the purest and most ascetic of the minimalists.

Violin has remained his trademark instrument, although he has also manipulated sound through electronics, studio techniques, and projects with various collaborators.

• Saturday, November 12, 2011, 7:30 pm
  Keith Fullerton Whitman

  White Flag Projects
  4568 Manchester Ave.
  St. Louis, MO 63110

  

  Since early childhood, Keith Fullerton Whitman has been interested in electronics. He eventually developed his own process-intensive version of electronic music, often involving a wide variety of electronic instrumentation, ranging from digital processing to analogue synthesis to primitive “musique concrete” tape experiments.

  Finding inspiration in electronic music’s history, Whitman helps to span the gap between early electronic pioneering experimentation and the current underground noise, electronica, and free music scenes.

  Pre-show ambience provided by DJ Joe Raglani

  EVENT BEGINS PROMPTLY AT 7:30 pm

  Whitman will also lead a WORKSHOP on electronic music and modular synthesis (bring your instruments!). Nov. 12, 1:00-2:30 pm;  Luminary Center for the Arts, 4900 Reber Place, 63139

• Friday, October 28, 2011, 7:30 pm
  James Mobberley and Paul Rudy

  Kranzberg Arts Center
  501 N. Grand
  St. Louis, MO 63103

  

  Paul Rudy and James Mobberley both teach, compose, and perform experimental and electro-acoustic music in the Conservatory of Music, University of Missouri–Kansas City. Together they have composed four new pieces which explore the possible interrelationships between ‘live’ acoustic instruments and pre-recorded electronic sounds.

  James Mobberley’s music spans many media, including orchestral and chamber music, music for film, video, theater, dance, and music that combines electronic and computer elements with live performance. Overall, his music has received more than 600 performances on five continents. He has recently been named Curators’ Professor of Music and currently serves as Composer-in-Residence for New Ear, Kansas City’s Contemporary Music Ensemble.

  Paul Rudy is a Rome Prize, Guggenheim, Fulbright and Wurlitzer Foundation Fellow and has recently won the Sounds Electric ’07 Competition. “Paul makes incredibly beautiful music from musical tones and environmental sounds of widely varying recognizability…” Kyle Gann, The Arts Journal

• Friday, October 14, 2011, 7:30 pm
  Matthew Shipp Trio
  Co-sponsored by Washington University

  

  Matthew Shipp, piano
  Michael Bisio, bass
  Whit Dickey, drums

  The Ballroom at the 560 Music Center at Washington University
  560 Trinity Ave.
  University City, MO 63130

  Always on the cutting edge of jazz improvisation, Matthew Shipp has, over the course of his career, developed an identifiable language of his own. His new ensemble direction blends high energy and a sense of freedom with complexly structured themes and extended, long range form.

  Learning to be a jazz player at an extremley early age, Shipp moved to New York City in 1995 and was soon performing with the David S. Ware Quartet and Roscoe Mitchell’s Note Factory. He has recorded with such top flight performers as William Parker, Joe Morris and Daniel Carter.

  In February 2011, Shipp released a double-disc album entitled ”Art of the Improviser”. This release is “testament to Shipp’s achievements, yet it is also a continuation of the discovery in his developmental musical language.” The Chicago Tribune

Saturday, September 17, 2011, 7:30 pm
Joe McPhee’s Survival Unit III
plus free workshop at 2pm (see below)

CAMA Event! – Combination Tones – Tom Hamilton

Tom Hamilton

• Peter Zummo – trombone
• Rich O’Donnell – percussion
• Tom Hamilton – electronics
• Bill Schulenburg – sound design

“Combination Tones” is the new work by composer/performer Tom Hamilton. In combining his electronic sound with 2 longtime collaborators, New York trombonist Peter Zummo and St. Louis percussionist Rich O’Donnell, Hamilton continues exploration of the improvisational territory defined in his previous CAMA events. The musicians form a confluence of changing sonic ideas and moods in the midst of Hamilton’s sonic environment, embellished by sound designer Bill Schulenburg.

Hamilton often explores the interaction of many simultaneous layers of activity, prompting the use of “present-time listening” on the part of both performer and listener. Hamilton was a 2005 Fellow of the Civitella Ranieri Foundation in Umbria.

NMC Laptop Orchestra Project – Premiere Performance

Saturday, April 16, 2011, 7:30 pm
William A. Kerr Foundation
21 O’Fallon St., St. Louis, MO 63102

An orchestra of laptop performers join together to present a multidimensional texture of sound layers. Individual performers distributed throughout the perfor- mance space explore spatial and antiphonal possibilities in originally created site-specific sound works. Lighting and projected video will enhance the multi-faceted environment. The concert features community members as laptop performers and soloists and is organized by the NMC and Jim Hegarty.

A demonstration workshop will also be held in the music technology studios, at St. Louis Community College at Forest Park in The Mildred Bastian Center, room T-165 (the rehearsal room under the main theatre) on Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 7:30 pm. The workshop is free and open to the public, and there will be free software distribution.

Peter Henderson, piano

Peter Henderson

Peter Henderson will perform The People United Will Never Be Defeated! by Frederic Rzewski and 24 Studies in African Rhythms by fellow St. Louisan Fred Onovwerosuoke. The People United is a theme and 36 variations on “El pueblo unido jamas sera vencido,” a song from the Unidad Popular coalition in Chile. Extended techniques and technically demanding passages build to frequent, forceful climaxes.

Mr. Henderson is a strong advocate of new music, having given several premieres of solo piano works over the past several years. In addition to solo recitals, Henderson has performed with noted German violist Roland Glassl, the Ilex Piano Trio, the Garth Newel Piano Quartet, and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra.

“In the classical music crowd in St. Louis, Henderson is a name to conjure with – up there with David Robertson, the musical director of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, who makes use of Henderson’s talents often. Onovwerosuoke, who produced and executive-produced this recording, selected an exciting variety of tunes and tempos for Henderson’s expert hands.” –Chris King, St. Louis American