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On the Road to Capture John Muir’s Yosemite

Travel Journal

July 1, 2013 — This series of posts recounts my June 2013 pilgrimage into the Sierra Nevada and includes slideshows with 160 of the best photos and videos from the trip.

Mirror Lake, Yosemite National Park
Mirror Lake, Yosemite National Park

About the Trip

June 4, 2013 — Tomorrow I begin a cross-country train trip from New York to California, where I’ll be photographing and filming in Yosemite National Park and nearby areas for multimedia project Illuminating John Muir’s Yosemite (more information about the project here). I feel privileged and thrilled to undertake this exciting journey into the Sierra Nevada mountains.

The visuals and field recordings I collect in Yosemite will be developed into a browser-based multimedia immersive environment accompanied by new music and selections from the writings of naturalist/conservationist/genius John Muir.

Travel and art are an inspiring combination. I find the process of exploring new places becomes even more poignant and memorable with a creative project as my mission. Music and video piece The Faraway Nearby involved tracking down painter Georgia O’Keeffe’s favorite landscapes in New Mexico (read my travel log about that adventure). My mini-documentaries for Beyond the Notes: Music Inspired by Art led me to explore the homes and environments that inspired painters Thomas Cole and Charles Burchfield (see posts A Thomas Cole Pilgrimage and A Charles Burchfield Pilgrimage).

Once again, I’ll be posting about this project’s development. You’re invited to follow my journey’s progress on this blog and on Twitter.

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Nell Awarded Grant from NYU Steinhardt for Multimedia Project

John MuirMy forthcoming multimedia project Illuminating John Muir’s Yosemite through Music, Video and New Media was recently selected to receive the Undergraduate and Master’s Students Research/Creative Project Award through the Challenge Grant program at the NYU Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.

Illuminating John Muir’s Yosemite will be an online installation and live performance weaving together a song cycle for soprano and piano with original video, photographs, and literary selections exploring naturalist John Muir’s experiences in Yosemite National Park at the turn of the 20th century. The audience will be invited to inhabit, re-imagine, re-invigorate, and share in John Muir’s vision of nature as a source of spiritual and creative inspiration.

This summer I will be traveling to Yosemite National Park to collect footage and photographs for this project. Stay tuned for updates!

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Beyond the Notes and NellShawCohen.com: New Projects and New Looks

BTN screencap

Things have been busy on the web design front. Check out my new mobile-friendly layouts for  nellshawcohen.com, composition portfolio, and beyondthenotes.org, home of my online multimedia experiences exploring the visual and performing arts. I’m also excited to share with you two recently completed interactive media projects (below).

The Marin Headlands in Fog

This multimedia installation for the web explores the atmospheric coastal landscape of the Marin Headlands of the San Francisco Bay Area through music and video.

You are invited to choose from nine different viewpoints in the Marin Headlands. Original video footage is looped and accompanied by music I composed for piccolo and piano, performed and recorded in March 2012 at New England Conservatory by Sarah Sullivan and Kristina Nyberg. The immersive format invites focused contemplation of the music and the aesthetic atmosphere of the landscape.

John Heiss on Charles Ives

Artists on Art: John Heiss on Charles Ives examines some of the work of early 20th century American composer Charles Ives through the eyes of John Heiss: a composer, musician, scholar, conductor, and professor at my alma mater, New England Conservatory. My video interview with Professor Heiss in May 2012 at his home in Newton, MA forms the basis of this piece.

John Heiss on Charles Ives is a short web-native or “connected” documentary: it uses the web browser and outside online resources (such as Wikipedia, Spotify, and YouTube) to create a seamless interactive experience giving the viewer jumping-off points to delve in the music and its history.

 

 

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The JACK Quartet Premieres “The Winding Path” at the Provincetown Playhouse

JACK Quartet Flier
I am honored to have my string quartet The Winding Path premiered by the acclaimed JACK Quartet alongside the works of nine of my talented colleagues in the graduate composition program at New York University Steinhardt. The concert is the culmination of a seminar led by the amazing composers Julia Wolfe and Missy Mazzoli, in which we have explored modern string quartet repertoire and workshopped new compositions in live readings. This performance is my New York City debut!

The concert, JACK x 10, will be held on Tuesday, April 23, 7:00pm at the historic Provincetown Playhouse in Greenwich Village (133 MacDougal Street, New York, NY). Admission is FREE (no tickets needed) and open to the public. View the event on Facebook to learn more about the venue and the program.

The JACK Quartet electrifies audiences worldwide with “explosive virtuosity” (The Boston Globe) and “viscerally exciting performances” (New York Times) and works with many of today’s leading composers. Visit their website for more information about their numerous notable collaborations and performances.

My piece The Winding Path describes a circular journey, moving outward, striving towards a goal, a destination, or a state of being perhaps illusory or unreachable, and inevitably returning, transformed, to where it began. This is my second composition for string quartet, preceded in 2008 by The Course of Empire. Audio and video recordings of the performance will be made available online.

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Recording of “Symphony No. 1”

I was honored to be selected for the New York University Orchestra composer reading and recording session on November 19. The student orchestra had a brief rehearsal and run-through of the second movement of my Symphony No. 1, led by David Rosenmeyer, conductor.

You can listen to the recording on my website, alongside the reading of the first movement of the symphony from last spring by the New England Conservatory Philharmonia.

Listen to Symphony No. 1, first and second movements

Two more movements of this four-movement symphony have not yet been recorded.

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Success at the Parrish Art Museum; “Watercolors” on YouTube

“Nell’s extraordinary interdisciplinary vision…was an ideal program to introduce the public to the Museum’s collection through music and images. Two “standing room only” performances [of Watercolors] were met with high praise from attendees. The Director of the Museum cited this event as one of the best of the opening weekend.” Andrea Grover, Curator of Special Programs, Parrish Art Museum

The Chelsea Quintet and I at the Parrish Art Museum“I am so glad someone has at last given voice to what one imagines Burchfield might have been hearing in so many of his watercolors. Congratulations on bringing Burchfield alive in a way that I think he would have much appreciated.” Richard Kahn, art collector

“Your music illuminated Burchfield’s paintings for me.” Audience member

* * *

I’m happy to report that The Chelsea Quintet’s performances of Watercolors at the Parrish Art Museum in the Hamptons were an all-around success. We received a great audience response and turnout, with about 400 people hearing Watercolors and viewing selected videos from Beyond the Notes in the Museum’s new Lichtenstein Theater.

Watercolors received several preview articles and photographs in regional and local papers, including Newsday (the country’s highest-circulation weekday newspaper in a suburban area); The Sag Harbor Express; and The East Hampton Star, which printed a large feature article about my music (read it here). The Parrish Museum’s grand opening as a whole received notable publicity in The New York Times, New York Magazine, et al.

Now you can re-live the Parrish Art Museum concert or experience it for the first time! I’ve posted an HD video of one of The Chelsea Quintet’s November 10th performances on YouTube:

Watch Watercolors online


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“Watercolors” at the Parrish: Crowdfunding Success!

Thanks to the generosity of some awesome and fantastic funders, my fundraising campaign to support The Chelsea Quintet‘s performance of Watercolors this Saturday at the Parrish Art Museum was a great success: contributions have brought the campaign to 126% of my fundraising goal! Combined with the funding provided by the Museum, this makes it possible to compensate the five musicians and cover transportation and production expenses.

The Chelsea Quintet
The Chelsea Quintet

The generous supporters of this campaign, whose contributions ranged from $15 to $200, are:

  • Anonymous (2)
  • Daniel Gagne
  • Andrea Grover
  • Kevin Morgan
  • Dorothy Reilly
  • John Resig
  • Nancy Weekly 

If you haven’t had a chance to contribute yet, you can still make a difference: all of the funds raised in excess of my goal for the Parrish Art Museum performance will help cover the expenses of my next (TBA) project bringing Music Inspired by Art into a gallery or museum venue. This is an ongoing project that needs continual support to thrive.

If you contribute by Saturday, November 10, 11:59PM Pacific Time you can still receive some neat perks, which include a DVD with over an hour of video from performances of my “Music Inspired by Art;” a personalized CD of my music; a special-invitation high tea at my apartment; and even a commission of a short piece of music.

Watch the Trailer, Find Out More, and Donate

Watercolors at the Parrish is already attracting some great feedback and press: The Sag Harbor Express included an article on the event in their Thursday, October 25 print edition announcing that I would be “Christening the Parrish” with the performance (click here to read a scan of the article). Nancy Weekly, leading Charles E. Burchfield scholar and curator at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, comments on the Indiegogo campaign: “Nell Shaw Cohen deserves superlative praise for her compositions inspired by art, particularly her understanding of Charles E. Burchfield’s rapport with nature.” 

Stay tuned for more updates!

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“Watercolors” at Parrish Art Museum

WATERCOLORS

Inspired by the paintings of Charles Burchfield
Performed by The Chelsea Quintet
The Parrish Art Museum
Water Mill, NY
Saturday, November 10, 2012
12:30pm & 2:30pm
Free admission

I’m thrilled to announce another exciting performance of my music inspired by art coming up this November. I’d also like to ask that you consider helping me make this special project a reality.

The Parrish Art Museum, est. 1898, a prestigious museum in the Hamptons, will open the doors of a brand new facility this November. To celebrate the public opening on November 10, the Museum has chosen to feature two performances of my piece Watercolors for wind quintet (flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, and bassoon) inspired by the watercolor paintings of Charles Ephraim Burchfield (1893-1967).

Watercolors will be performed by a wonderful ensemble of accomplished musicians, The Chelsea Quintet. The group’s affiliated parent organization, The Chelsea Symphony, is the resident symphony orchestra of the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City.

Read more about this concert and how you can help on my Indiegogo campaign page, which includes a video trailer and more information about the venue, musicians, and the music!

Watch the Trailer, Find Out More, and Donate *

* The Indiegogo campaign lists a number of suggested donation levels that have special “perks” — gifts and special opportunities I am offering as thanks — but remember that you or your friends can donate any amount, whether it’s $5 or $55!

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Going to NYU Steinhardt for my Master of Music!

I am very happy to announce that, with funding from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation (see this post), this fall I will begin a two-year Master of Music in Music Composition program at NYU Steinhardt’s Department of Music and Performing Arts Professions located in the heart of New York City. NYU Steinhardt offers a hybrid conservatory and university setting where performers and researchers work alongside each other and composers are encouraged to develop interdisciplinary collaborations with choreographers, visual artists, writers, filmmakers, and scholars in other departments at NYU. In addition to the concert music composition program, directed by the wonderful composer Julia Wolfe (founding member of the legendary Bang On a Can collective), Steinhardt offers high-caliber study in composition for film and multimedia.

The composition faculty includes Julia Wolfe, Ron Sadoff, David Spear, Ira Newborn, Michael Gordon, Justin Dello Joio, and Herschel Garfein, among many others. As a first-year graduate student, I will receive a performance of a new string quartet by the internationally renowned JACK Quartet in a public New York City venue, in addition to opportunities for student performances. I am thrilled to be able to take advantage of the many opportunities that NYU will provide, not least of which will be getting a head start in developing ties within the music and arts community in New York.