NEWS RELEASE
For immediate release: For further information contact:
October 15, 2011 Colleen Graves
gravesc@sou.edu
541.552.6102
Caballito Negro presents “Una Noche de Duende”, an evening of contemporary music, dance, and multi-media art featuring Southern Oregon University Faculty
(Ashland, Ore.) – Caballito Negro (flutist Tessa Brinckman and percussionist Terry Longshore) presents “Una Noche de Duende” Wednesday, November 2, at 7:30 PM in the Southern Oregon University Music Recital Hall in Ashland.
Caballito Negro is named from a line of the poem, Canción de Jinete (Song of the Rider) by Federico García Lorca, and one of the Madrigals, by composer George Crumb. "Little Black Horse" gallops in and around Oregon's new music scene, directed by flutist Tessa Brinckman and percussionist Terry Longshore. Assisted by brilliant guest artists, Caballito Negro presents contemporary music on the edge of many worlds, always in the spirit of duende.
The Spanish word ‘duende’ defies definition, but has been interpreted as inspiration, emotion, authenticity, magic, and “fire”. The music encountered in this eclectic program, “an evening of duende”, takes the audience on a journey of seldom experienced musical diversity, including avant garde American contemporary music, electro-acoustic music, video projection, dance, music of South Africa, and a musical score consisting entirely of bizarre pictographs to be “interpreted rigorously” by the performers.
New Zealand flutist Tessa Brinckman, described by Gramophone as a “flutist of chameleon-like gifts” and "virtuoso elegance", is an active performer on the West Coast, and serves on the faculty of Southern Oregon University and Rogue Community College. Percussionist Terry Longshore is a champion of contemporary music who has premiered and recorded many important works, composes contemporary percussion music, and is Professor of Music and Director of Percussion Studies at Southern Oregon University.
Brinckman and Longshore will be joined by guest artists David Bithell, composer/artist/musician; Ellie Leonhardt, choreographer/dancer; Christine Williams, soprano; and percussion ensemble Compás, including Terry Longshore, Bryan Jeffs, and Jacob Phelps-Ransom. The ensemble will perform works by Mark Applebaum, David Bithell, William Kraft, Ellie Leonhardt, Alvin Lucier, and Bongani Ndodana-Breen.
“Una Noche de Duende” will feature the world premiere of William Kraft’s “Encounters XVI” for flute and percussion, performed by Caballito Negro. World renown composer William Kraft has had a long and illustrious career. In 2002 he retired as chairman of the composition department and holder of the Corwin Chair at the University of California, Santa Barbara. From 1981-1985, Mr. Kraft was the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Composer-in-Residence. During his residency, he was founder and director of the orchestra’s performing arm for contemporary music, the Philharmonic New Music Group. Mr. Kraft had previously been a performing member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 26 years – eight years as percussionist, and the last 18 as Principal Timpanist. For three seasons, he was also assistant conductor of the Philharmonic, and, thereafter, made frequent appearances as guest conductor. Mr. Kraft has received numerous commissions and awards, including two Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards; two Guggenheim Fellowships; two Ford Foundation commissions; fellowships from the Huntington Hartford Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts; the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Music Award; and numerous others. Mr. Kraft’s works have been performed by orchestras throughout the United States and around the world, including in Europe, Japan, Korea, China, Australia, Israel, and the former Soviet Union. In November 1990, Mr. Kraft was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Percussive Arts Society.
Kraft’s “Encounters” series of works for percussion and another instrument are some of the favorites of the percussion chamber music repertoire. “Encounters XVI”, the latest in this series and receiving its world premiere by Caballito Negro, is full of rich color and texture. Scored for flute and a battery of percussion including marimba, vibraphone, seven graduated drums, tam-tam gong, and suspended cymbal—the work explores the rich harmonic sonorities between the flute and both the resonant sounds of metallic percussion and drier, woodier textures of the marimba and drums.
“encapsulating” is an interactive work of video and audio composed by David Bithell, newly-hired SOU Assistant Professor of Digital Art and interdisciplinary composer, artist, and performer whose work blurs the lines between experimental music, theater, and visual art. “encapsulating” was written specifically to accompany choreography by Ellie Leonhardt, creating a work that uses technology to convey a multiplicity of perspectives as well as a sense of containment, resistance, and escape. The video uses a camera focused on the live dancer as input to a series of visual columns and is controlled by audio cues as well as automated through algorithmic processes. The sound world is created by the live electronic manipulation of a Javanese gender (a 14-key bronze percussion instrument), augmented by flute and additional percussion performed by Brinckman and Longshore. Leonhardt’s dance and choreography blend her passions in Contact Improvisation, Authentic Movement/Dance-Therapy, Yoga/Somatics, and the Erick Hawkins Modern Dance Technique.
As with most of his compositions, Alvin Lucier’s “Still and Moving Lines of Silence in Families of Hyperbolas” is based upon an acoustic phenomenon, in this case “standing waves.” If sine waves are tuned closely to the geometry and resonant frequencies of the performance space, then pockets of tone and silence appear in different areas of the room simultaneously. With the addition of deliberately mis-tuned frequencies, the “lines of silence” can be spun around the room at varying speeds.
Bongani Ndodana-Breen’s “Apologia at Umzimvubu” is an unwavering explanation of Xhosa culture and the composer's personal identity through music. Animated dances by the young people give way to the dignified umxhenstso dance of the elderly matrons. “Apologia” was originally commissioned in 2005 by Tessa Brinckman for flute, violin and cello and will be performed for the first time in this arrangement for flute and two marimbas by Tessa Brinckman, Terry Longshore, and Bryan Jeffs.
The concert begins and ends with two compositions by Stanford University-based composer Mark Applebaum, a favorite of Southern Oregon audiences that have delighted in performances of his music by Terry Longshore and the Southern Oregon University Percussion Ensembles. Applebaum’s rousing percussion trio “Catfish”, performed by percussion ensemble Compás, sounds the alarm for an evening of exciting juxtapositions. “Catfish”, for each player’s choice of 3 like instruments (wood, metal, skin), features many polyrhythms, metric modulations, and aleatoric sections, all the while rooted in a strong sense of groove. Compás, led by Terry Longshore, features dynamic percussionists Bryan Jeffs and Jacob Phelps-Ransom.
The program concludes with Applebaum’s “Medium”, a work for a quartet of any four musicians (Tessa Brinckman, Terry Longshore, Jacob Phelps-Ransom, and Christine Williams) “who rigorously interpret its score—a mercurial spray of pictographs whose precise definition as musical specifications is left entirely up to its performers...There are several mediums at play: the work is multi-media as it resides equally in the realms of visual art and music. The score itself is a medium—it presents a conceptual substance through which the expressive energy of creative musicians must pass; and, as a non-standard notation presented to imaginative, inventive performers, it is as much a musical filter as a musical prescription...And lastly, the work represents a middle state between spatial right and left, between the ceremony of performance and the routine of not performance.” (Mark Applebaum)
The Southern Oregon University Music Recital Hall is located at 405 S. Mountain Ave. in Ashland. Tickets for this performance are $10 for general admission and free for students. Tickets and season passes may be purchased by calling 541-552-6101 or at the Music Box Office prior to the performance. For more information, please visit Southern Oregon University’s Music website at http://www.sou.edu/music
-SOU-
For immediate release: For further information contact:
October 15, 2011 Colleen Graves
gravesc@sou.edu
541.552.6102
Caballito Negro presents “Una Noche de Duende”, an evening of contemporary music, dance, and multi-media art featuring Southern Oregon University Faculty
(Ashland, Ore.) – Caballito Negro (flutist Tessa Brinckman and percussionist Terry Longshore) presents “Una Noche de Duende” Wednesday, November 2, at 7:30 PM in the Southern Oregon University Music Recital Hall in Ashland.
Caballito Negro is named from a line of the poem, Canción de Jinete (Song of the Rider) by Federico García Lorca, and one of the Madrigals, by composer George Crumb. "Little Black Horse" gallops in and around Oregon's new music scene, directed by flutist Tessa Brinckman and percussionist Terry Longshore. Assisted by brilliant guest artists, Caballito Negro presents contemporary music on the edge of many worlds, always in the spirit of duende.
The Spanish word ‘duende’ defies definition, but has been interpreted as inspiration, emotion, authenticity, magic, and “fire”. The music encountered in this eclectic program, “an evening of duende”, takes the audience on a journey of seldom experienced musical diversity, including avant garde American contemporary music, electro-acoustic music, video projection, dance, music of South Africa, and a musical score consisting entirely of bizarre pictographs to be “interpreted rigorously” by the performers.
New Zealand flutist Tessa Brinckman, described by Gramophone as a “flutist of chameleon-like gifts” and "virtuoso elegance", is an active performer on the West Coast, and serves on the faculty of Southern Oregon University and Rogue Community College. Percussionist Terry Longshore is a champion of contemporary music who has premiered and recorded many important works, composes contemporary percussion music, and is Professor of Music and Director of Percussion Studies at Southern Oregon University.
Brinckman and Longshore will be joined by guest artists David Bithell, composer/artist/musician; Ellie Leonhardt, choreographer/dancer; Christine Williams, soprano; and percussion ensemble Compás, including Terry Longshore, Bryan Jeffs, and Jacob Phelps-Ransom. The ensemble will perform works by Mark Applebaum, David Bithell, William Kraft, Ellie Leonhardt, Alvin Lucier, and Bongani Ndodana-Breen.
“Una Noche de Duende” will feature the world premiere of William Kraft’s “Encounters XVI” for flute and percussion, performed by Caballito Negro. World renown composer William Kraft has had a long and illustrious career. In 2002 he retired as chairman of the composition department and holder of the Corwin Chair at the University of California, Santa Barbara. From 1981-1985, Mr. Kraft was the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Composer-in-Residence. During his residency, he was founder and director of the orchestra’s performing arm for contemporary music, the Philharmonic New Music Group. Mr. Kraft had previously been a performing member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 26 years – eight years as percussionist, and the last 18 as Principal Timpanist. For three seasons, he was also assistant conductor of the Philharmonic, and, thereafter, made frequent appearances as guest conductor. Mr. Kraft has received numerous commissions and awards, including two Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards; two Guggenheim Fellowships; two Ford Foundation commissions; fellowships from the Huntington Hartford Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts; the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Music Award; and numerous others. Mr. Kraft’s works have been performed by orchestras throughout the United States and around the world, including in Europe, Japan, Korea, China, Australia, Israel, and the former Soviet Union. In November 1990, Mr. Kraft was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Percussive Arts Society.
Kraft’s “Encounters” series of works for percussion and another instrument are some of the favorites of the percussion chamber music repertoire. “Encounters XVI”, the latest in this series and receiving its world premiere by Caballito Negro, is full of rich color and texture. Scored for flute and a battery of percussion including marimba, vibraphone, seven graduated drums, tam-tam gong, and suspended cymbal—the work explores the rich harmonic sonorities between the flute and both the resonant sounds of metallic percussion and drier, woodier textures of the marimba and drums.
“encapsulating” is an interactive work of video and audio composed by David Bithell, newly-hired SOU Assistant Professor of Digital Art and interdisciplinary composer, artist, and performer whose work blurs the lines between experimental music, theater, and visual art. “encapsulating” was written specifically to accompany choreography by Ellie Leonhardt, creating a work that uses technology to convey a multiplicity of perspectives as well as a sense of containment, resistance, and escape. The video uses a camera focused on the live dancer as input to a series of visual columns and is controlled by audio cues as well as automated through algorithmic processes. The sound world is created by the live electronic manipulation of a Javanese gender (a 14-key bronze percussion instrument), augmented by flute and additional percussion performed by Brinckman and Longshore. Leonhardt’s dance and choreography blend her passions in Contact Improvisation, Authentic Movement/Dance-Therapy, Yoga/Somatics, and the Erick Hawkins Modern Dance Technique.
As with most of his compositions, Alvin Lucier’s “Still and Moving Lines of Silence in Families of Hyperbolas” is based upon an acoustic phenomenon, in this case “standing waves.” If sine waves are tuned closely to the geometry and resonant frequencies of the performance space, then pockets of tone and silence appear in different areas of the room simultaneously. With the addition of deliberately mis-tuned frequencies, the “lines of silence” can be spun around the room at varying speeds.
Bongani Ndodana-Breen’s “Apologia at Umzimvubu” is an unwavering explanation of Xhosa culture and the composer's personal identity through music. Animated dances by the young people give way to the dignified umxhenstso dance of the elderly matrons. “Apologia” was originally commissioned in 2005 by Tessa Brinckman for flute, violin and cello and will be performed for the first time in this arrangement for flute and two marimbas by Tessa Brinckman, Terry Longshore, and Bryan Jeffs.
The concert begins and ends with two compositions by Stanford University-based composer Mark Applebaum, a favorite of Southern Oregon audiences that have delighted in performances of his music by Terry Longshore and the Southern Oregon University Percussion Ensembles. Applebaum’s rousing percussion trio “Catfish”, performed by percussion ensemble Compás, sounds the alarm for an evening of exciting juxtapositions. “Catfish”, for each player’s choice of 3 like instruments (wood, metal, skin), features many polyrhythms, metric modulations, and aleatoric sections, all the while rooted in a strong sense of groove. Compás, led by Terry Longshore, features dynamic percussionists Bryan Jeffs and Jacob Phelps-Ransom.
The program concludes with Applebaum’s “Medium”, a work for a quartet of any four musicians (Tessa Brinckman, Terry Longshore, Jacob Phelps-Ransom, and Christine Williams) “who rigorously interpret its score—a mercurial spray of pictographs whose precise definition as musical specifications is left entirely up to its performers...There are several mediums at play: the work is multi-media as it resides equally in the realms of visual art and music. The score itself is a medium—it presents a conceptual substance through which the expressive energy of creative musicians must pass; and, as a non-standard notation presented to imaginative, inventive performers, it is as much a musical filter as a musical prescription...And lastly, the work represents a middle state between spatial right and left, between the ceremony of performance and the routine of not performance.” (Mark Applebaum)
The Southern Oregon University Music Recital Hall is located at 405 S. Mountain Ave. in Ashland. Tickets for this performance are $10 for general admission and free for students. Tickets and season passes may be purchased by calling 541-552-6101 or at the Music Box Office prior to the performance. For more information, please visit Southern Oregon University’s Music website at http://www.sou.edu/music
-SOU-
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