I CARE IF YOU LISTEN

This week: concerts in New York (November 19 – November 25, 2012)

Simone Dinnerstein with Pamelia Kurstin and Alvin Epstein | Bach, Mozart, Chopin, Poulenc

Simone Dinnerstein – Photo by Lisa Marie Mazzucco

Pianist Simone Dinnerstein, thereminist Pamelia Kurstin, and actor Alvin Epstein join forces for the first time at Le Poisson Rouge. Together they journey from Bach, Mozart, and Chopin to Poulenc’s The Story of Babar the Elephant, weaving together disparate elements in an unusual evening of poetry, music, improvisation, and narration.
Monday, November 19 at 7:30 PM
Tickets $25 advance, $30 day of show
Le Poisson Rouge, 158 Bleecker Street, New York, NY
..:: Website

Nacht und Traüme, “Night and Dreams”

Violinist and artistic director Gil Morgenstern’s acclaimed Reflections Series continues the 2012-2013 season with Nacht und Traüme, “Night and Dreams.” A nocturnal journey from dusk to dawn, Nacht und Traüme creates a narrative of fantasy and nightmare through the music of Schubert (Nacht und Träume and Fantasie); Enesco (Impressions of Childhood); John Cage (Dream); and Sibelius (Nocturne). Prose and poetry of Sylvia Plath (from The Unabridged Journals, Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams, and The Wishing Box) will be read by Maryann Plunkett.
Monday, November 19 at 7:30 PM
Tickets $35, $15 students
WMP Concert Hall, 31 East 28th Street, New York, NY
..:: Website

Stasis v. Motion | Flexible Music and Cadillac Moon Ensemble

In its third concert of the 2012-13 season, Ear Heart Music presents two quartets of uncommon instrumentation to juxtapose factors of stasis and motion in music. Flexible Music performs a set of musical sound sculpting using static structures and gestural language, with music by Peter Adriaansz (US premiere) and Seung-Ah Oh. The Cadillac Moon Ensemble follows suit with a program exploring motion in all its forms, including world premieres by Caleb Burhans, Osnat Netzer, and Alex Weiser with additional works by Timothy Andres and Florent Ghys.
Tuesday, November 20 at 8 PM
Tickets $15, $10 for members/students/seniors
Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY
..:: Website

Soundscape for 104 Flutes “Il Cerchio Tagliato dei Suoni” | Salvatore Sciarrino

Salvatore Sciarrino – Photo by Luca Carr

The Guggenheim Museum presents the U.S. premiere of Italian avant-garde composer Salvatore Sciarrino’s soundscape Il cerchio tagliato dei suoni (Cutting the Circle of Sounds) (1997), in a site-specific performance of this immersive and challenging work for four flute soloists and one hundred migranti, or migrating flutists, in the museum’s rotunda.
Tuesday, November 20 at 8 PM
$50, $45 for members (with seating in the Rotunda), $30, $25 for members (standing room only)
Guggenheim Museum 1071 Fifth Avenue (at 89th Street) New York, NY
..:: Website

Resisting Silence, Inevitability: Dal Niente at the Beethoven Festival

For this year’s anniversary of September 11, Chicago’s second annual Beethoven Festival asked Ensemble Dal Niente to perform a special program commemorating the event.  A memorial concert often runs the risk of alienating an audience, either by overtly politicizing the event at hand or being interpreted as not genuine in its tribute.  The ensemble avoided that risk by providing a program of thoughtful works that allowed the audience to reflect on their own terms, choosing what the music meant to them in light of the occasion.

Ensemble Dal Niente – Photo by Max Anisimov, with kind permission

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Group Theory by counter)induction

CDs are not live music. CDs have to compete for our attention in ways that concerts never do. They not only have to draw us away from the myriad attention-demanding devices that proliferate our lives but also have to hold that attention, even if peripherally, for an hour. What may work brilliantly in a performance setting may be challenging as a recording, and I fear that is the case with this CD. Here we have an award-winning, highly-lauded  ensemble performing wonderful music at an extremely high level on a debut CD that unfortunately falls flat. I have the strong sense that if I were to hear this music live I would be riveted, but at the end of the day Group Theory fails to hold my attention.

The group counter)induction was formed in 1998 and has seen its profile steadily increase over its lifespan. Three composers are listed in its ranks, alongside piano, violin, viola, cello, and clarinet, and that seems no small point. Performers often benefit greatly in working closely with composers, and the adeptness with which c)i tackles the music of both the resident and outside composers seems to be a result of this relationship. Moreover, composers often know what other composers are doing much better than performers, and this seems to have influenced their programming decisions over the years.

counter)induction

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