Are you in Boston? Do you enjoy guitar music? I hope you’ll be able to make it out to hear two upcoming performances of guitar music I’ve written for Devin Ulibarri and other Boston-based artists.
Friday, February 13, 2015 at 6:00pm Devin Ulibarri, Guitarist
On this installment of the “A Musical Apertif” Concert Series themed “Love, Loss, and Love Again,” Devin will be revisiting two works I composed for him:Triptych andDai-Shizen (Great Nature), which will feature Alicia Mielke on flute. Democracy Center at 45 Mt. Auburn Street in Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA. $10 admission.
Tuesday, June 16, 2015 at 7:30pm Boston GuitarFest Young Guitarists Workshop Faculty Recital
I’m thrilled to be writing a new work for guitar quartet for premiere by the Boston GuitarFest’s Young Guitarists Workshop Faculty (Adam Levin, Will Riley, Devin Ulibarri, and Colin Thurmond). Admission details TBA. Watch Boston GuitarFest for updates.
UPDATE: video recording of this performance is now online!
Movements (played continuously): California Topaz Sunset
Devin Ulibarri
The World Premiere ofDai-Shizen (Great Nature) for guitar and flute will be performed by fellow New England Conservatory alumni Devin Ulibarri and Alicia Mielke on the Emerging Artists concert at the 9th annual Boston GuitarFest this Saturday, June 28, 3:00pm in Jordan Hall.
Alicia Mielke
I am honored to have my music presented on this prestigious festival by these two wonderful performers!
When guitarist Devin Ulibarri – who I previously collaborated with in 2011 on Triptych – asked me to write a piece for him and flutist Alicia Mielke relating to Boston GuitarFest’s theme of “American Odyssey,” I gravitated towards the woodblock prints and ink and watercolor paintings of Japanese-American artist Chiura Obata (1885-1975). Obata lived and worked primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area and devoted himself to bringing traditional Japanese aesthetics and techniques into American art. Obata’s own “American Odyssey” as an immigrant deeply devoted to the culture and landscape of California was complex and richly represented by his artwork.
Chiura Obata, “Mono Crater, Sierra Nevada, California”
While composing this piece, I considered specific images and qualities I perceived in Obata’s art and used those as prompts for musical ideas. I felt the lush yet restrained, and powerful yet delicate expressiveness of Obata’s prints and paintings would be reflected very effectively by flute and guitar. On a more personal level, my choice to respond to Obata’s artworks relates to my own background as a Bay Area native and love for California landscapes, as well as Devin’s deep commitment to Japanese culture and language.
I was particularly inspired by Obata’s ability to follow his philosophy of dai-shizen (Great Nature), nature as a source of artistic inspiration and spiritual harmony, throughout the best and worst moments of his life. Obata and his family spent over a year in internment camps during World War II, primarily in Utah. Despite these demeaning conditions, Obata strove to bring meaning into the lives of those around him. He founded an art school with his fellow internees and created stunning, emotionally charged watercolor paintings juxtaposing the dreary manmade structures of the prison camp against broad expanses of desert, mountains, and fiery sunsets.
Chiura Obata, “Sunset, Watertower, March 10, 1943”
This video and music piece inspired by a cross-country train trip, created for the NYU Contemporary Music Ensemble, was given an excellent premiere performance with video projection on April 28 in the Frederick Loewe Theatre at NYU. Now you canwatch the video online with live musical recording. I hope you enjoy it!
Horizon: New York #1 & #2 – Dance & Music Films Online
The audience at my April 29th recital saw the world premiere screening of version #1 of Horizon: New York, a short film I created featuring wonderful dancer-choreographer Callie Lyons and cellist Fjóla Evans. There are actually two versions of the video, shot in two different locations in Brooklyn (Brooklyn Bridge Park and Prospect Park), both of which are now available for viewing online.
Premiere of Commissioned Work at Boston GuitarFest
When guitarist Devin Ulibarri – who I previously collaborated with in 2011 on Triptych – asked me to write a piece for him and flutist Alicia Mielke relating to Boston GuitarFest‘s theme of “American Odyssey,” I gravitated towards the woodblock prints and ink and watercolor paintings of the Japanese-American artist Chiura Obata (1885-1975).
Devin and Alicia will premiere my Obata-inspired composition Dai-Shizen (Great Nature) at the Emerging Artists concert on the 9th annual Boston GuitarFest on Saturday, June 28 at 3:00pm in New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall. Visit the Boston GuitarFest website to learn more about the concert.
The Coming of Spring: Success
Thank you to everyone who came out to see my recital and the staged workshop production of one-act monodrama The Coming of Spring on April 29. This was an extremely special evening for me and the audience response was very rewarding!
The performance was well documented and I’ll be sharing video and audio excerpts with you in the near future.
Save the dates: new music and multimedia works of mine will be presented on two different concerts in New York City on April 28 and 29 (see below for details). I hope you will join me!
The Coming of Spring and Multimedia Works
Tuesday, April 29, 2014 at 8:30pm
Provincetown Playhouse
133 MacDougal Street, New York, NY
Free and open to the public (no tickets needed)
Charles E. Burchfield, Wind Blown Asters, 1951
My Master of Music graduating recital at NYU will feature a full-length, staged workshop performance of The Coming of Spring and screenings of multimedia works.The Coming of Spring is my one-act monodrama for tenor, accompanied by flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon, and piano, based on the artworks and writings of visionary American painter Charles E. Burchfield (1893-1967), who was also the inspiration for my wind quintet Watercolors. This is my largest compositional undertaking to date (ca. 36 minutes) and the overarching focus of my time at NYU.
This workshop performance is being created by a group of outstanding professional artists, including conductor David Rosenmeyer, an advocate for opera and new music with companies and orchestras in the U.S. and abroad (notably as Associate Conductor of the Oratorio Society of New York); stage director Herschel Garfein, who is also a composer and GRAMMY® award winning librettist; tenor Tyler Lee, who will portray Burchfield; and The Chelsea Quintet, which gave wonderful performances of Watercolors at the Parrish Art Museum, joined by pianist Alice Hargrove.
Horizon: New York is a short film collaboration with two extraordinary colleagues of mine at NYU: dancer-choreographer Callie Lyons and cellist Fjóla Evans.
I originally composed the music for solo cello for performances at the Parrish Art Museum in November 2013. I was delighted to see this work reinterpreted by cellist Fjóla Evans and reinvented through Callie Lyons’ choreography and solo dance performance (conceived specifically for this film). With my father Burt Cohen, I filmed Fjóla and Callie in three locations around New York City to create this short film.
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NYU Contemporary Music Ensemble Premieres California Zephyr
Monday, April 28, 2014 at 7:30pm
Frederick Loewe Theatre
35 West 4th Street, New York, NY
Free and open to the public (no tickets needed) View this event on the NYU website
In June 2013, I traveled from New York City to San Francisco by train. I departed from NYC on Amtrak’s Lakeshore Limited line and transferred to the California Zephyr in Chicago.
The California Zephyr, which journeyed westward via the Rocky Mountains and Sierra Nevada, is a classic train famed for its scenic views. With a camera pointed at the window along the way, I attempted to capture the scenery’s transitions from farmland to mountains to desert.
California Zephyr, created for the New York University Contemporary Music Ensemble, summarizes my three-day journey on the Zephyr in eight minutes of music and video. Neither a film score nor a music video, California Zephyr features equally prominent music and video that I produced simultaneously, in dialogue with each other.
Tom Killion, “Point Reyes from Chimney Rock”, 2012. Used by permission of the artist.
UPDATE: The recording of this performance is now available, below!
As Composer-in-Residence with the NYU Symphony, I will receive the honor of having a newly commissioned work for orchestra, Point Reyes from Chimney Rock, premiered on Monday, March 3, 8:00pm at the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, 566 LaGuardia Place, New York, NY, the preeminent venue for the presentation of cultural and performing arts events for NYU and lower Manhattan. The concert will also include works by Britten, Tchaikovsky, and my colleague Kyle Tieman-Strauss.
While Point Reyes is my sixth composition for large ensemble, it’s the first to be publicly performed. I hope some of you will be able to share this special moment with me.
About the Music
A tone poem inspired by the coastal landscape of the San Francisco Bay Area where I was born and raised, Point Reyes from Chimney Rock takes its title from a woodblock print by contemporary artist Tom Killion (www.tomkillion.com), which I received as gift from my parents in Summer 2013.
The print depicts a view of Point Reyes, the peninsula jutting into the ocean north of San Francisco, from which the rugged Pacific can be seen on one side of the rocky, grass-frosted land mass, and Drake’s Bay on the other. Wild irises and grasses in the foreground appear to tremble in a brisk wind, while the water’s horizon and a looming orange-red sky stretch far into the distance.
Killion’s artwork, along with my personal experiences walking in this and similar environs on the Point Reyes National Seashore, informed the sound world I strove to create within the orchestra. This landscape is broad and sweeping on the large scale, yet delicate and intimate in the details; it is bold yet ethereal, in both sunshine and fog. My love and yearning for this place is embedded in the music.
Sunday, November 24, 2014 at 8:00pm UrbanAnimals NYU Provincetown Playhouse
133 MacDougal Street, New York, NY.
Free admission. Full program information on Facebook.
Charles Burchfield, “The Coming of Spring” (1917-43)
On the first concert of this series dedicated to presenting new works by current NYU graduate students, tenor Tyler Lee and pianist Alice Hargrove will be previewing an excerpt from my one-act monodrama The Coming of Springinspired by the writings and paintings of Charles E. Burchfield (1893-1967). The performance will include a video projection.
Tyler and Alice will be joined by The Chelsea Quintet to present a staged workshop production of the full score this spring. Stay tuned for details!
This weekend, in celebration of the Parrish Art Museum”˜s one-year anniversary in its new location, cellists Karlos Rodriguez and Richard Vaudrey will each perform in the Harriet and Esteban Vicente Gallery (on Saturday, November 9 and Sunday, November 10, respectively). The musicians will both feature Horizon for solo cello, which I composed for this occasion.
Having presented wind quintet Watercolors last year at the grand opening of the new Parrish Art Museum, I’ve written Horizon to celebrate and reflect on the aesthetic quality of the Parrish’s building and the surrounding landscape.
Watch the World Premiere performance by Karlos Rodriguez below!
Karlos Rodriguez
Karlos Rodriguez made his orchestral debut at the age of thirteen to great audience and critical acclaim and has since performed as an avid soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician. He has appeared at many of our important musical venues, including Carnegie Hall (Isaac Stern Auditorium), Merkin Concert Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Philadelphia’s Kimmel center, The Kennedy Center and Radio City Music Hall. Mr. Rodriguez has worked with distinguished artists such as the Beaux Arts Trio, and the American, Cavani, Cleveland, Emerson, Guarneri, Juilliard, Miami, Orion, Tokyo, and Vermeer String Quartets; and Janos Starker, Lynn Harrell, and Steven Isserlis. He has attended and been a guest artist at the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival, Grand Canyon Music Festival, ENCORE School for Strings, Sarasota, Aspen, and Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festivals, Cleveland Chamber Music Society, and the Philadelphia Orchestra Chamber Music Society. His teachers have included Richard Aaron, Peter Wiley, and David Soyer. Mr. Rodriguez has been featured internationally on TV and radio with multiple broadcasts on APM’s Performance Today. He is on the faculty at Summertrios and the Sphinx Performance Academy. Mr. Rodriguez has worked on various Broadway musicals and Pop albums, most recently with Shakira and Marc Anthony. In addition to these musical activities he is former Principal Cellist of the Florida Grand Opera Orchestra in Miami and cellist of the The Catalyst Quartet. He is prize winner of the 2012 Bergamo Classical music award (Switzerland). He proudly endorses Pirastro Strings.
Richard Vaudrey
Brooklyn based Australian cellist Richard Vaudrey is quickly becoming a notable force in the new breed of string players, classically trained and proficient across a multitude of genres. Originally from Melbourne, Australia, Richard was a scholarship holder at The Australian National Academy of Music before heading to the United States, where he completed doctoral study in classical cello performance and contemporary improvisation at SUNY Stony Brook, studying with Colin Carr and Ray Anderson whilst acting as Teaching Assistant to the Emerson String Quartet. Richard has had a prolific background in chamber music and performs regularly both as a soloist and collaborator across a multitude of genres including classical, new music, jazz, folk and pop in venues including Carnegie Hall, 92Y Tribecca, the Stone, Alice Tully Hall and the Harvey Theatre, BAM. Richard’s latest solo project “VAUDREY” a unique blend of post chestral-indie-dub -folk-pop for cello voice and electronics has this year been showcased in Sydney, Melbourne (Toff in Town) and New York City (Rockwood Music Hall, Pianos). The show also pays homage to the late Arthur Russell, a huge influence on Richard’s own compositions and the subject for Richard’s Doctoral Research. Richard is Adjunct Professor of Cello at Western Connecticut State University, and a member of the Numinous Ensemble, Indie band all boy/all girl and plays “The Beleura Cello” – a 1791 William Forster cello generously loaned by the Tallis Foundation. He currently resides in Brooklyn.
October 18, 2013 at 7:30pm NYU Mix: NYU Percussion Ensemble
New York University Frederick Loewe Theatre 35 West 4th Street, New York, NY. *Free Admission* View the event on NYU’s website
This concert will include the world premiere of my Three Decorations (2013) for percussion trio, presented by the NYU Percussion Ensemble (directed by Jonathan Haas) in collaboration with the Program in Music Composition.
TrencadiÌs. Photo by Lucy Nieto.
Three Decorations is a work for three percussionists in three movements: Column (Ancient Trees Rising), TrencadiÌs (Shards of Color), and Tapestry (Cozy Castle). Each movement is a musical response to, or evocation of, a favorite image of mine from European decorative art: first, the tree-like vertical extensions of cathedral columns; second, the colorful, asymmetrical style of mosaic popularized by Antoni GaudÃ; third, some grand tapestry covered in millefleur designs warming the walls of a dark 15th century castle.
Three Decorations is my first foray into writing for drum set in a chamber music context. As a former rock drummer, I opted to utilize the kit in similar ways I would in a popular music idiom: to create groove, accentuating and supporting the interlocking syncopations heard in the pitched instruments.
Sunday, October 13, 2013 at 3:00pm
Tufts University Distler Performance Hall, Granoff Music Center 20 Talbot Ave, Somerville, MA. *Free Admission* RSVP on Facebook
This Sunday, those of you in the Boston area will have a chance to hear Proclaiming Pan,the interdisciplinary program presented by flutist Elizabeth Erenberg and an ensemble of some of Boston’s finest musicians, scholars, and actors. The performance will combine music, literature, and theater to sound the stories of Greek mythology.
Nine Muses (2009), my set of nine miniatures for flute, violin, and harp—performed by Gabe Terracciano and Maria Rindenello Parker, respectively—will be included on this program in its fourth public performance.
Each movement of Nine Muses take its title and musical character from one of the nine Muses of Greek mythology. The Muses are goddesses who were thought to personify and inspire art and knowledge and are often referenced in Western art and literature (especially in epic poetry). Nine Muses was premiered at New England Conservatory on March 10, 2009. I am honored that Elizabeth Erenberg has given these miniatures continued life through Proclaiming Pan.
The acclaimed JACK Quartet gave an awesome premiere of my string quartet The Winding Pathon April 23 at the Provincetown Playhouse in Greenwich Village, New York City, along with nine fantastic works by my colleagues at New York University. See my previous post for more on this performance and my piece.
Friday, February 13, 2015 at 6:00pm
