radwidmer

Friday, May 11, 2012, 7:00 pm
New Music Circle Showcase and Seasonal Celebration

William A. Kerr Foundation
21 O’Fallon St.
St. Louis, MO 63102

New Music Circle is excited to announce its final concert of the 2011 – 2012 season. This showcase will highlight four of St Louis’s finest experimental musicians and artists, as well as one regional artist.

Following the Showcase, NMC will be hosting an end-of-the-season celebration, with food, beer, DJ’s and video, as well as a raffle of prizes and gift certificates to local businesses! (A full listing of prizes and certificates will be announced soon.)

Our celebration will begin immediately after the Showcase at 9:15 pm. Admission is a suggested $10 donation and may be purchased in addition to your entry to the showcase concert. Your donation will get you food, drink and one raffle ticket (additional raffle tickets will also be available for sale), and most importantly, your kind donation will help us to raise funds for next years NMC programming.

The New Music Circle is especially grateful to these businesses for their generous donations:

Olivia Block (Electronic and Processed Sound for Four-Channel Mix)

Olivia Block (Chicago) is a contemporary composer and sound artist who combines field recordings, scored segments for acoustic instruments and electronically generated sound.

Her recorded work seeks to introduce and ultimately reconcile nature with artifice in the realms of music and sound. In the process, “organic” sound becomes subtly processed, digitized and abstracted; “inorganic” sound becomes self-replicating and animate; and “musical” elements such as chamber instruments are defamiliarized from their traditional associations, freeing them to participate in the broader aesthetic possibilities of sound. Block works with recorded media, chamber ensembles, video, and site specific sound installations.

Sound Samples: http://soundcloud.com/olivia-block

Joseph Raglani and Kevin Harris (Solo and collaborative pieces for Modular Synthesizer)

Fixtures of the St. Louis experimental and underground music scene, both Joseph Raglani and Kevin Harris have explored a wide variety of approaches to music making, and recently both artists have focused their vision on the possibilities of the Modular Synthesizer – each finding his own unique style and voice through their machines complex patchwork.

The NMC Showcase will see Raglani and Harris performing short solo pieces as well as segueing into collaborative compositions.

Patrick Boland  (Solo Percussion)

While contributing his drumming skills to various local bands, most notably St Louis’s long running experimental-rock outfit, The Conformists,  “Pat” Boland has extended the range of his percussive palette and at the same time pursued music coursework at Maryville University.

His studies this year have lead Boland to tackle Rebonds, by Iannis Xenakis, for solo percussion, an intensely complex and fascinating examination of pulse and pattern.

Jeremy Kannapell (8mm film)
As a concert programmer, album and poster designer, filmmaker and musician, Jeremy Kannapell (St Louis), has lent his skills to these many fields in hopes of synergizing them into a broader artistic output.

Informed by pioneers of experimental film such as Robert Breer, Stan Brakhage, and Len Lye, Kannapell’s 8mm films consist of colorful and abstracted kaleidoscopic images and are sometimes shown silent, sometimes with live accompaniment. Throughout the past year, Kannapell has been compiling and editing his films into one lengthier piece, to debut at the NMC Showcase.

Special guest DJ, Nathan Cook ( Close-Far Recordings ) will be providing pre and post-show ambience and musical selections.

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.