Honoring Liana Alexandra

REVIEW:

Composer’s Voice: Honoring Liana Alexandra

Composer's Voice celebrates the spirit and talent of belated composer Liana Alexandra (1947-2011) in conjunction with the Romanian Cultural Institute of New York. Treasured in her home country of Romania and around the world, this prolific artist enjoyed a career that encompassed lauded awards and prestigious teaching and administrative positions. This concert — Honoring Liana Alexandra — acts as a eulogy for composers and musicians to pay tribute to their much-missed peer.

15-Minutes-of-Fame features Wonki Lee on saxophones and Riko Higuma on piano. Inspired by the life and works of Liana Alexandra, each work recalls her prodigious talent. Georgiana Trandafir’s piece showcases Lee playing into the body of the piano, which creates a silvery halo, dappled by the promise of a new beginning. Kala Pierson's muscular composition engages as a punchy draught checkered with silences. Beginning as an elfin gambol, Mike Perdue's piece veers into emphatic pounding accented with braying squeals. Jose Mora-Jimenez crafts a highly spiced minute, dense with frenzied delight that skids to an abrupt finish. Succumbing to the sweet savagery of melancholia, Joshua Ransom's soundscape pensively swoops and scoops, plumbing the sacred space of the heart.

Evocative pieces by Wade Meyers, Ching-Chu Hu, David Heuser, Serban Nichifor, Gordon Francis Blaney, Daniel Mihai, Scott Brickman, Andy Cohen, Guido Busocoli, and Corina Alexandra Tirziman round out this very poignant Fifteen-Minutes-Of-Fame.

Longer compositions, also dedicated to Alexandra's memory, investigate grief and its kin, memory and suffering. Cellist Jennifer Shaw renders each composition with a well-mannered, filigreed delicacy. Douglas DaSilva proffers "Liana," a subtle, finely hued work. Littered with sonic refractions, it bends peppery plucks into blaring smears. Robert Voisey’s “Lament and Sorrow” captures the all-enveloping, visceral immediacy of anguish. Designed for tape and cello, unearthly wails integrate with breath-like stroking from the cello. It affects a listener kinetically, cloaking the body in its pitched keening. Serban Nichifor, devoted husband of Liana Alexandra, contributes “Old Mormon Songs.”Burnished with a hearty and pioneering spirit, it relates sonic stories of hardship, perseverance, and divine intervention.

The program opens and closes with the lifeblood of Liana Alexandra's existence: her music. "Melody," for tenor saxophone and piano acts as a dusky, meditative poem; it’s a map of the inquisitive soul. In "Incantations 3," scraping shimmers of the cello stratify in chevrons over stuttering, electronic blasts.

The program closes with violinist Pauline Kim Harris providing a scorching performance of “Quasi-Cadenza.” Punctuated by thrusts of silence, it revs to a fuchsia-colored dynamism: bristling, thorny, and demanding in its insistence.

This concert accentuates that Liana Alexandra is a great talent who will be sorely missed. Composer’s Voice would like to thank to the Romanian Cultural Institute of New York for their munificent support.

Erin Bomboy
http://erinbomboy.blogspot.com/

Louie Louie

“Nobody move! Put up your hands. This is a stick-up!” snarled Louie Lechapeau as he waved his pistol at the band members. Or rather, that’s what he meant to say. What the French Canadian really said was “Personne ne se déplacent! Soulevez vos mains. C’est un hold-up!” Only the dancers Winken, Blinken and Noddy – a.k.a. “the Fabulous McGillicuddy Sisters” – under-stood what Louie was saying, and, hence, did what they were told. The drummer, Clyde, who had befriended the French bookkeeper while a member of Moe’s Rumbleseat Orchestra, grasped about half of what Louie said, so he held up one hand. Comprehending neither outburst nor gesture, the rest of the bandsmen continued to play for another thirty seconds. Coincidentally, the number was “Louie Louie,” a song that had long annoyed Lechapeau. And when the band reached the first chorus (at the 29-second mark), the would-be robber could take no more and fired his pistol at Max, the clarinetist. By a stroke of luck, the bullet entered the bell of the instrument, whizzed up the barrel, and lodged in the reed. Max was flabbergasted, but undamaged. The same could not be said for Holly, one of the singers, who shrieked in panic before collapsing in a dead faint. However, the screech peaked at the precise frequency at which glass shatters. Louie’s gun was made of glass. Worse (for him), it bore the consequences of the gunman’s inattention to hygiene, and a shard of the trigger that lodged in Louie’s finger teemed with a virulent strain of Southern Fried chicken pox. All in all, thought Louie, as he beat a hasty retreat to where his getaway car should have still been parked, it was a day he’d rather forget.

David Gunn
www.DavidGunn.org

Upcoming Performances

Fifteen Minutes of Fame

THE CRANE HARP ENSEMBLE CELEBRATES ITS 15TH SEASON WITH FIFTEEN MINUTES OF FAME

The Crane Harp Ensemble celebrates its fifteenth season with four performances of Fifteen Minutes of Fame on concert tour through New York State from Potsdam to new York City.

The Crane Harp Ensemble comprised of multiple harp players creates a unique atmosphere by performing as harp duos, trios, quartets, and as a full ensemble. It is a rare opportunity to see several harp players performing together as an ensemble. This Composer’s Voice concert is part of a New York State tour which starts in Potsdam with a live video stream performance at the Crane School of Music and ends in New York City.

Fifteen Minutes of Fame is 15 one-minute works by different composers specifically written for The Crane Ensemble. The composers include: Erik Branch, Inna Buganina, David Heinick, Elbert Liu, Martin Loridan, Roger May, Buck McDaniel, Michael Mikulka, Akmal Parwez, Robert Percy, Edward Ruchalski, Curtis Nathaniel Smith, Gregoria Karides Suchy, Christopher M. Wicks, and Farcry C. Zuke.

In addition to the Fifteen Minutes of Fame “suite”, two other works featured on this concert have been written for the Crane Harp Ensemble: Ryan Mix’s When/Where Lightning Strikes at the T and Two Brothers Dance in Spacetime: Two Amalgamating Memories of Adolescence and their Art of Deliquescing Entropy, and a newly-commissioned work by John Paul Brabant titled Soliloquy.

Also on this program are Domenick Argento’s The Angel Israfil, Caroline Lizotte’s Raga, Gregoria Karides Suchy’s Save, O Lord, Thy People and Sufjan Steven’s Chicago, arranged by ensemble member, Mikaela Davis.

Founded in 1999 under the direction of Dr. Jessica Suchy-Pilalis, Professor of Harp and Music Theory at the Crane School of Music, SUNY-Potsdam, the ensemble enjoys playing new and unusual music for multiple harps. http://www2.potsdam.edu/suchyjr/harp/craneharpens.html

This year, the Crane Harp Ensemble is comprised of seven collegiate harp majors: Katherine Berquist, Emily Chevrette, Mikaela Davis, Katherine Federiconi, Gillian Macchia, Kelsey Munz and Anna Wiegandt.

Composer’s Voice Concert Series is an opportunity for contemporary composers to express their musical aesthetic and personal “voice” created in their compositions. The “Composer’s Voice” concert series has presented over 100 concerts throughout the world premiering the works of thousands of living composers. www.voxnovus.com/composersvoice/

Performance Dates and Venues

November 5th at 7:30 pm
Snell Hall
Crane School of Music
SUNY-Potsdam
Potsdam, NY
Live video streaming accessed at
http://www.potsdam.edu/academics/Crane/streaming/index.cfm

November 8th at 7:30 pm
Brighton Town Hall Auditorium
2300 Elmwood Ave
Rochester, NY

November 9th at 2:30 pm
Calvary Methodist Church
15 Ridge Place
Latham, New York (Albany area)

Composer’s Voice featuring the Crane Harp Ensemble
Sunday, November 10, 2013 1:00 pm
Jan Hus Presbyterian Church
www.janhus.org
351 East 75th Street
New York, NY 10021-3798
FREE ADMISSION

Church of the Heavenly Rest,
2 East 90th St.,(Fifth Ave at 90th St.)
New York, NY
(reduced program)

Fifteen Minutes of Fame with David Bohn

November 6th, 2013 - La Crosse, Wisconsin

David Bohn encores his Fifteen Minutes of Fame on November 6th at Christ Episcopal Church in La Crosse as part of the 2013 La Crosse New Music Festival. this fifteen Minutes of Fame is 15 one-minute organ works wirtten speciffically for organist and composer David Bohn.

Composers selected for Fifteen Minutes of Fame with David Bohn include: Daniel Arnold, Rodrigo Baggio, Pedro Bernardez, James Bohn, Erik Branch, Scott Brickman, Fermino Gome, Stanley Hoffman, Dmitry Kitsenko, Bettie Ross, Edward Ruchalski, Aurelio Scotto,l Juan Maria, Jean-Pierre, and Justin Walker

You can find more information here:
http://www.voxnovus.com/15_Minutes_of_Fame/featuring/David_Bohn

Fifteen Minutes of Fame with David Bohn
November 6th, 2013 - 7:30 PM
Christ Church, La Crosse
www.christchurchlacrosse.org/‎ Christ Episcopal Church
111 N 9th St (Ninth and Main)
La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601
FREE ADMISSION

Calendar

Vox Novus Projects

Opportunities

60x60 CALL FOR WORKS

Call for Surround Sound Works: 60×60

Deadline: December 1, 2013

Vox Novus and Harvestworks are inviting composers and sound artists to submit recorded works as 5.1 audio 60 seconds or less in length to be included in a special 60×60 project collaboration in New York City.

60×60 is calling for works one-minute in length for 5.1 audio playback.

60×60 is a one-hour-long show made by sequencing 60 pre-recorded pieces by 60 different composers, each piece a minute in length or shorter. This 60×60 call for works is a unique collaboration with Harvestworks in New York City to create a 5.1 surround sound mix which will be premiered at Harvestworks multichannel TEAMLab listening room in Spring 2014.

Every one-minute piece selected will be played continuously without pause. Each of the 60 pieces selected will begin precisely at the beginning of the minute, this will mark the end of one piece and the beginning of another. Works selected that are less than 60 seconds long will be “padded” with silence either before, after, or surrounding the composition. Works may be less than 60 seconds in length, but may not exceed 60 seconds. Please note that the total duration of the work including silence may NOT exceed sixty seconds.

The 60×60 project’s definition of a record work is as follows: any work created as a musical composition which is captured on recorded media, which does not require live performers for its production in broadcast at concert halls, radio, multi-media, etc. Its creation can include but not limited to acoustic instruments, voice, environmental sources, and computer (Sampling, Max/MSP, Ableton Live, MIDI, C Sound, ProTools, etc.)

All works submitted should be with the understanding that it is their recording that is of prime importance and is what will be used to determine its selection. Since this is a multichannel work, the panel will pay special attention to the spatial aspects of your composition.

60×60 is a project of “signature works” and short works created specifically for the 60×60 project. Excerpts of larger works are strongly discouraged. Works generated from procedures (i.e. mathematical matrices, organizational systems, or computer programs,) remixed works, or themes and motives recomposed from other of the composer’s own work are acceptable. The call is open to composers of any nationality, age, or career stage.

Deadline for 60 second compositions for 60×60 is December 1, 2013.

There is no admission fee.

Works selected for the 60×60 5.1 will be announced in January 2014. The 60 works selected will be announced on the Vox Novus newsletter NM421 as well as the 60×60 and Harvestworks websites.

Technical details:

1) Any work between Quad and 5.1 Surround is eligible: 4.0, 5.0, 4.1, or 5.1

5-1-surround-sound.svg2) Files have to be delivered as up to 6 individual stems, or as an interleaved file. If you send individual stems, name them according to the following conventions: L, R, C, Ls, Rs, Lfe or Sub. For example, if you send a Quad piece, the labeling should be L, R, Ls, Rs.

3) The audio quality should be 48 KHz, 16 or 24 Bit. Do not send compressed formats. The work will be distributed on a video DVD, so if you send 44.1 KHz Sample Rate, we have to convert it to 48 KHz.

4) Send the files through a delivery service such as YouSendIt, Dropbox, Droplr, SendBigFiles – or include the links for downloading the materials from your site. Include a text file with the title of the piece, name of the composer, your email address, plus a descriptive text about your work and bio. Please do not exceed 1000 characters.

5) Send the materials to hanst@harvestworks.org.

Any questions regarding the call for works can be addressed to: Support@VoxNovus.com

Any questions regarding the technical aspects can be addressed to: hanst@harvestworks.org

Click here for more details at Harvestworks

Fifteen Minutes of Fame

CALL FOR SCORES

Fifteen-Minutes-of-Fame:
Daniel Sachs, piano
Hommage à Ravel

Deadline: November 9, 2013

Vox Novus is calling for one-minute pieces composed for Fifteen-Minutes-of-Fame: Daniel Sachs, piano to be premiered on March 9, 2014 for the Composer’s Voice concert series at the Jan Hus Church in New York City. The theme of this call is: Hommage à Ravel: Colors of sound and popular/folk idoms for the 21st century

Daniel Sachs, piano Born in Basel, Switzerland, Daniel Sachs earned his first degree in piano performance in his home town followed by studies in Paris, France, and Lübeck, Germany. In 2005, he completed his doctoral degree in piano performance at the College-Conservatory of Music (University of Cincinnati), where he studied with James Tocco. Mr. Sachs’ performances have brought him to venues such as the Fondation György Cziffrà in Senlis (France), the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, the Musiksaal in Basel and the Tonhalle Zürich, the Guest Artist Series at the College-Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, the University of Louisville and numerous other venues including performances with members of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. He performed with several orchestras and recorded solo works by Chopin and Rachmaninoff for the Swiss Radio. He is a founding member of the Mount St. Joseph Piano Trio and collaborates with his wife, soprano Rachel Sachs. Daniel Sachs is currently an Assistant Professor of Music at the College of Mount St. Joseph, where he teaches Piano and Music Theory. He lives in Lebanon, Ohio, with his wife, Rachel, and their three sons Samuel, Gabriel, and Nathaniel.

Click here for more details

Composer's Voice
CALL FOR SCORES

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