Tours

Sō Percussion is a percussion-based music organization that creates and presents new collaborative works to adventurous and curious audiences and educational initiatives to engaged students. With innovative multigenre original productions, sensational interpretations of modern classics, and an “exhilarating blend of precision and anarchy, rigor and bedlam,” (The New Yorker), Sō Percussion has redefined the scope and role of the modern percussion ensemble. Presented by the Davis Architects Guest Artist Series and the Birmingham Chamber Music Society.

Program:

Schütz – St Matthew Passion

David Lang – Little Match Girl Passion

Program:

J.S. Bach – Komm, Jesu, Komm

J.S. Bach – Concerto in C Major, BWV 1055

Costas Dafnis – How Long Ago

Osvaldo Golijov – Lua descolorida

James MacMillan – Lux Aeterna

Leonard Bernstein – Halil

Arvo Pärt – Fratres

David Lang – little match girl passion

Saturday March 17, 2018, 8:00pm, Prelude & Walking tour at 7:00pm

Sunday March 18, 2018, 8:00pm, Prelude & Walking tour at 6:00 & 7:00pm

Program:

Michael Gordon Anonymous Man (Midwest premiere)
Gabriel Jackson Rigwreck (Midwest premiere)

Anonymous Man (premiered July 2017) is a concert-length work from Bang on a Can composer Michael Gordon. The text is drawn from real life—Gordon's experiences living in a changing neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, meeting his future wife (the composer Julia Wolfe), raising a family, and especially his encounters with two homeless men who lived across the street.  The journey includes personal accounts of September 11, the death of one of the homeless men, and the outpouring of sympathy from the community following that loss, finally reaching an epiphany that evokes Lincoln's funeral train arriving on Desbrosses Street, the first stop on its visit to the streets of Manhattan. The interplay of personalities is beautifully rendered in music, springing from Michael’s conversations with the homeless men—serious, funny, mysterious, poetic, and mundane.

For Gabriel Jackson's dramatic setting of Pierre Joris' poem Rigwreck - a study on the power of money - The Crossing is joined by Northwestern's acclaimed vocal ensemble, BCE.

This is the tale of two
One life inside, the other one, outside

Program:

Gabriel Prokofiev – Cello Multitracks and Remixes
Zoe Martlew – Shift, Trip
Walter Zimmerman – Dit
Orlando Gough – Ariel Songs
Sally Whitwell – Going Somewhere and Lightness of Being
David Lang – In This Condition
Benjamin Oliver – Songs for Stanley
Sarah Dacey – Cold, Cold Night
Anna Snow – 7 Stars

The Bang on a Can All-Stars reunite with the Choir of Trinity Wall St, conducted by Julian Wachner, for this performance of Julia Wolfe's Anthracite Fields in Washington DC!

This event is part of the Kennedy Center's annual new celebration DIRECT CURRENT--an immersive showcase for cutting-edge contemporary arts and culture with a focus on interdisciplinary creations.

The Dessoff Choirs presents David Lang’s the little match girl passion, a work that evokes passion through stasis, repetition, and the unexpected combination of percussion instruments with voices. The composer describes his inspiration for setting the text:

In addition, Dessoff performs J.S. Bach’s Komm Jesu, komm, the fourth installment (over three seasons) of Bach’s six motets and as part of our Bernstein tribute, his Chichester Psalms.

Michael Gordon Weather 1 
Julia Wolfe  Cruel Sister

Brad Lubman, Conductor

The season will conclude with a string orchestra performance by Ensemble Signal, led by conductor Brad Lubman. The program will highlight Bang on a Can cofounder Michael Gordon’s Weather, a wild, explosive work that began with his curiosity about how musical instruments might be useful in mapping chaotic weather patterns. Ensemble Signal will also perform MacArthur Prize-winning composer Julia Wolfe’s Cruel Sister, a tour de force of story telling in which the music dramatizes the story behind a harrowing and heartbreaking traditional folk song.

All concerts begin at 8 p.m. in Wolfensohn Hall on the Institute campus. Tickets will be available to the public approximately one month before each concert.

David Lang's 'the little match girl passion' performed by Elmer Iseler Singers

Program:

Michael Gordon – Timber

Join us at the Garden Theater as Mantra Percussion performs Michael Gordon’s evening length work, "Timber" (2009). Scored for six graduated and amplified wooden Simantra's (2x4’s), it’s a musical tour de force showcasing a range of polyrhythmic layers and textures. 

Performers include Al Cerulo, Mike McCurdy, Joe Bergen, Joe Tucker, Mark Utley and Chris Graham. Committed to honoring the past and expanding the future of percussion music, Mantra brings to life new works for percussion by living composers, collaborates with artists from diverse genres and styles, and questions what it means to communicate music with percussion instruments. 

Starting at 6:00, cocktails will be available for purchase at Ethel’s Lounge, adjacent to the theater. 

Seating is limited and available on a first-come first-served basis. Recommended for guests age nine and older. Parking is available at a lot just south of the theater and at nearby meters. Free street parking is available after 6:00 p.m. on the south side of Fifth Avenue west of High Street around the corner from the theater

Program:

Michael Gordon – Timber 

Aaron Siegel – A Great Many

PROGRAM

Fiona Hill – Pentography (World premiere) for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, percussion, piano [10’]
Andrea Keller – Love in Solitude for piano, percussion, flute, clarinet + electronics [15′]
Thomas Meadowcroft – Medieval Rococo for keyboard, percussion, flute, clarinet + electronics [12’]
Annie Gosfield – Cranks & Cactus Needles for flute, piano, violin, cello [6’]
David Lang – Cheating, Lying, Stealing for piano, percussion, cello, bass clarinet, and brake drums [10’5]

Drown'd in one endlesse Day features a world premiere of Wisconsin composer Eric William Barnum, along with works new and old exploring the transformational moments when time seems to stop. Featured works include: the J.S. Bach motet Komm, Jesu, Komm, Antonio Lotti Crucifixus, C.H.H. Parry There is an Old Belief, Eric William Barnum one endlesse Day, Einojuhani Rautavaara Credo, David Lang, I live in Pain, and Last Spring, and Dan Forrest's Entreat me not to Leave You.

Saturday, February 10, 2018, 7:30pm - CHRIST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
Sunday, February 11, 2018, 2:00pm - St. ANDREW'S EPISCOPAL CHURCH

Program: 

John Luther Adams – Nunataks

Julia Wolfe – Earring

Cage – In a Landscape

David Lang – Cage

Frederic Rzewski – Piano Piece No. 4

Terry Riley – Keyboard Study No. 1

John Adams – Phrygian Gates

Rhythmic Kaleidoscopes

In Rhythmic Kaleidoscopes, Zubin Kanga performs a wide variety of American piano music, featuring rhythmic patterns and vibrant colours. It features the classic minimalist work, Keyboard Study No. 1 by Terry Riley, the mysterious landscapes of John Luther Adams’ Nunataks and the virtuosic explosion of melody in Rzewski’s Piano Piece No. 4.

The centerpiece of the programme is one of the great post-minimal works – John Adams’ epic masterpiece, Phrygian Gates.

Program:

Marc Neikrug, Flash
Mark Grey, Twenty
Sean Shepherd, wideOPENwide
James Matheson, Capriccio
Chris Cerrone, Shall I Project a World?
Derek Bermel, Twenty Questions
Andrew Norman, Still Life
Phil Kline, Bedeviled
David Ludwig, Moto Perpetuo
Gabriel Kahane, The Single Art Form Is Dead
John Harbison, Painting the Floors Blue
Bryce Dessner, Gift
Kaija Saariaho, Sense
Julia Wolfe, spinning jenny

This program,“in the dead of night,” mixes works by young composers, Williams alums, and some of today’s foremost composers. The music celebrates the spirit of inspiration and the objects, places, and people from which we derive it. In particular, it explores the difficult act of drawing inspirations from settings which seem otherwise dark, disparate. It is often from the presence of this darkness that creativity springs forth, that our most profound ideas are born.

Stick around after the performance for Night Jams 2, a chance for students to present their latest work.

IOTA Ensemble program:

Sato MATSUI ‘14: Fushugi Uta (Songs of Curiosity)

Alex MEDEIROS ‘20: New Work

Julia WOLFE (b. 1958): Singing in the Dead of Night (flute, clarinet, violin, piano, cello, percussion) (2008)

Sammi STONE ‘17: Individual Trees of Bahrain

MESSAIEN: Vingt Regards

Bryce DESSNER (b. 1976): Tenebre (string orchestra + pre-recorded track, and lighting design)

FREE EVENT

World Premiere, Chamber Version
January 9-13 at 7:30pm and January 14 at 6pm

At Gelsey Kirkland Arts Center

In the new opera Acquanetta, the spirit of 1940s horror movies is turned inside out in a bravura, one-act deconstruction of the genre that explores how vision relates to identity. Characters include the mad scientist Doctor, the insistent Ape, the reluctant Brainy Woman, the visionary Director and the beautiful Acquanetta, aka Mildred Davenport, an actress who disguised her identity. Acquanetta examines the ways the movie camera manipulates how we see and are seen. In soaring, sometimes comic and always indelible songs that capture the heightened drama of horror films, these vivid characters reveal their inner longings and emotional shadows in what is ultimately a haunting meditation on the meaning of identity, transformation, stereotypes and typecasting, set in the heyday of Hollywood gloss.

The coal industry long formed the backbone of towns and cities across England. Entire communities sprang into existence as fervent mining activity fuelled the industrial revolution. Integrating art, photography, film and an original musical soundtrack performed live, So Percussion – whose repertoire ranges across Cage, Xenakis and Steve Reich and have performed here as part of Bryce Dessner and Nico Muhly’s marathon weekends – capture the environment, personal stories, and aspirations of a community fighting against industrial decline.

This project – originally performed in County Durham – was born out of a collaboration between the quartet and Amber Films, and is inspired by East Durham’s reinvention after the crushing loss of its mining industry. They’re embarking on a national tour of sacred spaces, many in former mining communities, which combines live performance with community education programmes to lend local and contemporary context to historical narratives.

The coal industry long formed the backbone of towns and cities across England. Entire communities sprang into existence as fervent mining activity fuelled the industrial revolution. Integrating art, photography, film and an original musical soundtrack performed live, So Percussion – whose repertoire ranges across Cage, Xenakis and Steve Reich and have performed here as part of Bryce Dessner and Nico Muhly’s marathon weekends – capture the environment, personal stories, and aspirations of a community fighting against industrial decline.

This project – originally performed in County Durham – was born out of a collaboration between the quartet and Amber Films, and is inspired by East Durham’s reinvention after the crushing loss of its mining industry. They’re embarking on a national tour of sacred spaces, many in former mining communities, which combines live performance with community education programmes to lend local and contemporary context to historical narratives.

The coal industry long formed the backbone of towns and cities across England. Entire communities sprang into existence as fervent mining activity fuelled the industrial revolution. Integrating art, photography, film and an original musical soundtrack performed live, So Percussion – whose repertoire ranges across Cage, Xenakis and Steve Reich and have performed here as part of Bryce Dessner and Nico Muhly’s marathon weekends – capture the environment, personal stories, and aspirations of a community fighting against industrial decline.

This project – originally performed in County Durham – was born out of a collaboration between the quartet and Amber Films, and is inspired by East Durham’s reinvention after the crushing loss of its mining industry. They’re embarking on a national tour of sacred spaces, many in former mining communities, which combines live performance with community education programmes to lend local and contemporary context to historical narratives.

For two centuries, the coal industry formed the backbone of many towns and cities across England. Entire communities sprang into existence as fervent mining activity fuelled the industrial revolution. Integrating art, narrative, photography, film and an original musical soundscape performed live, Sō Percussion capture the environment, personal stories, and aspirations of a community fighting against industrial decline in From Out a Darker Sea. From Out a Darker Sea is not about coal, but like everything in areas rooted in industrial, there are always traces of it presence.

Commissioned by East Durham Creates as part of Arts Council England’s Creative People and Places programme, this immersive audio-visual performance is inspired by the context and history of East Durham, an area which has struggled to reinvent itself after the crushing loss of its mining industry. Sō Percussion collaborated with film and photography collective Amber Films on the creation of a new work, Song for Billy, which was developed from Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen’s photographic series The Coal Coast and features as part of the performance.

ARTISTS

Nick Photinos, cello

Vicki Ray, piano

PROGRAM

David BIRD: Lewisburg

Bryce DESSNER Lewisburg

Andrew NORMAN: Five Sonnets

David LANG: undanceable

David T LITTLE: and the sky was still there

Molly JOYCE: Sit and Dance

Florent GHYS: Game, Information and Flowers from Petits Artéfacts

Program:

Michael Gordon

acdc // for Madeline

David Lang

sweet air // cheating, lying, stealing

Lenka Novosedlíková

Seven:twenty:seven

Andrius Arutiunian

Atomic Butterfly (world premiere)