May 08, 2013
CUATRO CORRIDOS EARNS RAVE REVIEWS FROM LOS ANGELES TIMES AND UT SAN DIEGO

Cuatro Corridos, the new chamber opera created by Susan Narucki, Jorge Volpi and Pablo Gómez earned rave reviews on opening night from music critics Mark Swed at the Los Angeles Times and Jim Chute at UT San Diego. Swed praised Narucki's "commandingly theatrical" performance, while Chute wrote that "Narucki is able to communicate volumes with the most subtle gestures. And her voice is distinguished by its clarity, warmth, nuance, and presence." Cuatro Corridos was also featured on KPBS-FM this week, when Narucki and Mexican composer Hilda Paredes appeared on the "Midday Edition" program. You can listen to the segment on KPBS's webpage. Cuatro Corridos addresses the critical human rights issue of human trafficking. The opera, which runs May 8, 10, and 11 at 7 pm at UC San Diego's Conrad Prebys Music Center, features music by Paredes, Arlene Sierra, Hebert Vázquez Sandrin and UCSD's Lei Liang. Musicians are Aleck Karis (piano), Steven Schick (percussion), and Gomez (guitar). Tickets are still available for the May 10 and May 11 performances. Call the Box Office (858-534-3448) or purchase tickets online.

  

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April 25, 2013
NEW OPERA CUATRO CORRIDOS ADDRESSES HUMAN TRAFFICKING

Cuatro Corridos is a chamber opera addressing one of the most critical human rights issues of our time: human trafficking. Based on true events, it tells the story of women trapped in a cycle of prostitution and slavery in and around the San Diego/Tijuana border region and represents an unprecedented collaboration between internationally acclaimed Mexican and US-based creative artists. World premiere performances will take place on May 8, 10 and 11, 2013 at 7 p.m. in the Experimental Theater of the Conrad Prebys Music Center at the University of California, San Diego. Led by Grammy Award-winning soprano Susan Narucki and noted Mexican author Jorge Volpi, the fully-staged production features original music by composers Hilda Paredes, Arlene Sierra, Lei Liang and Hebert Vázquez. Each composer gives voice to one of the four female characters by presenting one act in the hour-long drama. Librettist Jorge Volpi explains the basis for the opera: "Young women are sold and exploited by mafias to serve as prostitutes for illegal migrant workers in southern California. In 2001 the authorities dismantled the network of the Salazar Juárez brothers who for years kidnapped Mexican women and forced them to work as prostitutes in the "Fields of Love" near the strawberry farms around San Diego." Three distinguished performers of new music, percussionist Steven Schick, pianist Aleck Karis, and guitarist Pablo Gomez, accompany Narucki in sharing the compelling stories of four women whose lives are scarred by human trafficking. The production team includes artist-activist Karen Guancione, lighting designer Kristin Hayes, costume designer Halei Parker and graphics animators Cameron Bailey and Sam Doshier. The artists collaborating on this project seek to heighten public awareness about human trafficking by engaging in social activism and disseminating information through multiple media platforms such as public forums and activities organized in partnership with human rights organizations. Susan Narucki believes, "there is a critical need for us to recreate our artistic practice within a wider social context. Music has the power to establish contact between people - real, intimate contact that can cause us to question, to see things differently, to move us to action and to negate fear." Two free public events are scheduled on May 9th, 2013 at Conrad Prebys Experimental Theater. An 11 a.m. panel discussion featuring Jorge Volpi and all four composers from Cuatro Corridos focusing on the development of the work and its place in their larger artistic concerns. A second forum at 2 p.m. features Mr. Volpi and experts on human trafficking in the San Diego/Tijuana border region including Elizabeth Aguilera, reporter from UT San Diego, Daliah Setareh, Senior Attorney at Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, and Dr. Jay Silverman, Professor of Medicine and Global Public Health at UCSD. Ticket are $15.50 general, $10.50 UCSD faculty-staff-alumni, FREE for all students. Tickets may be purchased online or through the music department Box Office: (858) 534-3448. Cuatro Corridos has received generous support from UC MEXUS, the MAP Fund for the Performing Arts (Doris Duke Charitable Foundation), Yellow Barn Music Festival, and the Department of Music at the University of California, San Diego.

  

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March 19, 2013
VIRTUAL TOUR: A REDUCED CARBON FOOTPRINT CONCERT SERIES

A quartet of internationally renowned composer-improvisers and UC faculty - Mark Dresser, Nicole Mitchell, Myra Melford and Michael Dessen - will perform Virtual Tour: A Reduced Carbon Footprint Concert Series, an unprecedented new music project conceived for world-class improvisers performing together in different geographical locations via Internet2. San Diego Reader music scribe Robert Bush previews the concert series in this week's issue. Taking advantage of high bandwidth networks available only at research and educational institutions, these concerts will feature virtuoso performers performing together across thousands of miles with lifelike, uncompressed audio and minimal time delays and HD video, setting a new standard for music making on the telematic stage. This new collaborative medium has been dubbed "telematics". The cyber format allows first-rate players to perform together without air and auto travel, resulting in a "green" mode of live performance (click here for detailed information about the Virtual Tour project).   The Virtual Tour concerts take place April 5 (7 pm), April 6 (noon), and April 7 (4 pm). Tickets are available online, through the Department of Music Box Office (858) 534-3448), and at the door.   With the core group performing each night at UC San Diego's Conrad Prebys Music Center's Experimental Theatre, the collaborative partners include a diverse lineup of outstanding improvisers and composers: Jason Robinson, Marty Ehrlich and Bob Weiner at Amherst College on April 5; Matthias Ziegler and Gerry Hemingway at the Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology (ICST) in Zurich on April 6; and Sarah Weaver, Jane Ira Bloom, Ray Anderson, Min Xiao Fen and Matt Wilson at the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics, Consortium for Digital Arts, Culture, and Technology (cDACT) at Stony Brook University in New York on April 7.   The three-night Virtual Tour series will feature premieres of new works created specifically for the telematic stage, with compositions by Mark Dresser, Michael Dessen, Nicole Mitchell, Jason Robinson, Marty Ehrlich, Gerry Hemingway, Matthias Ziegler and Sarah Weaver.   This Virtual Tour builds upon years of collaborative exploration into the artistic potential of telematics for improvisers performing simultaneously in different cities and even continents. Co-directors and UC Professors Mark Dresser and Michael Dessen, along with Sarah Weaver and Jason Robinson, have been leading innovators in the field of networked jazz and improvised music. This virtual format enables the musicians to mine the environmental benefits of networking technologies. By rehearsing via the internet over a period of many months, the musicians will develop a body of music that would normally require multiple flights, saving thousands of dollars, scores of travel hours, and much fossil fuel.   Collaboration has always been central to jazz traditions, and telematics offers possibilities for extending collective models of music making in exciting, new ways. Just as recording technology transformed jazz in the early 20th century by allowing improvisations to be captured and shared outside of local regions, 21st century networking technologies now provide options for collaboration that have never before existed in the history of music. Featuring an array of renowned musicians and building upon years of experience in networked performance, Virtual Tour promises to be a powerful and unique concert series that sets a new precedent for music making.   Artist Roster April 5-7, San Diego, CA / Core Group - Mark Dresser, bass, composition; Michael Dessen, trombone, composition; Myra Melford, piano; Nicole Mitchell, flute, composition; Trevor Henthorn, technical director April 5, 7 pm PST, Amherst, MA / Amherst College - Marty Ehrlich, woodwinds, composition; Jason Robinson, woodwinds, composition; Bob Weiner, drums; Mark Santolucito, technical director; Ross Karre and company, video. April 6, noon, PST, Zurich, Switzerland / Institute of Computer Music and Technology, ICST - Gerry Hemingway, percussion, composition; Matthias Ziegler, flutes, composition, network director; Johannes Schütt, video direction; Joel Di Giovanni, Benjamin Burger. April 7, 4 pm, PST, Stony Brook, NY / Stony Brook University, Simons Center for Geometry and Physics, Consortium for Digital Arts, Culture, and Technology (cDACT): Sarah Weaver, composer/conductor; Jane Ira Bloom, soprano sax; Ray Anderson, trombone; Min Xiao-Fen, pipa, voice; Matt Wilson, drums; Doug Van Nort, laptop; Kevin Schinstock, live audio, audio recording; Derek Kwan, network audio; Timothy Vallier, network video; Ross Karre, live video, network video; Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew, lighting; Dan Weymouth, director, cDACT; Elyce Winters, chief administrative officer, Simonrs Center; Tim Young, Jason May, systems administrators, Simons Center. Co-directors of Virtual Tour: Mark Dresser and Michael Dessen. Amherst site director: Jason Robinson. Stonybrook site director: Sarah Weaver. Zurich site director: Matthias Ziegler

  

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March 10, 2013
DON'T MISS! ROGER REYNOLDS' PROVOCATIVE PASSAGE 9

PASSAGE 9: On Collaborative Alliances, John Cage, John Ashbery, Barnett Newman and the Sublime, Toru Takemitsu, the Source of Aesthetic Impact, Intermedia and Obligation created by UC San Diego composer Roger Reynolds, will be presented March Thirteenth at 7 pm in UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Reynolds describes PASSAGE 9 as "a performed event: a non-linear aggregation of original stories, visual images, video clips, live performances, and sound spatialization." Reynolds, as reader, will be joined by computer musician Paul Hembree, percussionist Steven Schick, and flutist Rachel Beetz.   Tickets are available online, through UCSD Department of Music Box Office (858) 534-3448, and at the door beginning at 5:30 the night of the concert. FREE admission for all students.   "Several years ago, I began a series of presentations offering what I hope is an intriguing way of sharing observations, images, sounds, and their unpredictable resonances," Reynolds says. "PASSAGE 9 is not a lecture 'about something.' There isn't a particular message for everyone. I'm rather hoping that each individual will make his or her own connections between the elements. My intent is associative and inferential, not illustrative or explanatory. My texts, some read live and some pre-recorded, are spatialized in real time by a computer algorithm that allows a choreography of ideas, where lines of thought intersect and challenge one another in unexpected ways." Reynolds says that the Oxford English Dictionary's definition of "passage" informed his thinking as he worked on his piece.   The action of going or moving onward, across, or past; movement from one place or point to another ... Migratory flight of a bird ... Transition from one state or condition to another ... a road, a path, a route, a channel ... A thing that passes or takes place; an occurrence; an event; a proceeding ... an exchange of words, actions, etc...   Reynolds won the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 1989 for his composition "Whispers Out of Time" for string orchestra, incorporating fragments from Beethoven and Mahler. His work with sound spatialization began in 1961-62 with his musical theatre piece "The Emperor of Ice Cream" on a text by Wallace Stevens. He later collaborated with poet John Ashbery on the song cycle "last things, I think, to think about."   In 1998, Mode Records released Reynolds' "Watershed," the first DVD in Dolby Digital 5.1 to feature music composed for the five-channel medium. His "Sanctuary" for percussion and computer processing premiered at the National Gallery in Washington in 2007. His composition "Positings" was premiered by Southwest Chamber Music on March 2 at Zipper Concert Hall in Los Angeles to close its Twenty-Firth Anniversary International Festival. Reynolds is presently at work on "george WASHINGTON" for orchestra, three narrators, projected imagery, and 8-channel computer sound. This piece will be premiered October 3, 4, and 5 at the Kennedy Center by the National Symphony Orchestra under conductor Christoph Eschenbach.   Roger Reynolds' life's work is extensively explored online in the Library of Congress' Roger Reynolds Collection.

March 01, 2013
ANTHONY DAVIS' LEAR ON THE 2ND FLOOR PREMIERES MARCH 6, 8, 9

Lear on the 2nd Floor, a new chamber opera by Anthony Davis with libretto by Allan Havis, premieres March 6, 8, 9 at 7 pm in the Experimental Theatre at Conrad Prebys Music Center at UC San Diego. Ace photographer Jim Carmody, chair of the Department of Theatre & Dance, attended rehearsal on March 4. His beautiful images capture this painstakingly crafted multimedia production. The opera is inspired by Shakespeare's King Lear and tells the story of Nora Lear, a prominent neuroscientist plagued by early-onset Alzheimer's. As she loses her bearings and autonomy she is increasingly at the mercy of her three quarreling daughters. Shakespeare's Fool in the opera is Nora's late husband Mortimer who accompanies her as she moves through a world where the past and present blend and reality bends. Davis's music for the opera presents a unique synthesis of influences from Stravinsky, Weill, Mingus, Strayhorn, to Bob Marley. The production combines live performance with video, computer processed sound, lighting, and scenic design to express the increasing disorientation experienced by Nora. Davis, a music faculty member, is an internationally acclaimed composer whose previous operas include X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X, Wakonda's Dream, Amistad, and Tania. Havis, provost of UC San Diego Marshall College, noted playwright, and theatre faculty member, collaborated with Davis on the 2009 chamber opera Lilith. With musical direction by Steven Schick, and stage direction by Mark DeChiazza, the cast features soprano Susan Narucki as Nora Lear, bass-baritone Philip Larson as Mortimer, Jorell Williams as the Nurse and the Lawyer, Ruff Yeager as the Doctor,  UCSD graduate students Bonnie Lander, Alice Teyssier, Tiffany Du Mouchelle and Sara Perez and the musicians of palimpsest.  Lear on the 2nd Floor is presented by kallisti, the contemporary vocal ensemble of the UC Department of Music. Previous opera productions include the critically acclaimed 2012 production of Der Kaiser von Atlantis. Lear on the 2nd Floor is presented in the intimate Experimental Theatre at Conrad Prebys Music Center. UT San Diego ran this preview by music critic George Varga.  Special $10.50 discount tickets for UCSD faculty-staff-alumni-retirement association. Student tickets are FREE one hour before concert with student ID. General admission is $15.50. Tickets are available online, and at the door (first-come, first-served). Box office opens each night at 5:30 pm. For more information: (858) 534-4830.

  

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February 11, 2013
RED FISH BLUE FISH'S GRISEY ORBIT

red fish blue fish, UC San Diego Department of Music's renowned percussion ensemble, mesmerized the Mandeville Auditorium crowd on February 7 with a rare performance of Grisey's Le Noir de l'Etoile. Six percussionists surrounded the audience at six stations, each equipped with NASA-worthy arrays of equipment. Inspired by the discovery in the 1960s of a pulsar--a long-ago-expired star that emits radio waves detected on earth--Grisey composed the piece for his son. Ethereal pre-recorded sounds accompanied the live performance to create a cosmic experience. Following the concert's explosive finale, the audience departed in an altered state, looking as if they had been to outer space and back. red fish blue fish is Leah Bowden, Eric Derr, Dustin Donahue, Jonathan Hepfer, Ryan Nestor, and Stephen Solook. (Photo: Kevin Tran)

January 08, 2013
ICE AND RAND STEIGER, NEW MUSIC AT CALIT2

UC San Diego composer Rand Steiger's new music for ICE (the International Contemporary Ensemble) will be presented as a work-in-progress at the Calit2 Auditorium on January 11 at 5 PM. In recent years, Steiger, currently composer-in-residence at Calit2, has explored digital processing for music (UCSD has been on the leading edge of such technologies since the 1970s). Friday's event will showcase his latest research and applications for ICE's music utilizing 12-channel surround sound. Featured compositions are Concatenation (for bassoon), Cyclone (clarinet), Joust (flute and bassoon), and Light on Water (flute and piano). ICE includes MacArthur Fellow (and former La Jollan) Claire Chase as well as percussionist, video artist and UCSD music/visual arts alumnus Ross Karre. Steiger's new music will be performed by ICE next season in New York.

  

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December 17, 2012
SOPRANO SUSAN NARUCKI EARNS PRAISE FOR DEBUT AT OPERA NATIONAL DE MONTPELLIER

Soprano Susan Narucki recently made her debut at the Opèra de Montpellier in two one-act operas: Elliott Carter's 'What Next?' and Mathis Nitschke's "Jetzt". Susan reprised the role of 'Mama' in this, the first staged production of the work given in France. Written in 1999 with libretto by Paul Griffiths, 'What Next?" was Carter's only opera and already is considered a modern classic. Nitschke's"Jetzt", presented in its world premiere, is a humorous and poignant exploration of human speech. The production was led by conductor Carl Bettendorf and directed by Urs Schönebaum. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung praised the production, singling out the cast for their passionate acting and supremely confident singing.

  

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November 26, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

COMPOSER KATHARINA ROSENBERGER'S CD TEXTUREN won the German Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik. A German reviewer calls it a 'psychedelic trip'. MUSICIANS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC made a major contribution to the Division of Arts and Humanities' "Best Booth" award at the November 16 Founders' Day festivities. The players were Boaz Roberts (guitar), Alex Arango (accordion), Alexandria Pulido (voice), Lawrence Lee (piano), David Castaneda (timbales), Chase Pado (jazz piano), and Chris Duvall (jazz bass). Division performances also included Patricia Rincon's dancers (Abby Wang, Tanya Lewis, Melissa Gallegos) improvising in the crowd, a scene from Elizabeth I, directed by Kate Jopson, and experimental videos curated by Ricardo Dominguez. Posters on the booth depicted six founding arts faculty including Will Ogdon. Swag for visitors included a DVD of Susan Narucki's production of Der Kaiser von Atlantis as well as souvenir pens, handbags, carabiner keychains, and t-shirts. Special thanks to the music department's Jessica Flores for recruiting the performers and managing the stage and production. THE MUSIC FACULTY'S SHLOMO DUBNOV HAS BEEN NAMED AN ARTS AND MUSIC EDITOR for ACM Computers in Entertainment. COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER CHINARY UNG answers five thought-provoking questions in his recent interview with a leading music blog. CONTRABASSIST MARK DRESSER'S TRIO M gave an "exhilarating" performance earlier this month at The Sound Lounge in Australia. One Aussie critic says the appearance ranks among the year's best concerts. COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC ALUM MARY KOUYOUMJIAN HAS WON the Jerome Foundation Award for her work Dzov Yerku Kooynov (Sea of Two Colors), a "portrait piece" about Armenian composer Komitas Vardapet. In her work, Mary often draws inspiration from the stories of her ancestors who survived the 1915 Armenian genocide. Mary co-founded the new music ensemble Hotel Elefant with fellow UCSD music alumnus Leaha Maria Villareal. TRUMPETER JEFF KAISER AND PIANIST PHIL SKALLER earned props from San Diego Reader blogger Robert Bush, who says that their new CD Endless Pie "is a disc so severe that it makes Raphe Malik and Cecil Taylor sound like Ruby Braff and Dick Hyman." CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS AAKAASH ISRANI is on the radar of major music critics including the New Yorker's Sasha Frere-Jones. UCSD CARILLONNEUR AND MUSIC ALUM SCOTT PAULSON will ring in the New Year every day at noon during the first week of Winter Quarter 2013, chiming music by UCSD undergrads. Paulson is also curating an exhibit celebrating the kazoo during January in the Arts Library at Geisel Library, in honor of National Kazoo Day. Later in 2013, the Arts Library presents a late-night silent film festival with live music on Sundays in the library's Seuss Room. For more information about these events contact Scott: spaulson@ucsd.edu PIANIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS DANNY GREEN'S NEW CD is titled A Thousand Ways Home. He's getting great reviews for the Brazilian-flavored recording, ranging from "sensational" to "melodically engaging" and "richly engaging and utterly brilliant". Catch the video on youtube, check out the CD and reviews on Danny's website.

November 19, 2012
NOVEMBER 20: TIMOTHY TAYLOR ON MUSIC AND NEOLIBERAL CAPITALISM

Author and UC Los Angeles Prof. Timothy D. Taylor visits the department of music on November 20 to talk about his research examining the impact of today's capitalism on music. Taylor's talk takes place from 4 pm to 6 pm in Room 231 at Conrad Prebys Music Center. While capitalism has been dominant for centuries in the west, apart from the work of Theodor Adorno and a smattering of others, it has seldom been studied in any thoroughgoing way with respect to music. Taylor's presentation examines the latest phase of capitalism and its ramifications for the production and consumption of music. Neoliberal ideologies and policies have dramatically altered the landscape of the production, distribution, and consumption of music in the last few decades. Record labels, advertising agencies, music production companies were bought and sold at unprecedented rates in the 1980s and 1990s. The economic bottom line became all-important. In a never-ending quest to wring profits from music, marketing and branding have become central. While some musicians for centuries have been masters of self-promotion, in the new capitalism, the importance of marketing has grown to the extent that some musicians not only attempt to link themselves with major brands in advertising, but attach themselves to major brands in attempts to brand (or co-brand) themselves. The ideology of the genius has largely given way to an ideology of the star, or star-as-brand: the advertising trade press routinely and unironically refers to major musical celebrities and bands as brands. The genius is no longer someone who has risen to the top of a pool of talent, but a star who has risen to the top of a market.

  

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November 05, 2012
NOVEMBER 6 CREATIVITY IN MUSIC: A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

Cognitive scientist and musician Linda Kaastra gives a special lecture on Nov. 6 at 4 pm at Conrad Prebys Music Center (Room 231) titled A Conceptual Framework for the Study of Creativity in Music Performance. Kaastra is a visiting scholar at UC San Diego. Her presentation to Nancy's Guy's Integrative Studies class is open to the public. In the Western Art Music tradition, composing and performing music are often viewed as separate activities. Creativity is considered the domain of the composer and reproduction the domain of the performer. While these distinctions hold in some situations, they do not account for the role performance plays in generating a new musical work, nor do they account for the creative aspects of performing music. Through examples drawn from performance data and personal experience, Kaastra shows how an understanding of the structure of tacit knowledge can help us analyze what is creative in musical activity. Creativity is viewed as a process of connecting aspects of the performance in ways that makes the music "come alive" or "say something meaningful". In order to understand creativity in music making, we need concepts that allow us to label musical activity, unpack the target of focal awareness, and identify which aspects in subsidiary awareness combine to create meaning in performance. This research forms a bridge between science and performance, generating knowledge and theory on the performance of music while adding to scientific theory on the fundamental mechanisms of human interaction. Kaastra is a bassoonist, academic writing teacher, and cognitive scientist. She specializes in observational research on the performance of contemporary Western Art Music. She earned a BMUS in bassoon performance from the University of British Columbia (1990), an MMUS in bassoon performance from Yale University School of Music (19Γ), and a PhD in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of British Columbia (Thesis title: "Systematic Approaches to the Study of Cognition in Western Art Music Performance" (2008)). Through her research, she is committed to defining, articulating, and exploring the practical knowledge and research perspectives of instrumentalists. Her interests include how performers manage joint attention in rehearsal and performance; how the specific demands of musical works constrain the cognitive processes of ensemble performance; the interplay of anticipated vs. emergent actions in music performance; creativity and collaboration in music; the fundamental mechanisms of human interaction.

October 08, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UC SAN DIEGO COMPOSER CHINARY UNG was an honored guest at the Imagining Cambodia concert on Sept. 15 at Northern Illinois University's International Cambodian Studies conference. Ensemble Dal Niente celebrated Chinary's music with a Portrait concert on Sept. 16 in Chicago. Chinary was the Featured Guest Composer at the 58th Annual Symposium of Contemporary Music at Illinois-Wesleyan University on Sept. 18-19, where he was honored with another Portrait concert, this one including violist (and Chinary's wife) Susan Ung along with soprano and UCSD music alumnus Stacey Fraser. UCSD music alumnus Adam Greene delivered a guest lecture about Chinary's music. A few days later, the New Juilliard Ensemble gave the New York premiere of Chinary's Rain of Tears. Chinary will also be the guest composer/speaker at the Chengdu Contemporary Music Festival, Sichuan Conservatory, Oct.—-18, where his music will be performed by Hong Kong New Music Ensemble and Del Sol String Quartet, and by Susan Ung. CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER and his quintet, joined by famed avant garde trumpeter Bobby Bradford, performed Oct. 7 at the Angel City Jazz Festival at the Ford Amphitheatre in Los Angeles. Pianist Denman Maroney's hyperpiano "was a fine match for Dresser's out bowing," according to L.A. Weekly, and the interplay between Dresser and Bradford "implies a language all their own." FILM COMPOSER AND UC SAN DIEGO MUSIC ALUMNUS Larry Groupe talks about his film music Tuesday Oct. 9 at 7 pm at Groovy Like a Movie Studio, 5205 Kearny Villa Road, San Diego. COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER LEI LIANG'S SOLO PIANO PIECE MY WINDOWS was performed at Yale School of Music on Oct. 7 by Anna Kijanowska. The Tribute to Karol Szymanowski also included works by Szymanowski, Chopin, and Grazyna Bacewicz. THE MUSIC FACULTY'S SHLOMO DUBNOV collaborated with visiting scholar Liliya Tsirulsnik on a Calit2 project creating synthesized singing voices. UCSD singers Susan Narucki and Philip Larson's voices are among those in the database compiled for the project. UC SAN DIEGO MUSIC SOFTWARE INNOVATOR MILLER PUCKETTE adds his expertise to the as an invited lecturer at the International Symposium on 'Visual Music' October 12-13 at the School of Art Design & Media, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Another invited participant is UCSD music alumnus Jarek Kapuscinski (www.jaroslawkapuscinski.com). Miller and UC San Diego composer Philippe Manoury will be featured Oct. 18 at 8 pm at the Fresh Sound music series at Space 4 Art,′5 15th St., downtown San Diego. UC SAN DIEGO'S STEVEN SCHICK is artistic director of the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, which opens a new season Oct. 25 with a program including UC San Diego composer Lei Liang's Aural Hypothesis. The season also includes works by former UC San Diego faculty Chaya Czernowin and George Lewis, as well as alumni Mark Applebaum and Paul Dresher. NEW MUSIC CONCERT CURATOR, RECORDING LABEL FOUNDER, AND MUSIC ALUMNUS BONNIE WRIGHT WILL BE HONORED AS AN 'ARTS ANGEL' this Saturday evening by La Jolla Symphony & Chorus at its fifth annual Gala, for her long and strong support of new and experimental music. Bonnie founded Spruce Street Forum in the nineties as a venue for new, improvised and experimental music, and she continues to present live performances today with her Fresh Sound music series downtown. Bonnie is also the founder and head of Henceforth Records, which has released about a dozen new music recordings.

September 07, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

AUTHOR, MUSICOLOGIST, AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER JANN PASLER CURATED this summer's Saint-Saëns Festival at the Bard Music Festival, New York, where she was scholar-in-residence. The event earned significant media attention including multiple reviews in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Le Monde (Paris). Also, Jann's new book Camille Saint-Saëns and His World has been published by Princeton University Press.  It's a collection of scholarly essays about the composer, his music, and the historical/cultural impact of his work which she edited and to which she contributed an introduction, eight of the essays, and the translations. MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER TOM ERBE'S SEPT. 5 JOHN CAGE PERFORMANCE, the opening concert of this fall's Fresh Sound Music Series in downtown San Diego, earns a great review in the San Diego Reader. MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER DAVID BORGO'S BOOK SYNC OR SWARM sparks an interview with former Violent Femmes bassist Brian Ritchie. COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER LEI LIANG was Guest Composer in August at Tokyo's Gakuen School of Music. UC SAN DIEGO HARPSICHORDIST TAKAE OHNISHI'S NEW RECORDING of Bach's Goldberg Variations earns high praise on classicstoday.com, which cites her "vitality and differentiated articulations." (The sound quality of the CD receives a 9 out of 10 ranking, and Takae sends thanks to Department of Music sound engineer Joe Kucera for the excellent audio). SOPRANO AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER SUSAN NARUCKI performed works by Schubert and Lukas Foss earlier this summer to a full house at the prestigious Salt Bay Chamberfest in Maine. The festival was founded by cellist Wilhelmina Smith and presents music from the Renaissance to the present day. The concert hall is a converted barn on the banks of the Great Salt Bay in Damariscotta. CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER was in Iceland earlier this summer to perform at the Reykjavik Jazz Festival. This week he shared a stage with pianist Diane Moser at New York City's Cornelia Street Cafe. The appearance celebrated their recent release Duetto.   COMPOSER AND FORMER MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER CHAYA CZERNOWIN'S Gradual Edge premiered in Denmark. Also, during Czernowin's residency at the Warsaw Autumn Festival, her composition Ina for solo bass flute and six recorded flutes will be performed by Roberto Fabbriciani. COMPOSER AND FORMER MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER BERNARD RANDS marks his 80th birthday in 2014 with several performances of his Ceremonial for wind ensemble. IN JULY, COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS WOJTEK BLECHARZ was awarded a composition fellowship at the 46th Darmstadt International Summer Courses for New Music in Germany. Blecharz won for his piece K'an, "for steel drum and about 120 skewers and 10 bamboo chopsticks," he says. It was performed by percussionist and UCSD music alum Brian Archinal, who won a Darmstadt Fellowship for performance this year.

September 05, 2012
UC SAN DIEGO COMPOSER ROGER REYNOLDS PLAYS CENTRAL PART IN JOHN CAGE CENTENNIAL FESTIVAL

In Washington D.C. this week, composer John Cage (1912-1992) is being honored at the John Cage Centennial Festival. UC San Diego composer Roger Reynolds is a co-director of the festival, along with editor, curator and musician Karen Reynolds (yes, Roger's wife). UCSD musicians performing at the festival include percussionists Steven Schick, Ross Karre, Bonnie Whiting Smith, and Dustin Donahue, all members of red fish blue fish, the UC San Diego percussion ensemble which is working on a CD of Cage's percussion music. Billed as the largest Cage centennial celebration in the world, the festival provides a broad perspective on Cage's creative output. His visual art is included along with work by his contemporary Jasper Johns. There's also a reading of Cage's radio play James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, Erik Satie: An Alphabet. Cage visited UC San Diego several times over the years for performances of his music, to work with music faculty such as Reynolds, and to mentor students. His influence is felt in the ongoing prominence of his compositions in the Department of Music's repertoire. UT San Diego music critic James Chute is reporting from the festival.

  

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July 24, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

PHILIPPE MANOURY AND MILLER PUCKETTE WILL BE FEATURED in the Fall season of music alumnus Bonnie Wright's Fresh Sound music series at Space4Art (325 15th Avenue) in downtown San Diego. The Oct. 18, 8 pm performance of Philippe's En Echo features Puckette on live electronics plus soprano and music alumnus Julianna Snapper. The Fall season opens September 5 with electronic musicians Dieter Moebius, Jay Lesser, Wobbly, and Peter Conheim and includes concerts on October 2 (bassist Ken Filiano and guitarist Anders Nilsson), November 30 (trombonist and UCSD music alumnus Michael Dessen's Trio), and an as-yet-to-be announced date in December (violinist and electronic musician Todd Reynolds). MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER LEI LIANG AND ALUMNUS JOSH LEVINE were Guest Composers earlier this month at soundSCAPE festival in Maccagno, Italy. Lei's composition Lakescape was given its world premiere by soprano Tony Arnold, pianist Thomas Rosenkranz, and percussionist and UCSD music alum Aiyun Huang. Later this summer, Lei will serve as Guest Composer at Japan's premier music school Toho Gakuen, in Tokyo, where he will give a Composer Portrait Concert, lecture, and master classes. Additionally, Lei will be Composer-in-Residence at The Art of Migration Festival at the University of California, Davis, from January 29 to February 3, 2013. TRUMPETER AND MUSIC GRAD STUDENT JEFF KAISER has a new recording out on his own pfmentum label. And he earned an upbeat review from music scribe Robert Bush. VIOLINIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS MARY OLIVER performed with renowned percussionist Han Bennink on public radio's popular Fresh Air program. The April segment coincided with Bennink's 70th birthday. PIANIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS DANNY GREEN performs August 5 at 2 pm at the Encinitas Library, and August 16 at 7 pm at the Oceanside Museum of Art. MUSIC GRAD STUDENTS Cooper Baker, Issac Garcia-Munoz, Berglind Maria Tómasdóttir, Joseph Mariglio, Jason Ponce, Greg Surges, and Scott Worthington are among 23 artists who will perform at the August 25, 6 pm Art of Sound in San Diego at Space4Art in downtown San Diego.

June 29, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

MUSIC PhD CANDIDATE AARON HELGESON CHECKS IN FROM IRCAM IN PARIS, where he is involved with the Manifeste 2012 festival. UCSD's Philippe Manoury is a featured composer on several concerts. Aaron's new work Nor eyes, nor thou, based on a Walt Whitman poem, is being premiered by the French new music ensemble Les Cris De Paris. Composer and PhD student Paul Hembree's Light, Frozen and Refracted is being premiered by Ensemble Intercontemporain. UCSD JAZZ CAMP WRAPS ITS WEEKLONG 10th ANNIVERSARY SESSION TONIGHT (JUNE 29) WITH A FREE 6:30 PM CONCERT in the music department's Conrad Prebys Music Center Recital Hall. Several student groups will perform, along with jazz camp mentors probably including David Borgo and Gerry Hemingway. IN HAMBURG, UCSD COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER KATHARINA ROSENBERGER is at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater giving master classes, working on her latest compositions, and participating in the Natur & Trash concert. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG GAVE A LECTURE ON JUNE 27 at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden, Germany. MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER SHLOMO DUBNOV'S KAMZA AND BAR KAMZA will be broadcast five times on Jewish Life TV: July 23 (3 pm), July 24 (6 pm), July 25 (9 pm ET and PT), and July 27 (4 pm). JLTV is carried by Cox Cable, DirecTV, and other providers. FACULTY COMPOSER CHINARY UNG WILL BE HONORED IN SEPTEMBER at a banquet at the Imagining Cambodia conference at Northern Illinois University. Composer and UCSD music alumnus Adam Greene will pay tribute to Chinary with a biographical presentation, followed by a concert of Chinary's music.   SOPRANO AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER SUSAN NARUCKI will be in residence at the Yellow Barn Chamber Music Festival in Putney, Vermont from July 1 to July 15. One of the country's most exciting festivals, Yellow Barn offers an eclectic mix of old and new repertoire, and the opportunity for graduate students and young professionals to work alongside faculty artists in preparing works for performance.  During her residency, Susan will perform works by J.S. Bach, Shostakovich's Romanzen Suite, Jonathan Harvey's Song Offerings and Alexander Raskotov's Let there be Night. During August, Susan will travel to Salt Bay Chamberfest, in Damariscotta, Maine. Founded by cellist Wilhelmina Smith, the festival features performances by the Brentano String Quartet, principal members of the New York Philharmonic and distinguished guests. At the festival's opening concert (August—), Susan will perform songs by Franz Schubert and Lukas Foss' classic Time Cycle in its chamber version for voice, percussion, clarinet, and keyboard. UCSD MUSICIANS EARNED UPBEAT COVERAGE from San Diego Reader music critic Robert Bush recently. JAZZ PIANIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS Danny Green will perform July 1 at the "Loving Local Music, Loving Local Food" fundraiser for Jazz 88.3 FM at Hotel Solamar (435 Sixth Ave., San Diego). There are only a few seats left. Danny also appears July 7 at 8 pm with the Allison Adams Tucker Quartet, at Eddie V's in La Jolla.

  

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June 15, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC GRAD STUDENT YEUNG-PING CHEN'S Light and Tear for solo violin, composed for June in Buffalo, premiered last week. Violin virtuoso Yuki Numata played the piece at Baird Recital Hall. New York Times music critic Allan Kozinn called Light and Tear "spare but appealing." UCSD music alumnus David Felder is artistic director of June in Buffalo. BEST OF ICAM: PRESENTATIONS AND DEMOS takes place tonight (June 15) from 5 pm to 8 pm at Calit2 Digital Cinema Auditorium. ICAM graduate Tiffany J. Hopkins will give the keynote. UCSD SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI PERFORMS WITH PIPA VIRTUOSO WU MAN on June 16 at 7 pm at the Museum of Making Music in Carlsbad. Their collaboration dates back to Philip Glass' Orion Project. THE SOUNDON FESTIVAL OF NEW MUSIC CONTINUES JUNE 15 AND JUNE 16 at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla and features several UCSD music alumni and grad students. CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER performed at the VisionQuest experimental jazz event in NYC. STEVEN SCHICK DIRECTED PERFORMANCES OF JOHN LUTHER ADAMS' MUSIC AT THE OJAI FESTIVAL, and in the San Francisco Bay Area. DAVID BORGO PRESENTED A PAPER at the Skin Surface Circuit conference at McGill University in Montreal.

  

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June 08, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

COMPOSER/PERCUSSIONIST/INSTRUMENT BUILDER PAUL DRESHER'S ENSEMBLE has launched a Kickstarter campaign for a new collaboration with composer Amy X Neuburg (Dresher earned his MA in music at UCSD in 1979). The project, They Will Have Been So Beautiful, "will be an evening-length concert of ten newly commissioned songs performed by the Electro-Acoustic Band and vocalist/composer/lyricist Amy X Neuburg and will premiere in the 2013-14 and will mark the Electro-Acoustic Band's 20 anniversary. UCSD COMPOSER PHILIPPE MANOURY'S CONCERTO POUR PIANO is available as a podcast on France Musique through July 4. The program also includes works by Ligeti and Mahler. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG'S MUSIC WAS FEATURED AT HIS PORTRAIT CONCERT in Rome last week. The program included works by Lei's fellow Rome Prize winner Sean Friar. The music was performed by the Italian new music ensemble Alter Ego. MUSIC ALUMNUS CHARLIE KRONENGOLD has accepted a tenure track faculty position at Stanford University as Assistant Professor of Musicology. His partner (and fellow UCSD music alum) Carol Vernallis has accepted a two-year position at Stanford and will leave her post at Arizona State University.

June 07, 2012
COMPOSER ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR WINS PRESTIGIOUS NORDIC COUNCIL MUSIC PRIZE 2012

Composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir has won the Nordic Council's Music Prize 2012 for her work Dreaming, included on her new CD Rhizoma. The prize carries an award of DKK 350,000 (U.S. $59,353). "It is such an honor to receive this award, and I am obviously very grateful," Thorvaldsdottir said. "In addition to the great honor, it is invaluable to receive such an award at this stage of my career. This allows me to be able to concentrate exclusively on writing music and to travel for major performances in the near future." The prize places Thorvaldsdottir among an elite group. Past winners include Björk, Kaija Saariaho, and Magnus Lindberg. The Nordic Prize is the equivalent of the American Pulitzer Prize and is "awarded for a work of a living composer," according to the council's guidelines. "No 'genre' limitations have been set, but it is an assumption that the work meets high artistic standards, and that the work can be regarded as original within its genre. "Dreaming opens the sphere of the symphony orchestra in an unusual and innovative way. With Dreaming Anna Thorvaldsdottir has written herself into a contemporary Nordic orchestra tradition which derives its timbres both from electronic music and from the sounds of nature inherent in Nordic folk music. The tones are carefully depicted - almost like small pieces of embroidery. But the work is perhaps particularly unique by the way it achieves to build and unfold a large form within a sound world that apparently stands still. "The beginning and end of the work flow freely without time signature, creating a cyclic understanding of time invoking superstition and symbolism of nature that can be found in Nordic mythology. The music behaves like a shifting landscape, bringing an experience of chronological time to halt - like in dreams. In the old Norse sagas dreams allow humans to enter into dialogue with nature. In dreams, other languages and other senses are valid. Dreams connect night and day, light and darkness, and it is in the vision of dreams that people learn about death. The music in Dreaming is sensual and calm, but it can also surprise and be powerful and brutal." Anna is among several Icelandic composers who have earned composition degrees at UCSD and returned home to make major contributions to Iceland's Reykjavik-based music scene. Anna will receive the award in Helsinki in November.

  

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May 31, 2012
VIOLINIST JANOS NEGYESY EXPLORES THE MYSTICAL TERRITORY OF LUIGI NONO

In 1985, Italian composer Luigi Nono was walking in a monastery when he stumbled across the graffiti No hay caminos, hay que caminar - "There is no path, there is only walking." On June 2 at 8 pm, violinists János Négyesy and Päivikki Nykter give a rare performance of Nono's final two compositions (he died in 1990), inspired by those philosophical words on a wall. The performance breaks the "fourth wall" between stage and audience to reflect Nono's notion of wandering without a path. Exploration is central to "Hay que caminar" Soñando and La Lontananza Nostalgica Utopica Futura, which ask the performers to move "as if searching." Incorporating elements of lighting, costume, and scenic design, this provocative fully-staged production of Nono's final works uses the entirety of UCSD's Mandeville Auditorium as a "theater". Violinist Négyesy, a member of UCSD's music faculty, is internationally renowned as a performer of innovative modernist music by Morton Feldman, John Cage, and many others. He and his wife Päivikki Nykter have recorded many CDs and performed countless concerts together. They have an intuitive musical rapport which is bound to result in a distinctive interpretation of Nono's music.

  

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May 30, 2012
VIKTOR ULLMANN'S DER KAISER VON ATLANTIS OPENS TO RAVE REVIEWS

UCSD's fresh production of Viktor Ullmann's Der Kaiser von Atlantis opened to rave reviews on May 30 (it will also be performed June 1 and June 2 at 7 pm). U-T San Diego arts critic James Chute was fascinated with Ullmann's score and Peter Klein's libretto, "hovering between satire and seriousness," and he praised Susan Narucki's subtle and balanced direction. Ullmann penned Der Kaiser in 1943, while interred in the concentration camp Theresienstadt. When the opera's obvious references to the Nazi regime were discovered during rehearsal, the work was banned; it had tragic consequences for the composer and his family. Miraculously, the work survived. The story is a sort of fable. After a protracted and violent war, Death discovers that his job has been taken away from him by Der Kaiser. Death decides to go on strike; all of a sudden the concept of war, victory and defeat becomes irrelevant. The result is moving and heartbreaking. The cast includes sopranos Tiffany Du Mouchelle, Bonnie Lander and Alice Teyssier, guest artists Vince Vincent, Gerald Seminatore and Ryan Reithmeier, and UCSD Professor Philip Larson in the role of Death. The production team also includes Orli Nativ, costume designer (UCSD Department of Theater and Dance), as well as scenic designer Gaeun Kim. The production is an initiative of kallisti, whose mission includes presenting works of modern music theater in an intimate setting, led by Susan Narucki. Box Office: (858) 534-3448. Tickets also available at the door. A full house is expected, so we suggest that you arrive early.

  

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May 18, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD SAXOPHONIST-IMPROVISOR-ETHNOMUSICOLOGIST DAVID BORGO OF THE MUSIC FACULTY gave a presentation titled "Agency in Coaction: A Material-Semiotic Approach to Understanding Electro-Acoustic Improvisation" at the Music: Cognition, Technology, Society Conference held at Cornell University earlier this month. UCSD COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS ARE THE STARS of next month's soundON Festival of Modern Music at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla. COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER CHINARY UNG'S SPIRAL XIV: NIMITTA RECEIVES ITS PREMIERE in four performances at Zeitgeist in St. Paul, Minnesota. Additionally, Chinary's Spiral X receives three performances in New York City by the Del Sol Quartet. COMPOSER AND FACULTY MEMBER LEI LIANG gave a lecture titled "One-Note Polyphony, Shadows and Remembrance" at the Hamburg Hochschule für Musik und Theater, Hamburg, Germany. CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER performed this month at the Cornelia Street Café in New York City.

May 11, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD COMPOSER AND SCHOLAR CAROLYN CHEN HAS BEEN INDUCTED INTO THE BOUCHET GRADUATE SOCIETY. Carolyn's induction took place in March at the Yale Bouchet Conference on Diversity. UCSD pianist and music scholar James G. Williams was inducted into the society last year. COMPOSER AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER LEI LIANG gave a lecture this week titled "One-Note Polyphony, Shadows and Remembrance" at the Hamburg Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Hamburg, Germany. Lei's solo piano piece My Windows is being performed this spring by pianist Anna Kijanowski at the Budapest Conservatory of Music, and at St. Martin-in-the-Fields Church in London. CONTRABASSIST AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER joins a premiere performance of 2011 Guggenheim Fellow Earl Howard's Superstring. Howard is a pioneer in the development of live electronic processing. The Roulette concert is May 12 in Brooklyn.

May 04, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

MUSIC GRAD STUDENT GRACE LESLIE co-curates Mozart & the Mind at the Neurosciences Institute on May 19 at 6:30 pm. Grace is a researcher at the Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience. The expo includes interactive installations and demonstrations exploring the music-brain connection. UCSD'S STEVEN SCHICK WRAPS FIRST SEASON AS ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF SAN FRANCISCO CONTEMPORARY MUSIC PLAYERS: S.F. critic says it was "a lively and rewarding one, full of inventive programming and musical excellence." CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER'S NEW TELEMATIC CONCERT streams live tonight (May 4) at 7 pm, connecting musicians at New York University and in Seoul. The performance is a collision between Korean Shaman Music and Jazz. Meanwhile Dresser's Trio M has earned an upbeat review on public radio's California Report. COMPOSER AND MUSIC ALUMNUS PAUL DRESHER WILL BE AN ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE at the Atlantic Center for the Arts from May— to June 3. PERCUSSIONIST AND MUSIC ALUMNUS JUSTIN DEHART is a member of Los Angeles Percussionist Quartet, which has just released a new DVD. COMPOSER AND MUSIC ALUM NICHOLAS DEYOE'S ALBUM "with throbbing eyes" is featured on New Yorker music critic Alex Ross's "Nightafternight" playlist. MUSIC ALUM BONNIE WRIGHT'S FRESH SOUND SERIES CONTINUES with Focus on New York featuring BRIM: Eva Beglarian and Mary Rowell. The performance is May 10 at 8 pm at Space 4 Art in downtown San Diego. STRADIVARI, GUARNERI fetch grandi dollari.

  

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April 27, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD PIANIST JAMES G. WILLIAMS has won the prestigious Boucher Award for outstanding scholarly achievement and work towards promoting diversity in higher education. James traveled to Yale University to pick up his award.. UCSD CONTRABASSIST MARK DRESSER IS A GLOBAL ROAD WARRIOR, according to San Diego Reader writer Robert Bush. COMPUTER MUSIC INNOVATION AT UCSD will be honored May 1 with a 40th Anniversary Celebration of the Center for Research in Computing and the Arts (CRCA); and the Center for Music Experiment (CME), the Department of Music's pioneering early 1970s laboratory for developing and using new technologies in music. Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Roger Reynolds was a founder of CME and has collaborated with CRCA on a variety of projects. MUSIC ALUM JEFF NEVIN'S MARIACHI GROUPS are busy in the upcoming days surrounding Cinco de Mayo. Jeff directs the mariachi program at Southwestern College in Chula Vista, and has been invited to launch a mariachi program this fall at Arizona State University. On May 8 at 7:30, Southwestern College presents its a mariachi concert Serenata para las Madres, with 100 students in five different groups. And on May 12 at 7:30 pm, Jeff's Mariachi Champana presents its Sinfonia Mexicana's Mother's Day concert at the California Theatre in San Bernardino. Florencia Tinoco is flying up from Guadalajara to sing with the group. UCSD'S [N]MOTION PRESENTS ASAYAKE: THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS, a performance by the university's taiko drumming group, on May 6 from 5 pm to 7 pm at Price Center Ballroom West. The group is celebrating its 10th anniversary. When it began in 2002, members raised money to meet the cost of materials necessary to build their own drums. This is the group's fifth annual spring concert. MUSIC ALUMNUS VICTORIA MARTINO hosts a series of lecture-concerts tracing five centuries of art and music, on five consecutive Tuesdays beginning May 1 with the 16th Century.

  

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April 23, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD COMPOSER CHINARY UNG WILL BE HONORED at the Imagining Cambodia conference September–-16 at Northern Illinois University. A concert of his music for soloists and small chamber groups will be the main event on Saturday evening September 15. RED FISH BLUE FISH PERFORMED FOR THE DALAI LAMA on April 18 at UCSD's RIMAC Arena, honoring the spiritual leader at a major conference on climate change. In front of a crowd of 4,700, UCSD's resident percussion ensemble played Steve Reich's Music for Pieces of Wood and Drumming; Iannis Xenakis's Okho; and Javier Alvarez' Temazcal. And, to serenade his High Holiness as he walked onstage (wearing a UCSD visor), the group performed John Cage and Lou Harrison's Double Music. The Dalai Lama was in good spirits (as usual) and seemed to enjoy the Fish's performance. In other Fish news, they will appear at the Monday Evening Concert Series at Zipper Hall in L.A. on April 23, in a program bearing the same name as Steven Schick's book: The Percussionist's Art. S.F. CONTEMPORARY PLAYERS, DIRECTED BY STEVEN SCHICK, present their final concert of the season, with music by UCSD music alumni Aaron Gervais and Mark Applebaum (now on Stanford's faculty), plus Lou Harrison, Edmund Campion, and others. MARK DRESSER STORMS THE BIG APPLE, where his performances will include a 70th birthday concert for renowned percussionist Han Bennink, a concert at Roulette led by electronics pioneer Earl Howard, and a performance at Cornelia St. Café with his quintet, including saxophone phenom Rudresh Mahanthappa, trombonist Michael Dessen (who has performed with Dresser several times at UCSD), pianist Denman Maroney, and drummer Tom Rainey. Dresser received a great review from San Diego Reader writer Robert Bush for his CD Duetto with pianist Diane Moser. JAZZ PROGRAM DIRECTOR KAMAU KENYATTA SERVED AS ARRANGER AND PERFORMER on jazz singer Gregory Porter's new CD. To seal the deal, Kamau and Porter met in March with onetime pop star Don Was (Was Not Was), who became president of Blue Note Records earlier this year. In its efforts to survive, the label has expanded beyond the jazz agenda set by its founder Alfred Lion. Blue Note's roster includes popular artists such as Norah Jones. "Don is not thinking small, he's not thinking jazz, he's thinking in a bigger way," Kamau said. In March, JazzTimes magazine proclaimed Porter "jazz's next great male jazz vocalist." FLUTIST NICOLE MITCHELL, WHO PERFORMS AT THE DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC'S CONCERT PREBYS CONCERT HALL ON MAY 16, is among initial recipients of the new Doris Duke Foundation arts grants. Other winners include Don Byron, Rinde Eckert, Bill Frisell, John Hollenbeck, Vijay Iyer, Nicole Mitchell, and Meredith Monk. THE ADDO ART SHOW AT UCSD RUNS FROM MAY 29-31 and will showcase UCSD art from all disciplines. The goal of the exhibit is to bring together the UCSD arts community and encourage all departments and academic levels to connect with each other. If you are interested in submitting your work, go here. PHISH'S TREY ANASTASIO WROTE THE MUSIC FOR HANDS ON A HARDBODY, the new musical that runs at La Jolla Playhouse from April 27 through June 17. Based on S.R. Bindler's documentary of the same name, it tells the story of a pickup-truck competition in Longview, TX.

  

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April 17, 2012
PHOTOS: FULL HOUSE FOR SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI

Sitar master Kartik Seshadri, who directs the department of music's Indian music program, performed to a packed Conrad Prebys Concert Hall on April 11. Seshadri swept the audience on a journey through classical Indian ragas that evoked a range of moods, from quiet and thoughtful to bursting with joy. The synergy between Seshadri and tabla virtuoso Arup Chattopadhyay was supernatural, and the performers were honored with an ovation that lasted several minutes. Afterwards, we floated out to our cars and returned to the material world. Here's a photo album of the concert.

  

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April 17, 2012
UCSD COMPOSERS WIN PRESTIGIOUS EARSHOT AWARDS

UCSD composers Chen-Hui Jen and Adam Greene will put their music to the ultimate test when the San Diego Symphony takes it for a trial run. Their works were selected from among 250 submittals to the 2012 EarShot (National Orchestra Composition Discovery Network) New Music Readings program, where promising young composers develop their work with input from top-notch composers, conductors, musicians, and educators. Chen-Hui's winning composition is titled yet the dew remains in pale. Adam won for his piece In Winter. A "reading" is a sort of workshop session for a new composition. Chen-Hui and Adam join two other young composers whose music will be "read" on April 19 and 20 by the San Diego Symphony under the baton of guest conductor James Feddeck. During the process of working through the music, the composers will receive feedback from mentor composers Robert Beaser, John Corigliano, and UCSD music faculty member Rand Steiger, as well as from Feddeck and principal musicians. For Jen, the EarShot award comes as she completes her Ph.D. at UCSD this spring. "In terms of the younger generation of composers from Asia, she is one of the most promising," said Jen's mentor, UCSD faculty composer Chinary Ung. He said that he is particularly impressed with the subtle ways in which Jen draws from the traditional music of her native Taiwan in her own contemporary work. Her first-hand experiences of that music, he explained, allow her to incorporate various elements as part of the creative process, rather than using them as mere seasoning, as can be the case with a western composer. "This is the first time my work will be played by an American orchestra," said Jen, who graduated from the Music Department of the National Sun Yet-San University and earned a masters at Taipei National University of the Arts. She came to the U.S. in 2007 to study music on a scholarship from the Taiwanese Ministry of Education. "This will be a good change for me to work with musicians here. Being selected is also a big encouragement to my efforts and my composition." yet the dew is Jen's second orchestral work and "musically represents my spiritual journey that goes through the process of intoning, transcending, reaching another land, falling, and returning. Everything eventually falls into overwhelming thick fogs. During the past five years I've been focusing on tone colors and orchestration of different instrumental combinations, especially how they flow and move. "When composing a new work, I'd always like to hear it played. Rehearsing and reading will give me ideas whether I realized my imagination right, and whether what I wrote is practical. These should be treasurable experiences for my future works." Born in Chicago, Greene earned degrees in music and anthropology at Connecticut College and a masters in composition at the New England Conservatory of Music. He completed his Ph.D. in composition at UCSD, mentored by composer Roger Reynolds, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning work Whispers Out of Time made a lasting impression on Greene when he heard it in college. The EarShot reading marks the first time Greene's music has been performed by a major symphony orchestra. He said that for a young composer, "it is extremely rare to get the opportunity to work with a professional orchestra on a new piece. There are a number of speculative elements to my score that I'll finally have the chance to hear and assess. EarShot also includes a series of meetings and lectures regarding the practical issues of being a composer (such as legal and copyright issues) that are unusual to encounter in one setting." Greene composed In Winter in 2007. "The ideas for the piece emerged largely from the circumstance of having taught orchestration recently: the immersion in orchestral literature and the process of packaging the information for students was bound to spill over into my own creative project. In Winter is a quiet piece with a small repertoire of harmonic materials intended to reflect a sense of stillness I associate with winter. As I composed I was influenced by a haiku from Basho that reads 'Winter solitude/in a world of one color/the sound of wind.' This point of reference may explain the nature of the musical phrasing of the piece, which is aphoristic, and the sense of chilly austerity that characterizes its overall sound world. "I will have one hour with the orchestra. The piece is nine minutes long. This is, among other things, a heightened test of the practicality and aptness of my notation, since there is simply no time available to 'waste' on clarifying confusing issues with the score. It's a useful exercise, since all interactions with professional orchestras are compressed by nature of the unwieldy budgetary challenges of assembling that many people in the same space. "The reading should reveal critical information about the musical materials. For example, I'm anxious to hear whether some of the divisi strategies I've chosen achieve their intended spatial characteristics. More broadly, the scoring is quite transparent and I'm curious whether I've given enough weight to the materials and enough time to reveal some of the special sonorities I've imagined." Meanwhile, both of UCSD's EarShot winners are looking ahead to the future. Greene is composing two works for pianist and UCSD music alum Shannon Wettstein, his frequent collaborator. "We are particularly excited about a new concerto for piano and chamber orchestra that should be ready in 2014." Once Jen completes her Ph.D. later this spring, she will move to Florida where her husband (and fellow UCSD music grad student) Jacob Sudol has a tenured faculty position at Florida International University. Yes, Sudol has already landed a tenured post before completing his degree, which he will accomplish later this spring.

  

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April 10, 2012
PIANIST BRENDAN NGUYEN PERFORMS APRIL THIRTEENTH CONCERT INSPIRED BY ECLECTIC PERSONAL EXPERIENCES

Pianist Brendan Nguyen's mom and sisters are Vietnam refugees, and though he grew up in America and considers himself culturally American, he also feels the pull of his family heritage. The dark side of his family history helps explain Nguyen's fascination with dystopian films and sci-fi as depicted in books, films and television programs, from Asimov to Battlestar Galactica, Dune, and Blade Runner. As an artist rooted in two worlds--Vietnam/United States, oppressed/free, past/present--Nguyen, a doctorate of musical arts degree candidate in the music department at UC San Diego, has planned an April Thirteenth, 7 pm concert at Conrad Prebys Concert Hall that captures the opposing forces that continue to shape his work. "The Seven Tragedies of Space Travel" mixes western classical music with contemporary music, augmented by audiovisual elements and movement. On piano and harpsichord, Nguyen will perform works by classical composers Rameau (1683-1764) and Schubert (1797-1828), alongside new music by UCSD composers and music PhD candidates Nicholas Deyoe, Aaron Helgeson, and Clint McCallum. The audio-visual elements are a result of his close collaboration with visual artist Jason Ponce, sound designer Joe Mariglio, and costume designer (and incredible vocalist) Leslie Leytham. Throughout the evening, an otherworldly voice speaks to the audience and is derived from the voice of his own mom. Nguyen says that his concert has a "literary element derived from the erudition and storytelling style of Jorge Luis Borges, whose collected fictions are a huge source of inspiration for my creative process. He is without a doubt one of my greatest heroes. Without giving it away too much, there is a specific story by Borges that influenced the title and much of the thematic content of this concert." Nguyen considers his artistic process to be inspired by cosmology, which he defines as "the study of what the universe is, how it started, where it's headed and how, if at all, we humans fit in the grand scheme of things. I'm constantly humbled and fascinated by the study of cosmology. I believe cosmology and other sciences provide the tools necessary to make life fulfilling -- especially in the spiritual sense. For instance, that we are actually made of materials forged in the hearts of ancient stars is to me one of the most stupefying facts of science. It is a revelation that trumps any notion of the supernatural." Nguyen is already making his mark as a pianist on the rise, having performed with San Diego Opera singer Priti Gandhi, with percussionist Steven Schick, and with numerous composers including George Crumb. He hopes to complete his degree in 2014. After that, he imagines himself running an independent art and performance organization and continuing to coach his select group of advanced piano students.

  

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April 06, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

SOPRANO AND FACULTY MEMBER SUSAN NARUCKI has received a prestigious award from the MAP Fund for her Cuatro Corridos project, a collaboration with Mexican author Jorge Volpi. The MAP Fund award is among the most coveted in performing arts. The MAP Fund is a program by Creative Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This year, the MAP Fund awarded a total of $1.2 million to 41 "groundbreaking live performance projects." Cuatro Corridos "seeks to heighten public awareness about human trafficking by engaging in social activism." The hour-long, fully staged production features music by renowned composers Hilda Paredes, Arlene Sierra, Lei Liang, and Hebert Vázquez Sandrin. Each contributes one act of the story that is connected by a visual narrative. Intimate and portable, the production is conceived and designed to use small forces: three musicians and one singer, simple video screens, and a set created by the use of light and shadow. Other collaborators include acclaimed performers of new music, such as percussionist Steven Schick, pianist Aleck Karis, and guitarist Pablo Gomez. The initial performances of Cuatro Corridos will take place on May 8, 10, and 11, 2013, in the Experimental Theater of the Conrad Prebys Music Center at UC San Diego. Additionally, Susan and the Department of Music have been awarded a UC MEXUS Faculty Grant for Cuatro Corridos. And, Susan was featured in excerpts from UCSD composer Anthony Davis' new opera Lear on the Second Floor at Princeton University's McCarter Theatre Center on March 30 and 31. The entire work will be presented at UC San Diego in March 2013, conducted by Steven Schick. Finally, Susan performed Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire with musicians from Tufts University in Boston on April 5. The 100th anniversary of Pierrot Lunaire will be celebrated in a concert on April 21 at 7 pm in the Department of Music's Experimental Theatre. EARSHOT, A NATIONAL PROGRAM AIMED AT SUPPORTING YOUNG COMPOSERS, HAS SELECTED UCSD COMPOSERS ADAM GREENE (PhD) AND CHEN-HUI JEN (PhD candidate) for its April 19-20 New Music Readings concerts conducted by James Feddeck at Copley Symphony Hall in downtown San Diego. Adam Greene's piece is titled In Winter, Chen-Hui Jen's is Yet the Dew Remains in Pale. PIANIST AND PhD CANDIDATE JAMES G. WILLIAMS received the award for Best Oral Presentation in the Humanities at Yale University's 2012 Boucher Conference in Diversity and Higher Education. His winning paper is titled Improvising on Feedback Piano: Aesthetic Discourses Behind Music Technology and Sound. Additionally, composer and PhD candidate Carolyn Chen was inducted into Yale's Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, along with nine other UCSD grad students. Williams was inducted into the society last year. SOPRANO AND DMA CANDIDATE ALICE TEYSSIER EARNED A RAVE REVIEW when she stepped in at the last minute to sing with the San Diego Symphony. SITAR LEGEND RAVI SHANKAR, A REGENTS LECTURER AT UCSD IN 1997-8, celebrates his 92nd birthday this Saturday April 7. Shankar made many Americans aware of Indian music through his sixties association with the Beatles, especially George Harrison. The two remained close friends and Harrison regularly visited Shankar at his home in Encinitas. Shankar has handed down Indian classical music to subsequent generations including Kartik Seshadri, who directs the music department's Indian Music program. Shankar is scheduled to perform in Long Beach on Nov. 4 in "An Evening with the Maestro Ravi Shankar, Celebrating His Tenth Decade." JEFF KAISER (PhD CANDIDATE) AND DAVID BORGO (FACULTY) 'SCORCHED' UCSD'S LOFT NIGHT CLUB, according to the San Diego Reader. They were joined by the Mattson twins (music alums) and Tyler Eaton (music undergrad). MARK DRESSER AND TRIO M EARN A STAR from the New York Times as one of this week's recommended concerts. The trio also received an upbeat review from the New York City Jazz Record. MUSIC ALUM BONNIE WRIGHT'S FRESH SOUND new music series continues Monday April 9 at 8 pm with New York guitarist James Moore. JASON STANYEK, WHO EARNED A MUSIC PhD IN CRITICAL STUDIES AND EXPERIMENTAL PRACTICES AT UCSD, will join the faculty at Oxford University this fall, leaving his assistant professor post at NYU. NOVELIST WALLACE STEGNER INSPIRES Steven Schick's 2012-2013 season with La Jolla Symphony & Chorus. SCHICK WILL CONDUCT THE ST. PAUL CHAMBER ORCHESTRA'S APRIL 2013 PREMIERE of a new work by John Luther Adams. PIANIST AND UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS DANNY GREEN performs April 7 from 7 from 7-10 pm at the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla, with his trio, joined by vocalist Allison Adams Tucker. Danny also performs with Tucker on April 11 at 7 pm at the Carmel Valley Library; and on April— from 2-5 pm at the Mile of Music event along North Harbor Drive by San Diego Bay.   COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS LARRY GROUPE'S INTERVIEW with East Village Radio in New York City aired last week and is now available online. Meanwhile, Larry's next project is re-teaming with Jon Anderson of the rock band Yes for a three-day festival in Brazil. MUSIC ALUM SCOTT PAULSON HAS CURATED a stylophone exhibit at UCSD's Geisel Library. The stylophone was invented in 1967 by Brian Jarvis, manufactured by the British company Dubreq, originally intended as a toy. Paulson describes it as a "novelty electronic organ with an iconic transistor radio look. A small pen (or stylus) was attached to the unit, and touching the metal tip of the stylus upon the engraving of a flat piano-like keyboard allowed single notes to be played." The instrument soon fascinated experimental pop musicians such as David Bowie, who used it on his Space Oddity album, and Kraftwerk, who employed it on Pocket Calculator. Paulson, UCSD's carilloneur and outreach director for the library, has a longtime passion for odd instruments such as the ones featured in his Teeny Tiny Pit Orchestra. So, he's a natural to sustain the Stylophone's underground legacy. If you think you might make a good stylophonist, several of them are listed on ebay for less than $50. The exhibit runs through April downstairs in the arts library area.

March 23, 2012
SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI PERFORMS ON APRIL 11

World-renowned sitar master and music faculty member KARTIK SESHADRI performs April 11 at 7 pm at UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Kartik's CD "Sublime Ragas" was named one of the Top of the World Top 10 CDs by Songlines magazine. The Washington Post has praised his music for its "expressive beauty, rich tonal sensibility, and rhythmic intricacy." Kartik collaborates with world-renowned artists including Philip Glass, and he is dedicated to authentic Indian classical music as introduced to America in the sixties by his mentor Ravi Shankar. Kartik is a prolific composer whose Concerto #1 for Sitar and Chamber Orchestra received its world premiere in San Diego last October. He heads the Indian Classical Music program in the Department of Music at UCSD. For tickets to the April 11 concert, call the Department of Music Box Office: (858) 534-3448.

  

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March 23, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

SPRING BREAK IS UPON US. Concerts resume on Monday April 2 at 7:30 pm with Camera Lucida, featuring renowned musicians from San Diego Symphony and our music faculty in a concert of works by Bach, Strauss, and Brahms. COMPOSERS AND MUSIC ALUMS MARTIN HIENDL AND ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR HAVE BEEN SELECTED by the International Contemporary Ensemble as collaborators for ICElab 2013. The program mission is to develop innovative music which experiments with the human voice, large ensemble work, and electronic soundscapes. SAXOPHONIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER DAVID BORGO SAT IN with the Ian Tordella Group at the Loft night club at UCSD, earning props from the San Diego Reader. Also, Borgo and fellow music faculty members Mark Dresser and Anthony Davis performed at a recent fundraising concert to provide scholarships for UCSD Jazz Camp, held each summer at Conrad Prebys Music Center. MUSIC BY UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG WAS PERFORMED RECENTLY at the American Academy in Rome, where Lei is on a Rome Prize Fellowship. His string quartet Serashi Fragments was performed by the Left Coast Ensemble in Mill Valley, CA, earlier this week. The ensemble will reprise the concert March 26 at the San Francisco War Memorial Performing Arts Center. FACULTY PERFORMERS CHARLES CURTIS (CELLO) AND ANTHONY BURR (CLARINET) perform Suite No. 3 in C major, BWV 1009 v. Bourree on the new Big Bach collection of 120 pieces. The collection is on sale for 99 cents for a limited time! GRAD MUSIC STUDENTS JEFF KAISER AND LEAH BOWDEN APPEARED AT CALARTS THIS WEEK. Jeff made a presentation about his electro-acoustic work and music for large ensemble and choir (performed by his Ockodektet at UCSD last fall). Leah performed Jeff's new vibraphone piece. UNDERGRAD HONORS PERFORMANCE STUDENT AMY CALDERON has been accepted into the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival summer program for opera training. MUSIC ALUMNUS SCOTT PAULSON'S SHORT ATTENTION SPAN CHAMBER SERIES continues March 28 at 12:30 pm and April 15 at 2:30 pm. Concerts feature the stylophone, a "charming pocket-sized electronic instrument that is, perhaps, best heard in small doses." The concerts take place in conjunction with UCSD Library's exhibit "Stylophone: The Greatest Little [Musical] Instrument of the [Last] Century?" The exhibit runs March 28 through April 30 on the lower level of Geisel Library. Information: spaulson@ucsd.edu SAN DIEGO JAZZ PIANIST AND SDSU FACULTY MEMBER RICK HELZER performs with woodwinds player Vinnie Golia on March 31 at 8 pm at 98 Bottles, 2400 Kettner Avenue in San Diego. Also on the bill: the Burr/Unruh Duo. Information: (619) 261-8948. IN HONOR OF THE 185th ANNIVERSARY OF BEETHOVEN, violinist Victoria Martino and pianist James Lent perform a Beethoven Memorial Marathon on Monday March 26 at 7 pm at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla. Call it total immersion for Beethoven lovers. Reservations: (858) 454-5872.

March 16, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

THE GROUP HOTEL ELEFANT, FOUNDED BY MUSIC ALUMS Leaha Villareal and Mary Kouyoumdjian, debuted this week at the Dimenna Center in Manhattan. The program included music by Leaha as well as by UCSD music faculty member Chinary Ung and UCSD music alumnus Mary Kouyoumdjian. The group caught the interest of New Yorker music critic Alex Ross, who explains the origins of the Hotel Elefant moniker with a 1906 meeting at that hotel of Strauss, Mahler, Puccini, and Schoenberg following the premiere of Strauss's Salome. DON'T MISS SATURDAY NIGHT'S (MARCH 17) 8 PM BROADCAST OF THE MARCH 5 CAMERA LUCIDA concert at UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. All concerts in the series are recorded by music department's Tom Erbe and broadcast on KPBS-FM (89.5; or streaming online at kpbs.org) on the second Saturday following each concert. Concert broadcasts feature commentary by cellist and UCSD music faculty member Charles Curtis, who is Camera Lucida's artistic director.   PIANIST AND EMERITUS MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER CECIL LYTLE'S RECENT 'JAZZ GONE GLOBAL' CONCERT will be broadcast on UCSD-TV beginning tonight at 8:30 pm. UCSD-TV is carried by Cox, Time-Warner, and AT&T Uverse. It is also archived online. DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC CSEP ALUMS ARE EARNING SIGNIFICANT RECOGNITION FOR THEIR WORK. NINA EIDSHEIM has three fellowships, including one at Cornell University, where she is in residence and working on her new book. IVAN RAYKOFF got tenure last year at the New School in New York City, has a book accepted by Oxford University Press, and just won both a Humboldt Fellowship for Berlin fall 2012 and a Fulbright Fellowship for Vienna spring 2013. ZEYNEP BULUT, who got her PhD last spring, is a post-doc at the Institute for Critical Inquiry in Berlin. She has just been invited for a second year. TRACY MCMULLEN has just accepted a tenure track position at Bowdoin College in American vernacular music. She currently holds the USC Provost's Postdoctoral Scholar in the Humanities (Musicology). ELLEN WELLER recently received tenure at Palomar College and is now on sabbatical.   UCSD COMPOSER ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR HAS BEEN NOMINATED for the prestigious Nordic Prize. Previous winners include UCSD alumnus Haukur Tómasson (2004), Björk (1997), Haflidi Hallgrimsson (1986) and Atli Heimir Sveinsson (1976).   VIOLINIST AND FACULTY MEMBER JANOS NEGYESY has added several new videos to his Vimeo page. PIANIST RYOKO AMADEE GOGUEN, WHO HAS COLLABORATED WITH DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC composers and performers, presents two performances this month: On Saturday March 24 at 11 am, she'll perform at Bird Rock Coffee Roasters' Acoustic Music Series. And on March 27 at 4 pm, she'll appear at the Anime Conji 2012 festival, at the Town & Country resort in San Diego. She'll be joined by Department of Music tech guru Trevor Henthorn (trumpet and percussion), and former music grad student Arnie Schoenberg. MUSIC ALUM SCOTT PAULSON'S STYLOPHONE CONCERT earned detailed coverage in the San Diego Reader. MUSIC ALUM BONNIE WRIGHT'S CONCERT SERIES Fresh Sound continues April 9 at 8 pm with guitarist James Moore performing works by Larry Polansky and Molly Thompson, as well as John Zorn. UCSD music alumnus David Shively will headline the series in June. LA JOLLA PLAYHOUSE PREMIERES A NEW FLAMING LIPS MUSICAL in November or December. The production is inspired by, and named for, the band's 2002 album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. The musical is directed by former La Jolla Playhouse Artistic Director Des McAnuff, whose earlier projects include the musical adaptation of The Who's Tommy. LATER THIS YEAR IN ENGLAND: THE FIRST COMPLETE PERFORMANCE OF STOCKHAUSEN'S OPERA MITTWOCH AUS LICHT, including the legendary airborne Helicopter Quartet, first performed by the Arditti Quartet, which has frequently collaborated with UCSD composer Roger Reynolds.

March 12, 2012
PHOTOS OF A SUPERB MULTIMEDIA PERFORMANCE BY PERCUSSIONIST STEPHEN SOLOOK

Percussionist Stephen Solook presented an impressive multimedia concert (see photos here) last Sunday which included works by UCSD composers Katharina Rosenberger, Chinary Ung, and Roger Reynolds. Stephen was joined by soprano Tiffany Du Mouchelle, vocalist-actress Alice Teyssier, computer artist Paul Hembree, and scenic-lighting designer Jessica Flores. The house was full and included a mix of UCSD faculty and grad students, media types, new music fans, and some unfamiliar faces of people checking out our music for the first time. The Department of Music's sophisticated Meyer Sound system produced a huge echo effect which gave the ambiance of an eery, ethereal space.

  

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March 09, 2012
PROFILED: PERCUSSIONIST STEPHEN SOLOOK

Percussionist and Red Fish Blue Fish member Stephen Solook is profiled in the UCSD Guardian. The article by arts writer Ren Ebel explores Solook's evolution as a musician, his March 11 concert featuring works by UCSD composers, and his collaboration with UCSD soprano Tiffany Du Mouchelle in their duo Aurora Borealis.

  

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March 09, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD composer Rand Steiger's CD Ecosphere is now available on iTunes, Amazon, and CDBABY. Ecosphere features performances by the Ensemble Intercontemporain, Southbank Sinphonia and others; recorded in Paris, London, New York, and California. Rand's next portrait CD will be released in 2013 on the New World label, performed by the Talea Ensemble, featuring his composition A Menacing Plume (in collaboration with UCSD computer music master Miller Puckette).  Currently, Rand is at work on the Coalesce Cycle, eight works for instruments and electronics to be premiered by the International Contemporary Ensemble in New York in 2013. UCSD composer Anthony Davis and UCSD librettist Allan Havis have collaborated on the new opera Lear on the Second Floor, which will be performed March 30 and 31 at Princeton's Roger S. Berline Theatre. Davis, of course, is on the music faculty. Havis is provost of Thurgood Marshall College and a member of the Theatre & Dance faculty. UCSD soprano Susan Narucki is featured in the Princeton performance. Excerpts from the opera were performed last month at the American Lyric Theater. UCSD conductor and percussionist Steven Schick is in the news: he recently conducted new music by composer and UCSD music alumnus Mark Applebaum. And, Schick has been appointed the first-ever Artist-in-Residence for ICE (the International Contemporary Ensemble), where he has already made significant contributions as conductor, percussionist, and programming partner. Composer and music faculty member Lei Liang is making news in Rome as the Elliott Carter Rome Prize Fellow at the American Academy, where harpsichordist and adjunct UCSD music faculty member Takae Ohnishi (who also happens to be Lei's wife) is performing Lei's music with the Berlin Philharmonic's Scharoun Ensemble. Lei and fellow UCSD composer Chinary Ung lectured at UC Santa Cruz last month as Dintinguished Visiting Composers. UCSD composer Roger Reynolds and flutist Karen Reynolds are co-directors (with Steve Antosca) of the upcoming Cage Centennial Fest in Washington D.C.

March 02, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD COMPOSITION ALUMNUS ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR was awarded Composer of the Year at the 2012 Icelandic Music Awards on February 29th. Her album Rhizoma was also selected as Classical/Contemporary Album of the Year. Rhizoma has earned rave reviews and was on several "Best of 2011" lists including Steve Smith's list at TimeOut New York and Doyle Armbrust's list at TimeOut Chicago. Rhízoma was also listed as Icelandic Album of the Year (2011) by Arni Matthiasson at Icelandic newspaper Morgunbladid. TAKE A LOOK AT THE VIDEO OF COMPOSER AND PhD CANDIDATE PAUL HEMBREE'S premiere last fall of Nimbus for chamber orchestra. MUSIC ALUMNUS JAIME OLIVER has been awarded a Research Residency at IRCAM, the renowned center for experimental music in Paris. UCSD'S STUART COLLECTION OF PUBLIC ART CELEBRATES ITS 30th ANNIVERSARY with an exhibition of artistic proposals, sketches, construction plans, and photographs. The exhibit, curated by VisArts PhD candidtate Matthew Schum, is on view in the Literature Building, Rooms 410 and 310, through Spring Quarter.

February 24, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

PIANIST, COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS DANA REASON performs a premiere of her piece Currents for Symphony Winds, on Feb. 27 at 7:30 pm at Oregon State University in Corvallis. Reason earned her PhD in 2002. She has toured Canada, the U.S., and Europe, and released a dozen CDs. She is the director of Popular Music Studies at Oregon State University and founder and director of Between the Cracks Forum: Music, Sound & Interactivity. DIRECTED BY UCSD'S STEVEN SCHICK, the San Francisco Contemporary Players continue their 2011-2012 season this Sunday Feb. 26 at the ODC Dance Commons in San Francisco; and Monday Feb. 27 at San Francisco's Herbst Theatre. The programs include works by Luigi Dallapiccola, Michelle Lou, Salvatore Sciarrino, Pascal Dusapin, and Iannis Xenakis. Schick discusses the music before each concert. UCSD SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI'S RECENT PERFORMANCE at Symphony Space in New York City received another great review. Seshadri appeared with Arup Chattopadhyay on tabla. This insightful article captures the concentration required for a superb performance. PIANIST AND UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS DANNY GREEN has several performances this month: Feb. 26 at the Encinitas Library's Brazil Jazz Festa (1:30-4:30 pm); and on February 27 at noon at the Athenaeum Music and Arts Library in La Jolla. Green also appears with the Jonathan Karrant Quartet on Feb. 25 at 7 PM at La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla; and on Mar. 5 at noon at the Athenaeum Mini˜oncerts Series in the Lyceum Theatre at Horton Plaza in downtown San Diego.

February 23, 2012
UCSD COMPOSER PHILIPPE MANOURY WINS FRENCH GRAMMY

UCSD composer Philippe Manoury has been awarded Best Composer of the Year in France's Victoires de la Musique Classique 2012, the French equivalent of the Grammys. Manoury was honored for his opera La Nuit de Gutenberg (The Night of Gutenberg), which was premiered last fall by the Opera National du Rhin in Strasbourg. The awards program earlier this week was televised on France3, the French national television channel. Manoury, whose influences include avant garde composers Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen, said that his award provides a boost for contemporary music. "Receiving an award in the classical category for a contemporary composition is extremely rare. I hope that this will help to have new productions of my operas in Europe. It seems that Europe is not angry with me for living in California the past eight years [while teaching at UCSD], because this summer there will be a big celebration for my 60th birthday in Paris, where the Orchestra de Paris will premiere my piano concert, and in Lucerne, where Pierre Boulez and Peter Eötvös will conduct two of my orchestral works."

  

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February 22, 2012
SOPRANO JESSICA ASZODI PROFILED ON KPBS-FM

UCSD soprano Jessica Aszodi is profiled by KPBS-FM arts correspondent Angela Carone. Angela does an excellent job capturing the complexities of Morton Feldman's Three Voices, which Jessica performed in our Experimental Theatre earlier this week. The profile includes interviews with Jessica and with our music faculty's Susan Narucki; as well as excerpts from her rehearsal.

  

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February 10, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC COMPOSER NICHOLAS DEYOE'S NEW PIECE STILL GETTING RID OF will be premiered this weekend by La Jolla Symphony & Chorus. The new composition is the result of Deyoe's Tom Nee Commission, named for the founding music faculty member who directed LJSC for 31 years. Mr. Deyoe was profiled by the San Diego Union-Tribune. UCSD CONDUCTOR AND PERCUSSIONIST STEVEN SCHICK has signed on for five more years as artistic director of La Jolla Symphony & Chorus. UCSD DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC'S 'SOUND CHECK FIVE' CD IS NOW AVAILABLE ON BANDCAMP.COM. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG recorded music for a new CD while he was at UCSD for a Feb. 1 concert of his music. The CD, to be released by Naxos, will include four pieces. Three were inspired by the birth of Lei and wife Takae Ohnishi's son Albert. The lineup is Verge (performed by UCSD's Palimpsest Ensemble, conducted by Steven Schick), Aural Hypothesis (Callithumpian Consort with Stephen Drury), Five Seasons (Shanghai Quartet and Pipa superstar Wu Man), and Tremors of a Memory Chord (Pi-Hsien Chen, piano; Taipei Chinese Orchestra with En Shao, conductor). Following his visit to UCSD, Lei went to New York City for the Carnegie Weill Hall world premiere of his Messages of White. Lei is living in Italy this year on a Rome Fellowship at the American Academy. He reports that son Albert is picking up some Italian, while wife Takae (a harpsichordist who teaches in the Department of Music) has been mastering the art of Italian mosaic. In New York, Lei was interviewed by classical radio station WQXR. The station played performances of his music by UCSD music faculty flutist John Fonville and music alumnus and flutist Jane Rigler. UCSD MEDICAL SCHOOL FACULTY MEMBER DR. JOHN WEST is a classical music fan who often attends the Department of Music's Camera Lucida series. We caught up with him at the Feb. 6 concert and discovered that as a specialist in pulmonary medicine he once led a research expedition up Mt. Everest. Dr. West has also climbed with famed mountaineer Sir Edmund Hillary. EVOLUTION OF PIPA AS A NATIONAL SYMBOL: How an instrument is bringing together a nation's culture. OF COURSE SAN DIEGO HAS ITS OWN RESIDENT PIPA MASTER, WU MAN, who performed the premiere of UCSD composer Chinary Ung's "Formless Spiral" at Santa Fe Fest and La Jolla SummerFest last summer. Wu Man appears at the Neurosciences Institute in La Jolla on April 10 at 8 pm with members of San Diego Symphony. UNCLE SAM NEEDS A FEW GOOD VOCALISTS, if you're interested there's an audition coming up soon. NEW MODE OF "NAMING" FOR ARTS DONORS...

February 03, 2012
CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR UCSD SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI

After touring abroad and in the U.S. to much critical acclaim over the past few months (including a performance this weekend at Symphony Space in New York City), UCSD sitar master and faculty member KARTIK SESHADRI is considered as possibly "Today's Greatest Sitar Player?" by Songlines magazine, which just named his new CD "Sublime Ragas" among "Best New Releases" in its Top of the World section. Kartik is sustaining the tradition of Indian classical music at the highest level, building on the legacy of his mentor Ravi Shankar (who lived for many years in Encinitas just north of San Diego). Kartik is also expanding the possibilities of his instrument through collaborations with composer Philip Glass and other greats. Kartik's next performance at UCSD is on April 11 at 7 p.m. in Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, as part of the Department of Music's Wednesdays@7 series. In January, the series, in collaboration with UCSD ArtPower!, presented a sold-out tribute to composer Steve Reich. Box Office: (858) 534-3448

  

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February 03, 2012
FEB. 3: NEWS OF THE WEEK

TOM ERBE, DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC STUDIO DIRECTOR AND LECTURER, impressed createdigitalmusic.com with his "sonic wizardry" in creating his new Echophon module for his "long-beloved" SoundHack app. Echophon is included among coolest new products from last month's gargantuan NAMM music industry trade show. VIOLINIST AND UCSD FACULTY MEMBER JANOS NEGYESY'S VIDEO ARCHIVE is now available online at Vimeo. UCSD SAXOPHONIST AND FACULTY MEMBER DAVID BORGO headlines "Roots of Reeds" at Carlbad's Museum of Making Music on February 11 at 7 pm. UCSD SITAR MASTER KARTIK SESHADRI'S NEW CD "TOP OF THE WORLD" is reviewed in the new Songlines magazine, with the opening line "World's Best Sitarist?" UCSD COMPOSER CHINARY UNG'S "AURA" was a highlight at the Jacaranda Festival in Santa Monica last month. CONTRABASSIST AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER is earning acres of coverage. The L.A. Times reviewed a performance by Trio M, and Downbeat includes Trio M's CD in its monthly "Hotbox". Allaboutjazz.com reviews a new CD by the Skaller/Holt Duo, featuring Dresser's compositions (Skaller, a pianist, is a UCSD music grad student). Dresser plays the New Music Festival at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, this weekend. UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS SCOTT PAULSON CLAIMED A SPOT IN THE NATIONAL MEDIA  with an article and video on the Huffington Post, for his mastery of the kazoo, in connection with the recent National Kazoo Day. "They called me and I pushed real heard to get the African Diaspora aspect of the instrument mentioned [February is Black History Month), and the jazz and classical aspects as well," Scott says. "All weekend at the Arts service desk [at Geisel Library, where he works] we  gave away kazoos." VOCALIST AND MASTER OF CONTEMPORARY MUSIC CANDIDATE JESSICA ASZODI is featured in UCSD International Center's "Spotlight" column.

February 02, 2012
FEBRUARY 6: CAMERA LUCIDA PRESENTS BEETHOVEN, BACH, SCHUMANN

On February 6 at 7:30 pm at Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, Camera Lucida presents its first concert of 2012. This ensemble of world-renowned players from San Diego Symphony and UCSD music faculty will perform works by Beethoven, Martinu, and Schumann. Here is a welcome note from Charles Curtis, Camera Lucida artistic director, renowned cellist, and UCSD faculty member (you can read the complete concert program here). After a hiatus of two months, and a change of year, we welcome you back to an evening of chamber music. Our last concert was nearly symphonic in scope: Wagner and Johann Strauss, and the only chamber work of Gustav Mahler. But tonight, we reduce our forces to the minimum: one duo, and a pair of trios. Martinu, of course, manages to make almost a quartet out of his Duo for Violin and Cello, so furiously dense are the two parts. The originality of Martinu's music is in his melding of the atmosphere of folk and danse music with a very sophisticated and ambitious modernist program. In the Rondo, the simple and vigorous round-dance figures seem unproblematic enough, until the harmonies unhitch themselves from the wagon, spiraling into dissonances and chromatic climes that betray a mischievousness and perverse pleasure. And the cadenza sections truly verge on lunacy, both in the ruthless exploitation of the instruments' capabilities, and in their general lack of decorousness. Haunting double stops hint at fretted instruments like zithers or (could it be?) Hawaiian guitars. But the opening Preludium is a movement of quiet grandeur, heartfelt and moving. Some of the concluding passages in fact prefigure the mystical qualities of the late Shostakovich, stark and expressionistic. Beethoven and Schumann are almost unthinkable without each other. One the one hand, Beethoven was the single greatest inspiration for Schumann; and on the other, early Romantic elaborations of Beethovenian ideas, by Schumann and Brahms in particular, have completed for us the picture of Beethoven's later output. So it is enlightening to hear these two masters paired off in two masterful Piano Trios. The famous "Ghost" movement from opus 70 no. 1 is in fact in d minor, that quintessential key for a certain species of Schumannian melancholy, on perfect display in Schumann's Trio. The "Empfindsamkeit" of the Romantics, the "feelingfulness" or "sensitivity" captured in Schumann's marking "mit inniger Empfindung", is laid out as a model in Beethoven's slow movement, "Largo assai ed espressivo" - possibly the slowest of all of Beethoven's slow movements before the final period. A vast and shadowy space, tentatively probed by a halting recitativo, emerges as the uncertain enclosure of this world of complex feelings. To be experienced, all the same, in this radiant space, our welcoming and acoustically rich musical home. We are delighted to join you here tonight, and for the remaining five concerts between now and June, and we thank our stalwart supporter, Sam Ersan, for our good fortune. I hope to see you here on Monday night!

  

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January 31, 2012
FEBRUARY 1 AT UCSD: STEVEN SCHICK CONDUCTS MUSIC BY LEI LIANG

UCSD composer Lei Liang's Verge is the centerpiece when the ensemble Palimpsest performs under the direction of conductor Steven Schick. Also on the program: a new work by grad composer Chen-Hui Jen, plus Bártok's Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta; and Schick's performance of Brian Ferneyhough's Bone Alphabet on its 20th anniversary. Tickets are FREE for students on hour before the concert. Liang explains the genesis of Verge: "This piece was composed on the verge of an exciting moment in my life: the birth of our son Albert Shin Liang. Albert's musical name, A, B (Bb), E, and D, (re) asserts itself in different configurations and disguises as basic harmonic and melodic material. His heartbeat also makes an appearance in the form of changing tempi and pulsations. In a sense, I composed the piece in order to make a musical amulet for Albert. On a technical level, I was fascinated by the dialectical relationship between the convergence and divergence of musical voices found in the traditional heterophonic music of Mongolia. There, the functionality of a principal line and its accompaniment can interchange, and often not synchronously. The 18 strings are divided into antiphonal groups: left versus right, front versus rear. They diverge into various sub-ensembles, quartets, and also appear as 18 virtuosic soloists. Near the end, they converge into a singular voice." Verge was commissioned by the New York Philharmonic and its Music Director, Alan Gilbert. It premiered on December 17, 2009 in Symphony Space at the inaugural concert of the Philharmonic's new music series CONTACT!, conducted by Magnus Lindberg.

  

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January 30, 2012
PROFILED: UCSD PIANIST CECIL LYTLE

Pianist Cecil Lytle, former provost of Thurgood Marshall College and emeritus music faculty member, was  profiled on January 29 by San Diego Union-Tribune music critic George Varga. Lytle's intensive Liszt projects is featured. Cecil performed his "Jazz Gone Global" concert on January 29 in UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Ticket proceeds went to the Lytle Scholarship Fund for university freshman who graduated from UCSD Preuss School (college prep for students who will become the first in their families to attend college).

  

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January 27, 2012
JAN. 27: NEWS OF THE WEEK

ON JANUARY 16, SOPRANO AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER SUSAN NARUCKI presented the world premiere of Hayes Biggs' 30-minute song cycle Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs with pianist Christoper Oldfather on the composition faculty recital series at the Miller Recital Hall at the Manhattan School of Music. While at the Manhattan School, Narucki also presented the lecture  "On Writing for the Voice" at MSM's graduate composition seminar. And on February 3, Susan joins the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group (U.K.) and conductor Clement Power for a performance of Grisey's Quatre Chants Pour Franchir Le Seuil, and a world premiere by BCMG's composer in residence, Irish composer Sean Clancy. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG'S LATEST COMPOSITION MESSAGE OF WHITE, commissioned by the Prism Quartet and Music from China, will have its world premiere on February 3 at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall. CLARINETIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER ROBERT ZELICKMAN'S SECOND AVENUE KLEZMER ENSEMBLE will be interviewed in February for KPBS public television's April "Local Heroes Awards" program. As part of the program, the ensemble will perform with San Diego Ballet. The Heroes program honors San Diego's special multi-cultural months, including Jewish American Heritage Month. KPBS producer Tami Rogers looked at several performers. She says the Second Avenue crew is "the most talented klezmer band in San Diego." SITAR MASTER AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER KARTIK SESHADRI performs at New York City's Symphony Space on February 4. REGISTRATION IS OPEN FOR UC SAN DIEGO JAZZ CAMP 2012. The camp's faculty includes department of music faculty musicians David Borgo, Anthony Davis, and Mark Dresser. http://jazzcamp.ucsd.edu BONNIE WRIGHT'S FRESH SOUND NEW MUSIC SERIES stages its spring series at Space 4 Art in downtown San Diego. The series opens March 6 at 8 pm with a performance by San Francisco clarinetist Ben Goldberg with New York drummer Ches Smith and Chicago guitarist Jeff Parker. AND THE OSCAR NOMINATIONS FOR MUSIC GO TO...  Original Score: Ludovic Bource (The Artist), Alberto Iglesias (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy), Howard Shore (Hugo), John Williams (The Adventures of Tintin), and John Williams (War Horse). And, for Original Song: Bret McKenzie ("Man or Muppet" from The Muppets), and Sergio Mendes˜arlinhos Brown-Siedah Garrett ("Real in Rio" from Rio).

January 23, 2012
OUR NEW INTERVIEW WITH COMPOSER STEVE REICH!

Composer Steve Reich came to UC San Diego for a 75th birthday tribute concert on January 18. Steven Schick interviewed Reich at the pre-concert ArtTalks! event. The Steves have a long history together, and Schick prompted some thought-provoking remarks from Reich about his eclectic influences, his current project with Radiohead, and the making of Music for 18 Musicians, which was featured at the January 18 concert. Thanks to the Department of Music's Joe Kucera for the excellent recording of the interview. The Reich concert was co-produced by UCSD ArtPower! and the Department of Music.

  

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January 20, 2012
UCSD PERFORMERS EARN MAJOR PROPS FOR STEVE REICH CONCERT

Ecstatic reviews are rolling in for the January 18 concert at UCSD of music by famed composer Steve Reich, who made a rare San Diego appearance to lecture and perform.  San Diego Union-Tribune music critic Jim Chute names UCSD musicians Ariana Lamon-Anderson and Allison Roush among key players who propelled the music, while San Diego Reader writer Robert Bush called the concert "triumphant". And San Diego.com writer Kenneth Herman awarded the concert 5 out of 5 stars (same as a top restaurant in a Zagat guide). Herman described the Reich concert as "exhilirating" and "a musical feast of Reich." The concert was directed by UCSD percussionist, conductor, and faculty member Steven Schick and featured several top musicians from the Department of Music. The concert was presented by UCSD ArtPower! in partnership with the music department.

  

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January 17, 2012
STEVE REICH PROFILED IN SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

Steve Reich, whose music will be showcased at UC San Diego in a sold out concert at 7 pm on January 18, discusses his music with San Diego Union-Tribune music critic Jim Chute. Wednesday's program includes his spectacular "Music for 18 Musicians" featuring the Bang on a Can All-Stars and red fish blue fish. Reich will on hand for the occasion, making a rare San Diego appearance as he turns 75. The concert is co-presented by the Department of Music and UCSD ArtPower!. Prior to the 7 pm concert, Reich discusses his music at the 6 pm ArtTalks with UCSD music faculty's Steven Schick, director of red fish blue fish. We recommend that you arrive by 5 pm for the discussion.

  

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January 13, 2012
NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD CONTRABASSIST AND FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER AND TRIO M PERFORM JANUARY THIRTEENTH AT THE NEUROSCIENCES INSTITUTE IN LA JOLLA   STEVEN SCHICK AND RED FISH BLUE FISH'S JANUARY 17 CONCERT AT DISNEY HALL IN LOS ANGELES RANKS #1 among Best Classical Concerts 2012 recommended by San Diego music critic Christian Hertzog in LA Weekly. A PORTRAIT ALBUM OF CHAMBER WORKS BY UCSD GRAD-LEVEL COMPOSER NICHOLAS DEYOE, with throbbing eyes, will be released on January 17th by the brand new Los Angeles based Populist Records. The album features the Formalist Quartet, Red Fish Blue Fish, Stephanie Aston, and Brendan Nguyen. An album release/label launch party will be held on Monday, January 16 from 1 pm to 4pm at Machine Project in Los Angeles featuring beer from Eagle Rock Brewing, cupcakes from Stephanie Aston, and performances by The Formalist Quartet, Matt Barbier, Nicholas Deyoe, Clint McCallum, and more! Pre-orders available here: Populist Records (physical) and bandcamp (digital), or directly from Nick if you're around UCSD.   LA JOLLA SYMPHONY & CHORUS'S RECENT ANCIENT NOISES CONCERT WILL BE BROADCAST ON UCSD-TV on Friday, January Thirteenth, at 8:30 pm, and on several subsequent dates. Two brilliant folk-tales from the early twentieth century: Stravinsky's portrait of a folk wedding in pagan Russia, featuring four pianists, chamber chorus, and Lux Boreal dancers choreographed by UCSD's Allyson Green; and Bartok's magical story of nine young hunters transformed into wild stags scored for orchestra and chorus. Plus two much more recent pieces: György Ligeti's daring work for 100 metronomes, each at a different tempo, and David Lang's rambunctious Grind to a Halt.   NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS JAZZ MASTERS   AFTER A CELL PHONE INTERRUPTED A NEW YORK PHIL CONCERT, the owner of the phone apologized profusely the following day.

  

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January 09, 2012
JAN. 9: NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD COMPOSER CHINARY UNG'S AURA will be performed at Jacaranda Music at the Edges "Ring Around the Moon" concert on January 21 in Santa Monica, along with works by Saariaho, Takemitsu and Dutilleux. IN THIS VIDEO, STEVE REICH TALKS ABOUT 'MUSIC FOR 18 MUSICIANS,' which he performs at UCSD on Jan. 18 with Bang on a Can All-Stars and red fish blue fish (and at Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles on Jan. 17). CONGRATULATIONS TO COMPOSITION GRAD STUDENTS CAROLYN CHEN, BRIAN GRIFFEATH-LOEB, AND RAN DUAN, who have been selected for participation in the inaugural Harvard Summer Composition course. They are among 12 participants chosen from among 112 applicants. CONTRABASSIST AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER takes part in the Improvisers Summit on January Thirteenth at 8 pm at the Neurosciences Institute in La Jolla. He'll be joined by violinist and UCSD music alum Mary Oliver; percussionist Han Bennink; and trombonist Michael Dessen. The group will also perform at the Blue Whale in Los Angeles on Jan. 16 at 8 pm, and at U.C. Irvine on Jan. 17 at 7 pm. MARK DRESSER'S TRIO M CD (WITH MYRA MELFORD AND MATT WILSON); AND HIS RECORDING WITH BOBBY BRADFORD AND GLENN FERRIS, both get great reviews in the New York Times. Trio M's release "is a crisp, engaging ride, variously roiling or reflective, with high-wire interplay at almost every turn," while the music on the other CD "unfolds as rough-and-tumble sport, but not without a framework... Mr. Dresser is the anchor in their midst, and every bit as active with his use of contrapuntal texture." ROGER REYNOLDS' SANCTUARY DVD ON MODE RECORDS, WITH VIDEO BY UCSD MUSIC AND VISARTS ALUM ROSS KARRE, was chosen by Wire magazine (not available online) as one of the 10 best releases of 2011. Reynolds was interviewed in the December issue of Wire, and Los Angeles Times music critic Mark Swed also wrote about the Sanctuary release. Roger and the Sanctuary DVD also received a thoughtful review in the December issue of Gramophone. MILLER PUCKETTE (MUSIC FACULTY) AND JULIANA SNAPPER (MUSIC ALUMNUS) PERFORM AS A "FOLKSY DUO". CATCH MUSIC ALUMNUS AND PIANIST DANNY GREEN on January 11 at The Loft at UCSD, and on Feb. 26 at 1:30 pm at the Fourth Annual Brazil Jazz Festa at the Encinitas Library (540 Cornish Drive). UCSD MUSIC ALUMS MARY KOUYOUMJIAN, LEAHA VILLAREAL, AND JOANNA SZU are part of the new contemporary music ensemble Hotel Elefant. You can "Like" them on Facebook.

  

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December 20, 2011
INTERVIEW: PIANIST CATHERINE KAUTSKY, WHO PERFORMS AT UCSD IN JANUARY, TALKS ABOUT RZEWSKI, OSCAR WILDE, AND HER LIFE IN MUSIC

Pianist Catherine Kautsky performs Rzewski's Oscar Wilde-inspired De Profundis at UCSD on January Thirteenth. After Rzewski became fascinated with a passionate letter Wilde wrote while imprisoned for "gross indecency," he composed De Profundis in 1992 for pianist Anthony De Mare. Kautsky, who met Rzewski when he visited the University of Wisconsin-Madison at a time when Kautsky was on the faculty, had heard about the piece and knew she wanted to learn it. But she put De Profundis on hold as her blossoming career brought performances at prestigious venues and with renowned orchestras around the world, as well as recording projects and her work as an educator. Then a year ago, she returned to De Profundis. She performed it for the first time at her faculty recital at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, where she chairs the Keyboard Department. At UCSD, her concert program will also include Beethoven's Sonata No. 28 in A Major, Op. 101). Along with her concert,  Catherine will conduct a piano masterclass and visit the undergrad Music 5 course about the art and science of music making. Kautsky currently chairs the Keyboard Department at Lawrence. From a pianist's point of view, what are the most interesting and challenging aspects of De Profundis? The piece has some portions that are very challenging pianistically, but it's also a continual challenge to concentrate on doing so many disparate things at the same time. Rzewski has the pianist not only speaking, but sobbing, sighing, whistling, singing, tapping, and beeping a bicycle horn--among other things! What do you feel are the connections between the moods/contents of Wilde's letter, and this music? I think the music captures beautifully both the tragedy of Wilde's letter and the flamboyance of his former life and personality. For me, one of the most striking things about the composition is its sheer variety, daring, and physicality--it tells us a lot about the man before he was imprisoned, as well as during his time in jail. How did you connect with Rzewski and De Profundis?   I'd heard and taught a good deal of Rzewski's music and he came and visited as a guest artist when I was teaching at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I respect his musicianship enormously, and when a friend of mind mentioned he was doing this piece, I got very interested. I've done a recording of pieces for speaking pianist, so it's a kind of performing I'm familiar with and like a lot. I'm also very taken with the idea of a composer who's so openly political--I've always been interested in the intersections between music and politics. Had you and Rzewski worked together before? No, but he was very interested in learning about my great grandfather, Karl Kautsky, a famous German social-democrat who worked with Marx and Engels, so we had a nice long e-mail exchange last summer that covered a wide range of subjects. Did you do your own research on Wilde? Yes, I've done a good deal of research on Wilde by now. When I first came to the piece, I knew very little--I had simply enjoyed productions of a few of his plays, and I knew the Strauss opera, Salomé, based on his play of the same name. Do you actually read from Wilde's letter during your performance? Yes, I read excerpts from the letter. They're word for word, though sometimes taken out of order. When and where did you first perform De Profundis? I started to learn De Profundis about a year ago and performed it on a faculty recital at my university, Lawrence University. Unfortunately, my recital was on the day of the Super Bowl, and since the Green Bay Packers were in it, and Appleton is right next to Green Bay, not too many people were at the concert! When did you first begin playing piano, and what kind of music? I began lessons at the age of seven, though I certainly fooled around on the piano and wanted to learn before that. We didn't have a piano at home until then, though. The first piece I remember falling in love with was entitled Papageno's Magic Melody.  It was a transcription from The Magic Flute, and I've loved playing Mozart ever since. Were your parents musical? They're both from Vienna and had grown up hearing and liking classical music, but neither of them plays an instrument, reads music, or is particularly knowledgeable about music. Who were your mentors? I had many wonderful teachers. I did my doctorate under Gilbert Kalish, and he has remained a wonderful friend and mentor to this day. His openness to different kinds of playing and many different kinds of music make him a fabulous role model. Who were your musical heroes or role models? I grew up listening to pianists like Schnabel and Serkin--people steeped in the Austrian/German repertoire. This has been true of most of my teachers as well. What were the turning points in your career? My acceptance at Juilliard and my acceptance at Tanglewood both made an enormous difference to me. Likewise my first full-time tenure track job at Lawrence. And finally a sabbatical year spent in Paris, where I first got very involved in French music. What projects are you working on? I'm currently working on a recording/book project on the Debussy Preludes and their reflection of Parisian culture at the turn of the 20th century. I'm also planning a large-scale symposium at Lawrence on exiles from the Holocaust and the music, dance, film which is related to that moment in history. How did you end up at Lawrence University the first time? I applied and got the job! Why did you move to the UW-Madison faculty? My husband teaches philosophy there, and we'd had a commuting marriage for many, many years, raising our kids in Appleton, where I taught, while my husband taught two hours away in Madison. When UW offered me a job, I was eager to take it, since we could finally live together, and I would also have the chance to teach graduate students and work in a large, active department at a major university. And why did you return to Lawrence University? I found that I badly missed the opportunities Lawrence provided for very close relationships with both students and colleagues and the priority given to creating a strong, cohesive community. I also enjoy teaching at a place where there is a great deal of flexibility in my job description, where undergraduate teaching is a very high priority, and where I can very easily collaborate with colleagues in other disciplines. How does your work as a performer connect with your work as a teacher? As a performer I'm constantly trying to hear more accurately and imaginatively, create a better sound, play with less effort--and as a teacher I'm trying to help my students do the same things. Anything I figure out gets passed right along. What can you say about the current generation of music students? What do they bring to their college music education? How are they different from your peers in college? What are their ambitions? How are their career possibilities different from what yours were when you graduated college? I'm pretty happy with my current students. I actually find that because of all the technology out there they tend to be listening to more music than my students were 15 years ago, and that's great. On the other hand, I worry that they're so used to instant answers on the web that libraries are a bit unfamiliar to them--I'm always trying to send them over to delve in. Career possibilities for pianists have always been extraordinarily difficult--I'm not sure that's changed much, nor have the ambitions of my students. Since I teach only undergraduates now, I'd say that most of them are just trying hard to become the very best pianists they can, and not worrying too much quite yet about where they'll land. For the most part, I think that's quite healthy. A life in music is extremely unpredictable--you never know what talent or connection might land you somewhere, so about the best thing you can do when you're young is just get as good as possible at what you love! Have you ever performed in San Diego before? No, I have not. [Pianist and UCSD music faculty member] Aleck Karis and I knew each other about 30 years ago, when we were both young pianists in New York. More recently, we, very coincidentally, rented the same apartment in Paris (not at the same time!) when we both took our families for one year sabbaticals there, and we got in touch again at that point. Last year Aleck came to Lawrence and gave a wonderful recital and masterclass, so this is sort of the second half of that exchange. What do you still want to accomplish that you haven't done yet? Oh, there are infinite numbers of pieces I hope to still learn and perform (especially Schubert!), some solo some collaborative. I suppose that's the very highest priority, but I love writing, teaching, and lecturing as well--I'm not yet thinking of stopping any of those activities!

  

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December 16, 2011
DEC 16: NEWS OF THE WEEK

THE DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC'S WINTER 2012 CONCERT SERIES BLASTS OFF with pianist Catherine Kautsky's performance of Rzewski's Oscar Wilde-inspired De Profundis (January 12), followed by mezzo-soprano Leslie Leytham's premieres of music by grad-level composers Robert Pierzak and Martin Hiendl, and renowned percussionist Steve Reich's appearance with Bang on a Can All-stars and redfishbluefish. Reich's concert includes his Music for 18 Musicians, Clapping Music, and Electric Counterpoint. IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT, YOU NEED TO VISIT THE WEBSITE OF PHILIP LARSON AND ED HARKINS AND THEIR DUO, THE. During their long tenure at UCSD, Harkins (trumpeter, performance artist and emeritus faculty) and Larson (bass baritone and current faculty) have collaborated on many edgy, often hilarious performances. They provided a jolt at the gala opening concert of the Conrad Prebys Music Center in 2009. Now their work is archived, and one wonders what aliens will make of our culture when they land here and discover this stuff in 500 or 1000 years. FORMER UCSD MUSIC FACULTY AND MUSIC ALUM CHAYA CZERNOWIN, NOW ON THE HARVARD FACULTY, WILL BE IN RESIDENCE in the Department of Music in mid-February. Her visit will include a recording session and a Weds@7 concert on February 15. UCSD SITAR MASTER AND ADJUNCT MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER KARTIK SESHADRI PERFORMED IN INDIA RECENTLY. CONTRABASSIST AND MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER MARK DRESSER'S TRIO M WITH MYRA MELFORD AND MATT WILSON gets good vibes from San Diego Reader writer Robert Bush. PIANIST AND EMERITUS MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER CECIL LYTLE WILL LEAD A "JAZZ IN PARIS" TOUR next summer. Cecil, former provost of UCSD's Thurgood Marshall College, performs a "Jazz Gone Global" concert in our Conrad Prebys Concert Hall on Jan. 29 at 3 pm. The program includes... music inspired by Paris. UCSD ICAM STUDENT BOBBY BRAY HAS CREATED A NEW EFFECTS CONTROLLER BASED ON FACULTY MEMBER MILLER PUCKETTE'S PURE DATA SOFTWARE. PERCUSSIONIST AND UCSD MUSIC ALUM LISA TOLENTINO is making her mark in Arizona, where she is a Media Arts and Sciences doctoral candidate at Arizona State University. "My dissertation study is underway. I plan to defend in August. I have spent most of my time exploring empowerment through media technologies. Specifically - How can embodied and mediated technologies empower marginalized youth to explore and share their voices, so they are not simply present, but heard? To investigate this, I am collaborating with high school teachers, education researchers and media designers at the School of Arts, Media and Engineering (AME) at Arizona State University. My focus has been on using "mixed-reality" environments as part of special education curriculum, with a specific interest in youth with autism. I am working on an embodied media design theory that combines human-computer interaction, game design research, contemporary learning theory, and a critical/experimental arts practice. These last three years, my work in K-12 schools has taught me that "management aesthetics" dominate both classroom culture and technology for students with disabilities. This is not always a problem ... but I believe it prevents these students from reaching their full potential by denying them freedom of expression and creativity on a deep level. I am challenging this model by designing new media learning contexts that are both immersive and supportive enough to allow new shades of their identity to emerge. Aside from research ... [music alumnus] Robert Esler and I are members of an arts-technology collective, urbanSTEW. We perform, we make work, and we curate community-based events driven by socially transformative themes. On March 23-24, 2012, we will host the first "PLAY: A Digital Arts Festival" in Tempe, AZ. There will be performances, interactive installations, and public workshops by experimental musicians, dancers, and digital media artists. Many of our visiting musicians are from UCSD (Cristyn Magnus, NY-based composer/computer musician; Brett Reed with his new music ensemble Crossing′nd Street - playing with Rob and I) The festival is inspired by the lived experiences of people with disabilities. And it recognizes the role experimental arts practice can play in allowing us to revisit how we perceive, experience, and connect with each other."

December 09, 2011
DECEMBER 9: NEWS OF THE WEEK

UCSD COMPOSER CHINARY UNG'S MUSIC OF CHINARY UNG, VOL. 3 (with his wife Susan on viola, voice and percussion) has just been released by Bridge Records. COMPOSER AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY RAND STEIGER ATTENDED A PERFORMANCE OF GRAD COMPOSITION STUDENT ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR'S AERIALITY at Harpa Concert Center in Reykjavik, Iceland. Meanwhile, Anna's Hrim premiered in New York City, conducted by UCSD composition PhD candidate Nicholas DeMaison, on a program also including UCSD composer Philippe Manoury's Instants Pluriels. FACULTY MEMBER DAVID BORGO AND GRAD STUDENT JEFF KAISER'S recent performance at UCSD's The Loft nightclub earned props from San Diego Reader blogger Robert Bush, who dug Borgo and Kaiser's Kaiborg more than headliner Marco Benevento. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG HAS BEEN SIGNED BY SCHOTT MUSIC, which will have exclusive rights to publish his compositions. Lei is already part of Schott's digital publishing initiative Project Schott. Meanwhile, Lei's string orchestra piece Verge is going to be performed by the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra led by Jayce Ogren (Dec. 8) and by the Oberlin Contemporary Ensemble led by Timothy Weiss (Dec. 9). Finally, Lei recently lectured on his music at Lettere e Filosofia Università Roma Tre. UCSD MUSIC ALUMNUS TODD DAVIDSON has produced a new musical titled West Coast Cabaret and is raising funds via kickstarter.com DR. HENRY POWELL OF UCSD'S MED SCHOOL FACULTY IS A DEDICATED FOLLOWER OF CLASSICAL MUSIC who religiously attends our Camera Lucida concerts. Harry, as he is known to friends, reads voraciously and often recommends books. His latest suggestion is Stendhal's biography of Rossini: "I like the Rossini biography for the following reasons. Stendhal is one of my favorite authors; The Charterhouse of Parma is a book I really like. When I saw that he had written a book about Rossini I was eager to read it and the book did not disappoint. However, I had better point out before someone else does, that Stendhal also plagiarized other people's work. I learned this a couple of years ago when I found a book ostensibly by Stendhal on Mozart, Haydn and Metastasio.  I was excited to find the book but when I started to read it, was surprised to learn that my literary hero had not written the book, he had passed it off as his own. So now we come to Rossini. The book is criticized by music scholars for some inaccuracies.  However I stand by my recommendation of the chapter that describes how a small town in Italy in the early nineteenth century went about commissioning an opera, then the arrival of the composer, frantic efforts to get the score finished and printed before the singers arrive in town, then the arrival of the singers and the tensions and scandals before the work is finally performed.  What I love about the book is the fact that Stendhal, a French diplomat working in Italy managed to attend the first nights of many of Rossini's operas.  Hence the value and charm of the chapter I cite. BACH COLLEGIUM (INCLUDING SOPRANO AND UCSD MUSIC ALUM ANNE-MARIE DICCE) performs Gauteti's Motels and Carols: Old and New, Dec. 16 at 7:30 pm at St. James by the Sea Episcopal Church in La Jolla (743 Prospect St.), and Dec. 17 at St. Andrews Episcopal Church in Pacific Beach (1050 Thomas Ave.).

November 23, 2011
NEWS OF THE WEEK: NOVEMBER 23

UCSD FACULTY COMPOSER KATHARINA ROSENBERGER's Scatter 2.0 is included on Hat Hut Records' Women Composers I. The piece will be performed in March by the San Francisco Contemporary Players, directed by UCSD's Steven Schick. Katharina's portrait CD with Wet Ink Ensemble, also on Hat Hut, will be released next spring. GRAD-LEVEL RESEARCHER GRACE LESLIE has been working with neuroscientist and music PhD alumnus Scott Makeig running EEG experiments to analyze the brain activity of music listeners as they are engaged in listening and expressing movement. Her project is based at UCSD's Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience. MUSIC ALUMNUS AAKAASH ISRANI'S MULTIMEDIA WORK KASHMIR HAD ITS WORLD PREMIERE at the Fundaçao Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art in Porto, Portugal, and will be performed in NYC next spring. FORMER LA JOLLA PLAYHOUSE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR DES McANUFF is directing a new production of Faust at New York's Metropolitan Opera. AND AT THE PLAYHOUSE: PHISH GUITARST AND FOUNDER TREY ANASTASIO is developing his new musical Hands on a Hardbody. R.I.P.: JAZZ DRUMMER PAUL MOTIAN CLASSICAL MUSIC BUSTS FREE FROM THE CONCERT HALL

November 21, 2011
JEFF KAISER CONDUCTS HIS POWERHOUSE OCKODEKTET

Jeff Kaiser directed his Ockodektet in a smashing, humor-seasoned concert of his original music on November 19, in honor of his 50th birthday. Kaiser, a grad-level composer and trumpeter, assembled an all-star crew for the program he titled 132350, including saxophonists Vinny Golia and David Borgo, contrabassist Mark Dresser, trombonist Michael Dessen and many more. Conrad Prebys Concert Hall at UCSD was packed, and the evening did not disappoint. New music blogger Robert Bush, who has become a close follower of the department of music, gave the concert a prompt and upbeat review.

  

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November 18, 2011
NEWS OF THE WEEK: NOVEMBER 18

RENOWNED SOPRANO AND UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER SUSAN NARUCKI joined ASKO/Schoenberg and conductor Pierre-André Vallade for the world premiere of Arbre généalogique a twenty-five minute work for soprano, large ensemble and electronics by Dutch composer Rozalie Hirs. The piece was performed in Amsterdam's Muziekgebouw on November 10 as part of the PROMS series, in the Dutch festival, November Music in Den Bosch. UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG'S MUSIC HAS BEEN SELECTED FOR SCHOTT NEW YORK's pilot project utilizing digital media (former UCSD faculty Chaya Czernowin and Joji Yuasa are also published by Schott). UCSD ALUM COMPOSER RICHARD CARRICK'S SCORES are also part of Schott's digital publishing venture. Carrick moderated a panel discussion at the recent concert of George Lewis's music in New York City. ITALY'S SOUNDSCAPE FESTIVAL ANNOUNCED THAT LEI LIANG will be guest composer and UCSD music alumnus Josh Levine will be composer-in-residence. The festival takes place in Maccagno from July 4 to July 16. UCSD FACULTY MEMBER JOHN FONVILLE, ADJUNCT FACULTY TAKAE OHNISHI, GRAD GUITARIST PABLO GOMEZ, AND ALUMNUS JANE RIGLER perform on Lei Liang's new CD Milou. MILOU EARNS AN EXCELLENT REVIEW FROM ITALY'S PERCORSI MUSICALI. Here's a translated excerpt: "The new generation of composers (Tan Dun, Chen Yi, Sheng, et al.) have bridged the cultural gap with the West by inserting new connecting elements, but there is one who is trying to do much more: creating contemporary music without barriers and taking into account the intrinsic cultural elements of a country are only one part of the formula. Lei Liang (b. 1972) represents this new dimension of cultured music...[sic] With Liang you certainly are not faced with a product of stylistic mediation between East and West. Liang is contemporary, and he takes the theories of Cage and of the New York School as his first working level, passing freely through the many elements that comprise that school...[sic] He makes cultural references with such discretion that in the end one appreciates it more for the wide range of solutions employed. In the space of freedom opened naturally by contemporary composition, Liang manages to travel magnificently giving instruments a language all their own that affirms not only its prerogatives of highly intense technique but that also affirms their engaging sense of the mysterious and transcendental that does not pass forcibly for modern western theory: it is a sort of new age spirituality, but one that has a strength of definition and an entirely serious modernism...[sic] His music is at the same time both abstract and sensitive and is made up of a thousand trajectories condensed into appealing and ultra-modern sounds." UCSD'S STEVEN SCHICK CONDUCTED A "LEAN AND ELEGANT" PROGRAM IN SAN FRANCISCO, according to San Francisco Chronicle music critic Joshua Kosman.

November 17, 2011
PALIMPSEST ENSEMBLE MAKES MUSIC FROM NEW YORK

Palimpsest, the department's new music ensemble, gave a mesmerizing concert of Music from New York on November 16, conducted by Aleck Karis and featuring ace grad-level players. One highlight was Milton Babbitt's Between Categories, a delicate duel between matching quartets flanking the stage. Karis conducted on the right, Steven Schick on the left (see photo). Stefan Wolpe's Chamber Piece No. 2 for thirteen players bookended the program, opening and closing. Alongside Babbitt's music were compositions by Davidovsky, Babbitt, Feldman, and Elliott Carter, who turns 103 on Dec. 11 and is still going strong. Amid these renowned masters came our grad composer Paul Hembree with Nimbus for chamber orchestra, a rich and powerful work that provided sharp contrast to New York minimalism. The audience included Seth Lerer, dean of arts and humanities, as well as several faculty and music grad students plus dozens of undergrads exploring new music for class assignments. Palimpsest's performance is part of our 2011-2012 Wednesdays@7 series showcasing new and experimental music, as well as rarely heard (in San Diego) world-renowned performers including sitar master and music faculty member Kartik Seshadri.

  

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November 14, 2011
UNION-TRIBUNE PROFILE: PHILIPPE MANOURY

UCSD Composer Philippe Manoury is profiled by music writer Jim Chute in the Nov. 11 edition of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Chute covers Manoury's long association with IRCAM, the French center for experimental music, where he has worked with fellow UCSD faculty member Miller Puckette as well as renowned pioneers such as Pierre Boulez. Manoury says he is confident audiences will appreciate new music if given the chance.

  

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November 14, 2011
NEW YORK TIMES: SCHICK LEADS GEORGE LEWIS TRIBUTE

Esteemed New York Times writer Steve Smith reviewed last Saturday's tribute to composer and former UCSD music faculty member George Lewis at Columbia University's Miller Theatre. Smith gave an upbeat account, praising Lewis's "prodigious imagination and persuasive skill". UCSD's Steven conducted ICE (the International Contemporary Ensemble, including UCSD music/visual arts alumnus Ross Karre), and performed North Star Boogaloo, composed for Schick by Lewis in 1996.

  

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November 10, 2011
NEWS OF THE WEEK: NOV. 10

UCSD FLUTIST BERGLIND TOMASDOTTIR's Home as in Heima is part of Studio: Fall 2011 at L.A.'s REDCAT on Nov. 19 and 20. Berglind's score for flute and electronic processing accompanies her collection of family films. IN HIS FIRST SEASON AS ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF THE SAN FRANCISCO CONTEMPORARY PLAYERS, UCSD FACULTY MEMBER STEVEN SCHICK has commissioned ten chamber works from an international group of distinguished composers including Chou Wen-chung, George Crumb, Lei Liang, Koji Nakano, Gabriela Ortiz, Elena Ruehr, Laurie San Martin, Ken Ueno, Du Yun, and Agata Zubel. The new music will premiere during the 2014-2015 season. SCHICK AND MUSIC/VISARTS ALUMNUS ROSS KARRE take the stage Nov. 12 at the Composer Portraits concert showcasing the music of former UCSD music faculty member George Lewis at Columbia University's Miller Theatre. Ross is a percussionist and video artist with ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble). Also part of the performance: poet and former UCSD faculty member Quincy Troupe. UCSD COMPOSER AND THEATRE FACULTY MEMBER SHAHROKH YADEGARI'S Scarlet Stone, based on a poem by Siavash Kasrai and Shahnameh by Ferdowsi, will be performed Nov. 19 at 8 pm at UCSD's Mandell Weiss Forum, and Dec. 10 and 11 at the UCLA's Freud Playhouse. UCSD MUSIC ALUM AND SOPRANO STEFANIE ASTON sings the lead in John Adams' A Flowering Tree (2006) with Riverside Lyric Opera on Nov. 11 at 8 pm. Undergrad vocalist Mariya Kaganskaya is in the chorus. UCSD COMPOSITION ALUMNUS ADAM GREENE has been invited to contribute his work to a project spearheaded by UCSD music alumnus Reiko Manabe and her ensemble "mmm..." called "hibari" that endeavors to bring hope, awareness, and funds to the people affected by the tragic Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in March, 2011. The project includes short works by 100 composers from around the world, and the ensemble is releasing two recordings online each week. This week you can hear my piece for alto flute, called Ripples, performed by the amazing Reiko Manabe. Please follow the link below to the hibari website, where you can learn more about the project and make a donation. All the performers, engineers, editors, and designers have donated their time and donations go directly to people in need. UCSD COMPOSER ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR's Rhizoma was New York classical radio station Q2's Album of the Week. The honor spotlights "compelling new recordings". The station also offered a free download of Anna's chamber work Hrím, which was awarded Composition of the Year at this year's Icelandic Music Awards. Rhizoma was released on October 25th by Innova Recordings and has been very well received. The CD includes three large pieces for orchestra and chamber orchestra, punctuated by five smaller movements from a solo percussed piano work. The works are performed by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra conducted by Daniel Bjarnason, the Icelandic CAPUT Ensemble conducted by Snorri Sigfus Birgisson, and percussionist Justin DeHart. The album is released by American new music label Innova Recordings and is distributed by Naxos. Smekkleysa (Bad Taste Records) distributes the album in Iceland".   ACOUSTICIAN ASHTON TAYLOR, WHO PLAYED A MAJOR PART IN THE€OUSTICAL DESIGN OF CONRAD PREBYS MUSIC CENTER, spends his spare time building beautiful custom guitars. Ashton is also a fair player himself who performs with the group Taylor Made. Ashton was in San Diego recently for the Acoustical Society of America's annual meeting and he joined Department of Music faculty member Rand Steiger in showing off our concert hall to the visiting sound professionals. ARTIST DO SUH'S Fallen Star is schedule be hoisted 100 feet to its perch atop Jacobs Hall engineering building on Nov. 15. The small picket-fenced house will teeter at the edge of the seven-story building's roof. FOUND HORIZON: STRAVINSKY IN L.A.'S PROGRESSIVE MUSIC SCENE 1949-1964 is a concert on Nov.— at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, celebrating the composer's significant impact on music in Southern California. Stravinsky was part of an important group of artists who fled Hitler's Europe for California. That scene also included Ernst Krenek, who in the mid-sixties advised Muir College Provost John Stewart to hire Krenek's protégés Will Ogdon, Robert Erickson, and Thomas Nee as our Department's founeding faculty. Some music historians assert that Krenek had a significant influence on Stravinsky's 12-tone system

November 04, 2011
NEWS OF THE WEEK: NOV. 4

UCSD MUSIC FACULTY MEMBER JANN PASLER (photo, at left) is off to a busy Fall: On Nov. 4 she's the invited speaker for the University of Ottawa Department of Music's Colloquium Series. Nov. 5-6, she'll attend the university's International Conference on Interwar French Music to present her paper: "L'Initiation a la musique (1&Gammaε): Politics and music for radio listeners." On Nov. 11 at the national meeting of the American Musicological Society in San Francisco, Jann will present "Performing Frenchness: Music at the Colonial Edge." Nov. 24-26 she will attend the International Conference Bruxelles ou la convergence des arts (1880-1914) in Brussels. She'll present "Correspondances, le rêve, et l'extase: la musique et la synesthésie dans les Cinq Poèmes de Baudelaire et Debussy." She's the invited speaker on Nov. 30 at the Institut des Sciences politique; on Dec. 1 at the Université de Strasbourg; and on Dec. 7 at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland. She's also the keynote speaker at the Dec. 8-10 Radical Music History Conference at the Sibelius Academy. FORMER UCSD FACULTY COMPOSER PAULINE OLIVEROS requests your vote for her Adaptive Use Musical Instruments (AUMI) project in a Pepsi-sponsored contest that carries a $50,000 prize. Dozens of projects are competing. Should Pauline's project win, she pledges to use the money to bring AUMI's drum circle to two schools, hospitals, or centers in the U.S. who can demonstrate a commitment to sustaining the project. UCSD ALUMNUS, FORMER FACULTY, AND COMPOSER CHAYA CZERNOWIN's Lovesong was premiered Oct. 3 by Red Light New Music Ensemble at NYC's Symphony Space, with another performance by the Ensemble Dal Neinte on Oct. 20 in Evanston, IL. UCSD EMERITUS FACULTY MEMBER AND CONTRABASSIST BERT TURETZKY performed on Oct. 29 at the Soka BluePort Jazz Festival in L.A., in a duo with spoken word artist Chuck Perrin (who owns Dizzy's jazz club in downtown San Diego). On Nov.• Bert's California Consort performs music by Beethoven and Kreutzer at Dizzy's (2nd and J, San Diego Wine & Culinary Center on the ground floor of Harbor Club Towers). MUSIC ALUMNUS RICHARD CARRICK IS VISITING PROFESSOR this year at Columbia University, where he's teaching individual lessons to graduate students and co-teaching the graduate composition seminar with former UCSD music faculty member George Lewis. Another bit of good news: Carrick received the Fromm Foundation Commission for 2011. SEVERAL UCSD FACULTY AND ALUMNI ARE FEATURED in the Pacific Standard Time festival in Los Angeles, a celebration of the Southern California art scene, 1945-1980. SAN DIEGO GUITARIST AND UCSD JAZZ CAMP FACULTY MEMBER is performing with jazz vocalist Dianne Reeves at Tokyo's Blue Note and Cotton Club this month.

October 31, 2011
THIS WEEK IN MUSIC: NEWS

MUSIC ALUMNUS PAUL DRESHER'S ENSEMBLE PERFORMS THE WORLD PREMIERE of Light Moves on November 3-5 at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. The performance is a collaboration with choreographer Margaret Jenkins, as well as multimedia artist Naomie Kremer and poet Michael Palmer to create a synthesis of dance, moving images, live music and text, inspired by the natural cycles of light. www.mjdc.org CONRAD PREBYS (OUR MUSIC CENTER AND CONCERT HALL'S NAMING DONOR) AND SAM ERSAN (WHOSE GENEROUS SUPPORT MAKES OUR CAMERA LUCIDA SERIES POSSIBLE) both attended last Monday's Camera Lucida concert. After the concert, there was birthday cake for Ersan and for San Diego Symphony violinist Jeff Thayer. UCSD FACULTY COMPOSER AND PIANIST ANTHONY DAVIS PERFORMS AS A MEMBER OF WADADA LEO SMITH'S GOLDEN QUARTET at Redcat in Los Angeles on October 28 and 29 at 8 PM and Sunday October 30th at 7Π0 PM. The music is Smith's sweeping Ten Freedom Summers, inspired by the African-American civil rights experience through the 20th century. It's a work that Southwest Chamber Group Artistic Director Jeff von der Schmidt refers to the "African-American equivalent of Wagner's Ring Cycle." Southwest Chamber Group joins the Golden Quartet for the performance. http://www.redcat.org/event/ten-freedom-summers THE FORMALIST QUARTET (INCLUDING UCSD CELLIST ASHLEY WALTERS) does Wadada Leo Smith's music on Dec. 10 at Beyond Baroque Literary/Arts Center in Venice, CA. http://www.beyondbaroque.org/events.html SITAR MASTER AND UCSD FACULTY MEMBER KARTIK SESHADRI looks ahead to dates in the most prestigious venues in the U.S and India. Nov. 18: Kalakendra Society for Performing Arts of India, Portland, OR. Dec 9: Sawai Gandharva Festival, Pune, India. Dec. 21: Andhra Music Academy, Hyderabad, India. Jan. 1: SAPTAK, Ahmedabad, India. Jan.–: U.C. Riverside. Feb. 4: World Music Institute, Symphony Space, New York. GRAD-LEVEL FLUTIST BERGLIND TOMASDOTTIR'S INSTALLATION/PERFORMANCE is part of the Oct. 29, 6-10 pm Hell House: A Sinful Twist on the Haunted House, at Space 4 Art in downtown San Diego (325 15th Ave.). Her work is "inspired by an Icelandic folksong about a singing ghost baby". http://www.sdspace4art.org/2011/10/october-29-2011/ https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eidϒ26296924097676 http://berglindtomasdottir.com/2011/10/24/307/ MUSIC ALUMNUS, COMPOSER AND CONTRABASSIST JAMES ILGENFRITZ' NEW OPERA The Ticket That Exploded hits the stage at Brooklyn's Issue Project Room, where Ilgenfritz is artist-in-residence. The opera is based on William Burroughs' 1962 dystopian novel about identity disintegration, oppression of humanity's collective consciousness through technological influence, and revolution through the subversion of those very technologies. UCSD composer Nick DeMaison conducts, and his fellow music grad student Jason Ponce contributes video art and live processing. http://jamesilgenfritz.com/ http://www.issueprojectroom.org/ COMPOSITION ALUMNUS RICK BIDLACK showed an installation titled Clang on Oct. 21 and Oct.• at Gallery—12 in Seattle. Clang is also the name of Bidlack's sound-and-color software, which he has been developing for 30 years. Bidlack runs Signals and Noises music and audio software in Seattle, WA. http://www.gallery1412.org/ http://www.signalsandnoises.com/ COMPUTER MUSIC PhD CANDIDATE CHRIS WARREN AND INTEGRATIVE STUDIES PhD CANDIDATE JAMES GORDON WILLIAMS present and perform at the (Re)thinking Improvisations conference next month at Malmö Academy of Music, Lund University, Sweden. EMERITUS FACULTY MEMBER AND PIANIST CECIL LYTLE'S documentary Liszt in the World kicked off the Visions of Liszt festival on Oct. 17. http://www.browndailyherald.com/classic-rock-festival-honors-liszt-1.2657764

  

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October 17, 2011
STEVEN SCHICK HONORED BY MATA FOR COMMITMENT TO NEW MUSIC

Conductor, percussionist and UCSD music faculty member Steven Schick is being honored for his support of emerging composers and contemporary music by Music at the Anthology (MATA), a New York organization devoted to promoting young composers. Schick will be recognized along with Ara Guzelimian (dean and provost at Juilliard) at MATA's annual Benefit Gala on October 18 at the Chelsea Art Museum in New York City. The event, hosted by composer David Lang, includes special performances by cellist Maya Beiser, sound artist Joan La Barbara, and the International Contemporary Ensemble, as well as by Schick, who will play Vinko Globokar's solo percussion piece Toucher. "I'm so pleased about this," Schick says. "I've commissioned or premiered well over one hundred new works, mostly for percussion, and I'm honored to be associated with MATA, which stands so firmly behind the newest music by young composers." MATA was founded in 1996 by Philip Glass, Eleonor Sandresky, and Lisa Bielawa. It has commissioned more than 61 works and presented 263 performances of music by young composers during its annual spring festival and at other concerts. Schick is a genuine global ambassador for new music. He is internationally renowned as both a percussionist and composer. He directs UCSD's resident percussion ensemble RED FISH BLUE FISH, which recently premiered British composer James Dillon's epic Nine Rivers at Columbia University's Miller Theatre. He is artistic director of La Jolla Symphony & Chorus and has brought in renowned composers such as Glass and John Luther Adams for premieres of their music. Schick was also recently appointed artistic director of the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, and their new season is getting rave reviews. Schick's recordings include a definitive multi CD collection of percussion music by revolutionary Greek composer Iannis Xenakis. And this year, he will direct RED FISH BLUE FISH's recording of most of the percussion music written by John Cage. Cage's music, as well as Dillon's East 11th Street, are on the program for the percussion ensemble's Nov. 17, 8 pm concert at UCSD's Conrad Prebys Music Center.

  

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October 12, 2011
NANCY GUY LECTURES IN TAIWAN

Ethnomusicologist Nancy Guy, who specializes in the music of Taiwan and China, is the Keynote speaker on Oct. 21 at the Taiwan Musicology Forum meeting in Hsinchu, Taiwan. Guy's talk is titled "Magic in Performance: Beverly Sills in the Moment as a Case Study," an offshoot of Guy's ongoing research for her book about the legendary opera singer. Guy will also give a joint research presentation at the Hakka College of National Chiaotung University with Larry Tse-Hsiung Lin, a grad-level Ph.D. candidate in UCSD Department of Music's Integrative Studies program. Their presentation is titled, "Hakka Contributions to Taiwan's Environmental Music." And, at the Graduate Institute of Musicology at National Taiwan University in Taipei, Guy will present "Experiencing Beverly Sills as Anna Bolena: An Ethnomusicologically-Inspired Recovery Effort." Guy is the author of Peking Opera and Politics in Taiwan (University of Illinois Press, 2005).

October 12, 2011
GUARDIAN ANGEL STEPS UP TO SUPPORT CLASSICAL MUSIC AT UCSD

Thanks to the generous support of San Diego entrepreneur Sam Ersan, the Department of Music presents the critically acclaimed Camera Lucida chamber music series. Since creating the Sam B. Ersan Chamber Music Fund in 2008, Mr. Ersan has contributed $840,000 to Camera Lucida, which features principal soloists from San Diego Symphony with renowned UCSD faculty players and special guest musicians. With the fourth season of Camera Lucida underway, UCSD news writer Kristin Luciani profiles the generous philanthropist and the chamber concerts made possible by his passion for classical music.

  

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September 30, 2011
SOUND CHECK: DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC CD SERIES AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD

Sound Check, the Department of Music's annual CD of music composed and performed by top graduate students, is now available for free download (as well is in traditional CD format). Each of four volumes has been curated by a faculty member. So far, curators have included Charles Curtis, Miller Puckette, David Borgo, and Philippe Manoury. The music is recorded, mixed, and mastered in the department's state-of-the-art studios at UC San Diego. To obtain a Sound Check CD, send an e-mail to publicity@music.ucsd.edu. Specify which volume you want, and please provide your name and mailing address.

  

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September 30, 2011
CAMERA LUCIDA OPENS 2011-2012 SEASON ON OCT. 3

Camera Lucida, the critically acclaimed chamber series opens the 2011-2012 season on October 3 at 7:30 p.m. with a program of music by Schubert, Mozart and Chausson. The series features outstanding solo instrumentalists of the San Diego Symphony such as violinist Jeff Thayer and violist Che-Yen Chen alongside UCSD performance faculty like cellist Charles Curtis plus special guests from the international chamber music world. Blending the precision and cohesiveness of an established ensemble with widely varying instrumentation, Camera Lucida is the leading San Diego chamber music project, presenting fresh and expressive performances in the intimate and acoustically refined setting of UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Season subscriptions offer a substantial savings over single tickets. All concerts air on KPBS-FM (89.5, or streaming at kpbs.org) at 7 p.m. on the Saturday following each concert.

September 20, 2011
COMPOSER AND MUSIC ALUM LARRY GROUPE SCORES "STRAW DOGS" REMAKE

Larry Groupe, who earned his grad degree in composition from the Department of Music, wrote the score for the recently released film "Straw Dogs", a remake of the cult classic 1971 film directed by Sam Peckinpah. Groupe says the knowledge of modern and experimental music he gained from UCSD music faculty members such as Will Ogdon, Bernard Rands, Pauline Oliveros informs his film music. Groupe believes his music for "Straw Dogs" is his best film score yet.

  

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May 27, 2011
UCSD LAUNCHES NEW MUSIC SOCIETY

Known for its cutting-edge technology and innovative spirit, it's no surprise that UC San Diego is at the forefront of defining 21st century music. From original chamber operas to computer music, our musicians are at the frontier of new music, and it's an exciting time of possibilities for the university as well as the San Diego community. To support exploration of this new frontier, UCSD's Department of Music has launched the New Music Society to engage, challenge and inspire patrons with insider experiences in the four areas of the department's mission: Performance, Composition, Computer Music and Integrative Studies.         Members of the New Music Society participate in a dynamic, creative and passionate environment with the artists who are defining what's next in music. Through events such as New Music 101 and the Meet the Musician series, members will be exposed to various intellectual tools that will assist them in their interpretation and appreciation of new music. In addition, society members will receive two pairs of complimentary concert tickets per quarter, discounts to concerts throughout the year, recognition in concert programs and on the department website, invitations to special events, access to an online social networking community and an opportunity to host salon events at their home. With a membership gift of $1,000, New Music Society members will support innovation and experimentation among faculty and students. All proceeds from the society will help fund essential needs of the department, including student scholarships, guest lecturers or performers, and instrument maintenance. Like Mozart or John Cage, innovative composers today need patrons who are willing to become ambassadors for their art. The New Music Society provides an engaging forum to explore the innovative culture of new music on the UC San Diego campus. For more information about joining the New Music Society contact Frank Teplin at (858) 534-9050 or fteplin@ucsd.edu.

May 26, 2011
ROGER REYNOLDS' 1968 COMPOSITION PING IS RESTORED FOR 2011

More than 40 years after the premiere of UC San Diego composer Roger Reynolds innovative intermedia work PING, the piece has been restored and updated with new technologies. The new production of Reynolds' 1968 composition for flute, piano, percussion, harmonium, live electronics, and projected moving and still images will be performed May 27 at 8 pm at UCSD's Conrad Prebys Music Center. The concert is free and open to the public. Coinciding with the performance, The UCSD Libraries present "Ping Migration," an exhibit through June 10 in the Geisel Library's ground-floor Arts Library . PING is named for Samuel Beckett's short story of the same title. Beckett's text is projected using a series of slides produced by Reynolds' wife Karen, a musician and typographical designer. The text is not spoken or sung. Reynolds originally collaborated with several other important artists including Beckett, Akaji Maro (butoh dancer), and Kazuro Kato (cinematography). Kato had worked with famed Japanese director Akira Kurosawa and was recommended to Reynolds by fellow composer Toru Takemitsu. At the heart of PING is a short 16mm film scripted, scored and directed by Reynolds, featuring images of Maro. The film was restored by UCSD music alumnus and MFA student Ross Karre with assistance from The UCSD Libraries. Karre also produced a new documentary "Ping Migration," about the process of restoring the original work. Reynolds collaborated with UCSD music Ph.D. student Paul Hembree to add digitally-generated sounds to PING's original score. As part of the May 27 event, UCSD flutist and music grad student Rachel Beetz' will perform Reynolds' "Transfigured Wind" (1984). The concert is being promoted with Karen Reynolds' original hand-designed poster as updated by Karre. PING premiered in Tokyo at Takemitsu's "Orchestral Space '68" festival. It was performed at UCSD the same year (when Reynolds was a Regents Lecturer) as part of a national tour, alongside works by then-UCSD music faculty member Pauline Oliveros; and repeated in a Japanese-English version for a crowd of 3,500 at the CROSS TALK INTERMEDIA Festival in Japan in 1969 together with compositions by Robert Ashley, Salvatore Martirano, Gordon Mumma, Takemitsu, and Joji Yuasa. In the 43 years since PING's debut, technology, performance practice, intermedia collaboration methods, and Reynolds' own aesthetic foundation have changed in fascinating ways, as documented in the library exhibit and Karre's film. Some changes were so profound (such as the decay of the original 16mm film print) that they had prohibited the piece from performance. Now, the process of migrating the piece to new digital media has given it new life and opened doors to new additions which were planned for the original but never realized. The UCSD Libraries are working with Reynolds and Karre to digitize PING excerpts and creative materials for the library's Digital Library Collections website. The materials include compositional sketches and diagrams, films, interviews with Reynolds, and photographs from both the 1968 UCSD performance and a recent recording session.

May 13, 2011
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE PROFILES UCSD COMPOSER CHINARY UNG

In the latest in his series of articles about UC San Diego composers, Union-Tribune arts writer James Chute takes an in-depth look at the life and music of Chinary Ung, whose ethereal compositions draw from a variety of Eastern traditions and techniques.

  

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May 02, 2011
MILLER PUCKETTE'S PURE DATA MUSIC SOFTWARE

Music faculty member Miller Puckette's innovative Pure Data music software rarely receives attention from the general media, but San Diego Citybeat, the independent weekly, recently published a lengthy feature. Pure Data also appears prominently in Western Spaghettification, a review of Icam major Bobby Bray's band Innerds.

  

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April 29, 2011
REVIEWED: MARK DRESSER'S TELEMATICS

Mark Dresser's recent Net Works concert at Calit2 earned a thoughtful review from San Diego music writer Robert Bush, for the leading jazz website allaboutjazz.com. Bush has written several articles about Dresser's telematic concerts, and is becoming somewhat of an authority on these performances that link musicians in multiple locations via high-speed internet.

  

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April 15, 2011
UCSD COMPOSER LEI LIANG AWARDED ROME PRIZE

UC San Diego composer Lei Liang has been awarded the prestigious Rome Prize. The award, announced April—, is given by the American Academy in Rome each year to approximately 30 artists and scholars, who spend six months to two years at the academy working on new projects. Liang will devote his time in Rome to finishing a chamber concerto for longtime collaborator Stephen Drury and the New Music Ensemble at the New England Conservatory of Music; and a sextet commissioned by the Southwest Chamber Music ensemble with the Cicada Chamber Music Players. He may also be inspired to conceive new music. "They told me I can be very flexible as to which projects I pursue," Liang said. "Lei Liang exemplifies the creativity, innovation and diverse talent at UC San Diego," said Chancellor Marye Anne Fox.  "We are proud of him and his work, and congratulate him on receiving this well-deserved, prestigious prize." Liang joined the UCSD music faculty in 2007 as an assistant professor and was promoted to tenured associate professor in 2010. His career has since been on a steady upward trajectory. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2009, for "stellar achievement and exceptional promise." A CD of his composition "Brush-Stroke," conducted by Drury and with such performers as the Arditti Quartet, was released in 2009. In early April this year, a CD of Liang's "Milou" was issued by New World Records. On April— his composition "Tremors of a Memory Chord" commissioned by the Taipei Chinese Orchestra, premiered at Taipei's National Concert Hall. "It received a standing ovation from almost 2000 people," said Liang, who attended the concert. "It was one of the most rewarding experiences of my career." The New York Times has called Liang's music "hauntingly beautiful and sonically colorful," while The Wire magazine referred to Liang as "one of the most exciting voices in New Music," and the Washington Post described a Liang composition as "brilliantly original and inarguably gorgeous." Schott Music, a prestigious music publisher specializing in contemporary classical music, will publish a saxophone quartet composed by Liang later this spring, which will make the piece widely available for performance. "That piece is about the history of injustice in China and the people who have sacrificed," said Liang. "I was born into the Cultural Revolution, 1966 to 1976, and was denied access to older traditions of art forms in China. As a teenager, I participated in mass demonstrations and witnessed the bloodshed in Tiananmen Square. "I made a personal effort to acquire knowledge of traditional Chinese culture by studying and copying classics, sutras, and treatises on paintings by hand. I think of this effort as a way to break down a modern Great Wall that separates me from my own heritage. Thirty years ago, when I was a student living in Beijing, China was dominated by political tyranny. Today, it is dominated by the tyranny of politics and commercialism." Liang is married to harpsichordist Takae Ohnishi, an adjunct faculty member in UCSD's music department. Their son Albert is 20 months old. Liang's family will accompany him to Rome in September. "There are very few fellowships that accommodate the whole family, and for me this is a very important part of the Rome Prize."

  

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April 12, 2011
LEI LIANG: UNION-TRIBUNE PROFILE EXPLORES HIS ROOTS AND MUSIC

In the latest of his series on UC San Diego composers, San Diego Union-Tribune arts writer Jim Chute takes a detailed look at Lei Liang's music and how it evolved from Lei's early hardships growing up under the oppressive Chinese government. Chute, a superb writer who holds a degree in music, is the first journalist ever to devote intensive time, energy, and news space to the works that place UCSD at the cutting edge of new and innovative music. The online version of his article includes samples of Lei's music, and a fantastic photo of Lei taken by the U-T's Howard Lipin. In this era of rapidly shrinking arts coverage, you can e-mail Union-Tribune Editor Jim Light to remind him of the importance of arts content: james.light@uniontrib.com

  

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April 04, 2011
NEW BOX OFFICE OPENS: BUY TICKETS IN PERSON OR BY PHONE

For the first time, music fans can enjoy the convenience of purchasing advance tickets for Department of Music concerts from the department's own dedicated box office at Conrad Prebys Music Center. Tickets for Spring 2011 concerts go on sale beginning March 30. Box Office hours are Tuesdays, 11 AM to 3 PM; and Wednesdays through Fridays, 2:30 PM to 5:30 PM. Tickets are also available by phone during the same hours. The Box Office phone number is (858) 534-3448. Additionally, tickets can be purchased at the door beginning one hour before each concert. Conrad Prebys Music Center is located near the intersection of Russell Lane and Gilman Drive, across from Gilman Parking Structure. From Interstate 5, take the La Jolla Village Drive exit, go west, turn right on Villa La Jolla Drive and follow it straight into Gilman Parking Structure.

  

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March 21, 2011
SOUND CHECK FIVE: DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC RELEASES NEW CD

New and innovative music by UC San Diego Department of Music graduate students is showcased on Sound Check Five, the department's new CD. Curated by faculty composer Philippe Manoury, the CD includes works by current and former students: Benjamin Hackbarth, Vincent Raikhel, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Martin Hiendl, and Paul Hembree. Performing the pieces are more than a dozen music graduate students, plus faculty "ringers" including conductors Steven Schick and Aleck Karis and clarinetist Robert Zelickman. The music ranges from Hackbarth's 23-minute  Crumbling Walls and Wandering Rocks, performed by a 10-piece ensemble, to Raikhel's Mobius Ascent, for solo violin, Thorvaldsdottir's Hidden for solo percussion, Hiendl's Erwartung and Traumverlust for solo mezzo-soprano, and Hembree's Passion, performed by a five-piece group. "I'm impressed with the tremendous variety and quality of the music," said Miller Puckette, chairman of the music department. "The CD provides evidence of the department's success as an incubator for the next generation of composers and performers." Many of the composers are already well known for their music. Hackbarth is currently composer-in-residence for musical research at IRCAM (the Institute for Research and Coordination Acoustic/Music), a famed center for experimental music in Paris. His music has been performed by the Arditti Quartet and the Wet Ink Ensemble, and at venues in Stuttgart, Sydney, New York, Freiburg, and many other cities. Raikhel is a co-founder of the Red Light New Music series and ensemble based in New York City. He often draws inspiration from the natural environment. Some of his works venture beyond music and find expression as multimedia installations. Thorvaldsdottir has made a mark as one of Iceland's leading composers. Her music has been performed at prominent venues in Prague, Vienna, and in several Icelandic cities. The Iceland Symphony Orchestra has recorded three of her compositions. "Having a piece selected for the CD is a great opportunity to have my work presented," said Ms. Thorvaldsdottir. "Hidden is written for percussionist performing on grand piano. I wanted to compose a piece for the inside of the instrument and decided to write it for a percussionist because I became fascinated with the sound of multiple mallets playing on the piano strings." The CD provides an opportunity for UCSD composers and performers to document some of their best work. It leaves a record of their work at UCSD after they graduate and serves as a "calling card" in the future. "When I finish my degree I plan to continue working as a freelance composer," Thorvaldsdottir said. Sound Check Five was recorded, mixed and mastered in the Department of Music's state of the art studios. The CD is free and available for download, and in old-school format by request. Send an e-mail including your mailing address to: publicity@ucsd.edu.

February 18, 2011
RAND STEIGER HONORED BY ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS

Composer Rand Steiger, a member of U.C. San Diego's music faculty, has won the 2011 Walter Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. The award is "for the publication of a work by a gifted American composer." It was established in 1984 by music publisher C.F. Peters Corporation, which will publish a new work to be written by Steiger. While Steiger has not yet begun composing the new work , a 2009 review of his "Cryosphere" by New York Times critic Steve Smith gives an idea of the intertwining of instruments and technology in Steiger's music. "In Rand Steiger's achingly lovely 'Cryosphere' Mr. Steiger and Miller Puckette [also a UCSD faculty member] used computers to manipulate sounds meant to evoke the formation and dissolution of glaciers and icebergs. Rolling cymbals stretched into enveloping hums that swirled around the hall. Clattering vibraslaps and brittle synthesizer notes ricocheted; long tones wobbled through microtonal inflections. The effect was like sitting in a huge, resonant Tibetan prayer bowl." Steiger is currently composer-in-residence at UCSD's Calit2 (the California Insitute for Telecommunications and Information Technology) where he is at work on music for solo instruments and electronics for the International Contemporary Ensemble. Growing up in New York, Steiger played drums in a rock band, as well as percussion in his high school's orchestra. As an undergraduate at the Manhattan School of Music, he switched his major from performance to composition and completed a bachelor's degree in music. Steiger earned his master of fine arts degree at the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia (near Los Angeles), and served on the CalArts faculty from 1982 through 1987. He joined UCSD's music faculty in 1987 and was department chairman from 2007 to 2010.

  

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February 07, 2011
STEVEN SCHICK NAMED ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF SAN FRANCISCO CONTEMPORARY MUSIC PLAYERS

UC San Diego Department of Music faculty member Steven Schick has been named artistic director of the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players. He adds this new endeavor to his roles as a world-renowned percussionist, director of the department's percussion program, and artistic director of La Jolla Symphony & Chorus. The San Francisco group is emerging as a leading proponent of new and experimental music, and the appointment of Schick will only increase this momentum.

  

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January 18, 2011
SONIC DIASPORAS ALUMNI FESTIVAL PROGRAM

Sonic Diasporas, the Department of Music's first-ever alumni music festival, takes place January 20-22 at Conrad Prebys Music Center (with two events at The Loft night club on campus). View the concert schedule View the full program (PDF)

  

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January 07, 2011
MUSIC ALUMNUS MARY OLIVER GIVES SPECIAL LECTURE

Violinist/violist and UC San Diego music alumnus Mary Oliver pays a special visit to the Department of Music to deliver a talk titled, "The affect and its effect: an exchange of presences". Oliver's lecture takes place in Conrad Prebys Music Center Room 231 on Tuesday, January 11, at 5 p.m., during Nancy Guy's Focus On Integrative Studies class. Born in La Jolla, Oliver earned her Ph.D. at UCSD for her research in the theory and practice of improvised music. Her work as a soloist and ensemble player encompasses both composed and improvised contemporary music. Oliver has premiered works by a.o. John Cage, Chaya Czernowin,  Brian Ferneyhough, George Lewis, and Iannis Xenakis and has worked alongside improvising musicians and dancers such as Han Bennink, Mark Dresser, Katie Duck, Cor Fuhler,  Rozemarie Heggen, Joëlle Leandre, Thomas Lehn, George E. Lewis, Phil Minton, Alexander von Schlippenbach and Michael Schumacher. She has also appeared as a featured soloist in many music festivals like Brisbane Biennale, Donaueschinger Muziektage, MaerzMusik, Salzburger Festspiele Berliner Jazz Festival and Chicago, Montreal, Vancouver and Toronto Jazz Festivals. Currently she lives in Amsterdam, where she works as a free-lance artist, teaches at the Hogeschol voor Kunsten Utrecht and is a member of Instant Composer's Pool Orchestra , duo Oliver & Heggen (www.oliverheggen.com) and duo JOMO.

January 05, 2011
SONIC DIAPORAS ALUMNI FESTIVAL, JANUARY 20-22

Celebrating UCSD's 50th anniversary, music alumni from several decades join forces January 20-22 for Sonic Diasporas, the Department of Music's first ever alumni music festival and symposium. Two prominent alums give keynote speeches on Jan. 20 at 8 pm: Cutting edge performance artist Diamanda Galas and edgy Bay Area composer/band leader Paul Dresher. The festival features thirteen concerts as well as panel discussions and lectures--all events are free and open to the public. Showcasing influential innovators in new and experimental music, Sonic Diasporas represents the tremendous impact UCSD's music department has had since its founding by composers Will Ogdon and Robert Erickson in the  sixties. Today, the department is ranked on a par with Ircam in Paris and other nodes of groundbreaking music. Alumni artists who will participate in Sonic Diasporas also include film composer Larry Groupe, renowned bassist Mark Dresser (now on UCSD's music faculty), and Aiyun Huang, who directs the percussion program at McGill University in Montreal. Groupe's credits include The Contender, Deterrence, the upcoming remake of Straw Dogs, as well as the television program Commander in Chief. Dresser has recorded and performed around the world with luminaries such as John Zorn and Anthony Braxton. Huang is known for critically acclaimed performances around the world--and as a groundbreaking woman percussionist in field traditionally dominated by men. The festival also gives music alums the chance to re-unite with mentors from the music faculty, such as trumpeter Ed Harkins, vocalist Philip Larson, and violinist János Négyesy, who will all perform during the festival. In addition to concerts, several lectures and panel discussions cover topics of research and theory explored by music alumni, such as Carol Vernallis' presentation of ways in which new technologies have helped shape popular music, film, and video games. And the festival also includes installation works. Festival events take place at UCSD's Conrad Prebys Music Center, with two concerts also scheduled for the Loft night club at the Price Center on campus.

  

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January 03, 2011
JANUARY 12: WET INK TO PREMIERE NEW WORK BY KATHARINA ROSENBERGER

Visual art, geometry, and plant forms inspired seven new works by UC San Diego composer Katharina Rosenberger. One of these pieces will premiere at UCSD on Jan. 12, performed by the highly regarded Wet Ink Ensemble from New York City (the concert also includes works by five other composers). Rosenberger and Wet Ink will be guests on KPBS-FM public radio's "These Days" program on Jan. 12 at 10:20 a.m. Listen at 89.5 FM, or streaming online at kpbs.org. TEXTUREN, the piece to be performed at UCSD, is a prime example of Rosenberger's influences. "My inspiration is the wild and vast garden adjacent to the house I currently live in," says Rosenberger. Her new material, she says, is "a carefully curated sonic landscape of seven chamber pieces, whose finely crafted compositional material and structures all relate to the interconnectedness of the aural and the visual and include contours, lines, textures, and the anatomy and morphology of plants." Rosenberger's interest in combining Influences ranging from nature to mathematics and musical theory carries her music and multimedia works beyond traditional classical music and into experimental realms. This innovative spirit is one reason why she was recruited to join UCSD's music faculty in 2008. "Katharina's combination of accomplishments, as a composer of uncompromising, colorful instrumental and electronic music, as a creator of experimental music theater works; as an installation artist creating innovative, interactive sonic environments; and most uniquely, with the way her work traverses and combines elements from all of these areas; enables her to bring inspiring new perspectives to our students," says composer Rand Steiger, a longtime member of UCSD's music faculty. Rosenberger was born and grew up in Zurich, Switzerland. She first took an interest in music when she was tall enough to reach the piano keyboard. As a teenager she was a vocalist with a special interest in improvisation, and she directed of a teen choir. She realized she wanted to pursue composition after she wrote and staged the opera "Iphigenia in Aulide" in Boston. "It was such a thrill to work with the musicians and hear the music performed," she says. As an undergrad at Berklee College of Music, "I worked a lot in the studio and learned recording techniques. I was fascinated with recorded sound and elements such as spatialization. Plus I had friends who were in Visual Arts and I was exposed to their work all the time." Rosenberger earned her doctorate degree in composition at Columbia University, where she studied installation art with former UCSD music faculty member George Lewis and composition with Tristan Murail. She had never been to San Diego before taking the job at UCSD, but as a lover of nature she was soon hiking through our region's many canyons. Following the January Wet Ink concert and a recording session for a  CD of her new music, Rosenberger will mix the new CD at a favorite studio in Zurich and seek distribution with a European record label. The Jan. 12 concert at UCSD is part of the music department's Wednesdays@7 series focusing on new and experimental music. The series runs through May 2011.

  

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December 07, 2010
$750,000 GLUCK GRANT FOR OUTREACH CONCERTS

Late San Diego arts patron Muriel Gluck's $750,000 gift gives Department of Music graduate program performers such as Rachel Beetz (left) the opportunity to present concerts in the San Diego community, at venues ranging from senior centers to public locations, in a range of neighborhoods.

  

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December 06, 2010
RAND STEIGER REACHES FOR THE STARS, IN DEC. 5 UNION-TRIBUNE

UCSD composer Rand Steiger is the subject of arts writer Jim Chute's excellent profile in the Sunday, December 5, Union-Tribune. Chute explores Mr. Steiger's musical roots, his eclectic sources of inspiration, and his present and future projects. And, U-T photographer Howard Lipin has taken the all-time great photo of Rand. In the weeks ahead, Chute plans to profile the rest of UCSD's innovative composers: Katharina Rosenberger, Roger Reynolds, Chinary Ung, Lei Liang and Philippe Manoury.

  

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November 18, 2010
ONCE FEST: ROGER REYNOLDS RE-UNITES WITH HIS SIXTIES PEERS

ROGER REYNOLDS, UC SAN DIEGO'S PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING COMPOSER, was among four composers honored by concerts and symposia in early November at the 50th anniversary celebration of the influential ONCE festival in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Reynolds was a co-founder of the festival, along with fellow composers Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma, and Donald Scavarda (a fifth co-founder George Cacciopo, is deceased). "Being together again as a group after nearly 50 years was a remarkable experience," Reynolds said. "Most bracing was the fact that everyone remains now what he was then, in effect. We remain very different, yet we are still able to work together in the service of a common enterprise." Concerts on Nov. 2 and 4 showcased Reynolds' early and more recent work, alongside compositions by his ONCE peers. Flashing back to the early years, the first program included Reynolds' A Portrait of Vanzetti (1962-1963), a mix of live narration, performance, and recorded sounds, inspired by the 1920s anarchist. "Everyone commented on the fact that the music still sounded fresh," Reynolds said. "I imagine that this was due to the remarkable ferment within which it was created. The early sixties were an extremely vital time socially in the United States. We had the idea for a festival that would embrace international musical innovation and were able to realize it." ONCE began as a modest event that grew into a major forum for innovative artists including composers John Cage and Luciano Berio, painter Robert Rauschenberg, the Judson Dance Theater, and dancer-choreographer Lucinda Childs. The idea of bringing artists from diverse media together later became a thread through Reynolds work, such as in the recent Sanctuary project, a collaboration between Reynolds, UCSD percussion ensemble red fish blue fish, as well as computer and video artists. "Last week it was evident that the level of awareness and capacity on the part of young performers had greatly increased in recent decades," Reynolds said. And, although ONCE was once an edgy and not widely accepted endeavor, Reynolds said that renewed interest in the music is evidence that innovative artists who push boundaries need to be patient while traditional institutions come to accept, and then honor their earlier work. "The recurring theme in discussions at the Ann Arbor Festival," Reynolds said, "was that if you don't like the way things are, you should do something to change the situation." At 76, Reynolds is as busy as ever. A new 2-DVD set of Sanctuary is due later this year, and he is engaged in creating a new Arts Program at the University of California's Washington Center, offering U.C. faculty and students a chance to research, work, study, and live in the nation's capitol.

  

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November 09, 2010
GRAND ORCHID FOR CONRAD PREBYS CONCERT HALL!

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall's superb design and acoustics were recognized with the Grand Orchid, the highest honor, at last week's Orchids and Onions design awards. Projects are nominated by the public and judged by a panel of experts. Department Chairman Aleck Karis was on hand to accept the award on November 4 at Culy Warehouse in downtown San Diego. Jurors singled out the concert hall as a "jewel box" and a "timeless creation in concrete".

  

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November 08, 2010
RED FISH BLUE FISH: THREE NEW FISH

red fish blue fish, UCSD's resident percussion ensemble, has three new members this fall: Leah Bowden, Eric Derr, and Jennifer Torrence. They perform their first UCSD concert with the group on November 18 at 8 PM in the Department of Music's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Each year, a few fish complete their grad degrees and move on with their careers. Aiyun Huang became director of the percussion program at McGill University in Montreal. Ross Karre (who still performs with the ensemble) is pursuing a graduate degree in Visual Arts at UCSD. Fabio Oliveira is teaching music in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Meanwhile, new percussionists join red fish blue fish each fall, lured by the international reputation of its director Steven Schick, and by the group's status as a professional endeavor with important projects such as the 3˜D set of Xenakis' percussion music, and the upcoming CD/DVD of UCSD composer Roger Reynolds' Sanctuary. By the time they arrive at UCSD to work toward graduate music degrees, they have already established their careers as musicians. Bowden completed her undergrad degree at UC Santa Cruz. Derr earned his masters McGill University in Montreal. Torrence came from Oberlin Conservatory of Music. "I knew that working with Steven Schick and my colleagues in red fish blue fish would prove invaluable to my vitality has an artist," says Bowden, who selected UCSD from a handful of top universities. "I also knew that at UCSD I would engage in longterm collaborations with composers and performers, and this is extremely important to me." red fish blue fish performs each year at prestigious events and venues across the United States and around the world. They have appeared several times at Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. This year's group was featured at the Carlsbad Music Festival in September; and in early November performed in Los Angeles in conjunction with a Xenakis design exhibition at Pacific Design Center. Tickets for the group's November 18 concert are $15 general, $10 UCSD faculty-staff-alumni-friends of music, and free for all students.

October 12, 2010
SOIREE FOR MUSIC LOVERS: A NEW DIMENSION

Violinist János Négyesy's popular Soirée for Music Lovers concerts were born nearly twenty-five years ago when the Hungarian virtuoso and UC San Diego music faculty member sensed a need for first-rate live classical music to complement the department's new and experimental offerings. Négyesy's Soirées proved immediately popular, both on campus and in the San Diego community. Since then the quarterly performances have grown to the point where they attract full houses at the department's 400-seat Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. As director of the concerts, Négyesy selects music by a range of classical composers from various eras. Composers whose music is regularly featured range from Mozart, Schubert, and Brahms, to Telemann, Locatelli, and Saint-Saens. The music is also selected to present a variety of instrumental formats, from soloists and duos, to ensembles of more than a dozen musicians. Performers are a mix of professionals and gifted students, which gives young musicians the opportunity to play at a professional level. On Oct. 23, the Fall Soirée for Music Lovers extends the series' repertoire in a new direction with a new work from master sitarist Kartik Seshadri, a former student of famed sitarist Ravi Shankar. This compelling and spectacular piece combines Seshadri's sitar with seven string players, flute, persussion, and keyboard. In addition to luring classical music lovers to UCSD, Négyesy also uses the Soirées as an outreach program, with regular performances at Mesa Community College and at other San Diego locations including next February's concert at the Escondido Center for the Performing Arts. "Traditionally the Soirées feature music from the last century, so in this new century it's time to play pieces such as Kartik's from the 20th century," Négyesy says.

September 16, 2010
MUSIC ON THE EDGE: WEDNESDAYS@7 SERIES BEGINS OCTOBER 6

New and experimental music is showcased in the Department of Music's increasingly popular Wednesdays@7 concert series featuring renowned faculty performers and special guests. The 2010-2011 season begins Oct. 6 with Aleck Karis (piano) and Charles Curtis (cello) performing composer Morton Feldman's luminous Patterns in a Chromatic Field. Karis and Curtis released a CD of Feldman's work in 2004. Between October and May, Weds@7 ranges from new music by composers such as James Newton and Katharina Rosenberger to multimedia works including Mark Dresser's live Telematic internet collaboration and performances by Palimpsest, Steven Schick, and many others. "Wednesdays@7 gives us the chance to showcase the kinds of music for which our department has become known since its founding by composers 45 years ago," said Aleck Karis, acting chair. "We have some of the most talented composers and performers one can hear anywhere in the world, and I encourage San Diegans to sample this compelling and rewarding music." Concerts take place at the Department of Music's new Conrad Prebys Music Center, which opened in May 2009 and includes a state-of-the-art 400-seat concert hall as well as an experimental theatre adaptable for a variety of traditional, experimental, and multimedia performances. Tickets for Weds@7 are $15 general, $10 for UCSD faculty and staff, $1 student rush one hour before concert. To purchase tickets, call the Department of Music Box Office: (858) 822-2166.

  

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July 01, 2010
RAND STEIGER NAMED CALIT2 COMPOSER-IN-RESIDENCE

Rand Steiger has been appointed composer-in-residence at Calit2, succeeding Roger Reynolds as UCSD's technology institute extends its commitment to expanding the potential of arts/tech collaboration. Rand's two-year term began July 1. For a full report and a video interview, follow the "more info" link (below) to Calit2's website.

  

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May 15, 2010
KLANGFARMERS LIVE MAY 15: WE MIGHT LIKE MUSIC

Klangfarmers, a collaborative ensemble, perform at The Loft night club in the Price Student Center on the UC San Diego campus. The concert begins at 8 pm on May 15. The group promises "light-up shouting contests, aural tea service, text-to-speech light sabering, coffin of love, talking sewage, singing lamp-posts, and a very sinister slinky web."

May 13, 2010
TELEMATICS REVIEW: A MUSICAL BRIDGE BETWEEN IRVINE AND SAN DIEGO

After the stunning "Jazz TeleMotions" concert on May 12, one jazz musician in the audience proclaimed it a "landmark concert". Indeed, those who attended bassist Mark Dresser's intricate multimedia event in UCSD's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall were awed by the collaboration between musicians and artists at UC San Diego and at UC Irvine, connected by high-speed internet. From a studio at UC Irvine, trombonist Michael Dessen's performance was sent to Prebys hall and projected on a sheer double-layer screen suspended behind Dresser and pianist Myra Melford. Dessen's ghostly presence completed the trio. The San Diego set was designed by Victoria Petrovich. In Irvine, video artist John Crawford deftly mixed images captured by cameras at both locations, and the resulting collage of hands, faces, fingers, and instruments was projected on the screen behind Dresser and Melford. Despite the digital journey to San Diego, the sound of Dessen's trombone did not lag behind Melford and Dresser, and an excellent sound system (and crew) at UCSD blended Dessen's trombone seamlessly with the San Diego players. Dresser, Melford and Dessen have performed together many times, and their intuitive empathy was obvious. The 70-minute concert consisted of four distinctive movements. Each musician's sound was broadened by the use of unconventional techniques, such as the percussive effects produced by Melford as she reached beneath the piano lid, or Dresser as he tapped and scraped his bass to conjure a range of primal effects,  shaping his sound with a volume pedal. The concert was the latest of Dresser's Telematic productions, which often connect musicians in multiple locations around the world. It seems obvious that Dresser's innovative methodology points the way toward a near future where more and more artists will embrace emerging technologies.

May 05, 2010
NANCY GUY LECTURES AT UCLA RE: AMERICA'S QUEEN OF OPERA

Nancy Guy of UCSD's music faculty will talk about opera star Beverly Sills at UCLA on May 12 from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. in the Schoenberg Music Building (B544). Her lecture is titled "Re-membering Beverly Sills: An Historical Ethnography of the Art and Meaning of 'America's Queen of Opera'." The lecture is part of UCLA's Nazir Jairazbhoy Colloquium Lecture Series and is presented by the university's Department of Ethnomusicology. Guy is an ethnomusicologist, Fulbright scholar, and past winner of the Bela Bartok Award for Excellence in Ethnomusicology. Her lecture at UCLA represents a segment of her ongoing research examining Sills' identity as the "Queen of Opera," from a fresh and scholarly perspective. Guy has been fascinated with Sills since she attended a performance in 1977. "She gave a recital in my hometown and I never got over it," Guy said, in an online tribute to the opera singer, who died in 2007.

April 27, 2010
NEWLY FORMED KALLISTI ENSEMBLE PREMIERES DUSAPIN CHAMBER OPERA

Soprano Susan Narucki, a leading interpreter of modern music and a Professor of Music at UC San Diego, has established Kallisti, an ensemble for new and experimental vocal music. With members from the graduate program in contemporary music performance at UC San Diego, Kallisti will explore modern chamber opera, experimental music theater and performance in unconventional spaces. Kallisti makes its debut in the West Coast premiere of French composer Pascal Dusapin's chamber opera To Be Sung on May 26, 27 and 28, 2010 at 7 p.m. in the Black Box Theater at the Conrad Prebys Music Center on the UC San Diego campus. This haunting work, with text by Gertrude Stein, is a kaleidoscope of colors and textures for both voices and instruments, by turns whimsical, dramatic and poignant. Since its premiere in the early nineties, To Be Sung has been presented more than fifty times throughout Europe. Guest conductor Julian Pellicano will lead Kallisti, joined by guest artist and UCSD Professor baritone Philip Larson and the instrumentalists of Palimpsest. Susan Narucki (one of the work's original cast members) serves as stage director. To Be Sung has been described as an exquisite interplay between Dusapin's tightly woven vocal chamber music (at times, reminiscent of Monteverdi) and Stein's evocative texts in which "shifting atmospheres and sound and create moments of concentrated emotion, which are constantly transformed, disappearing and melting, over and over again."    For more information about To Be Sung and Kallisti, visit Kallisti's webpage.                            Soprano Susan Narucki joined UCSD's Department of Music in the Fall of 2008. She has earned special recognition as a champion of the music of our time, having performed over one hundred world premieres during her twenty five year career, as soloist with orchestra, in chamber music and in innovative music theater and opera productions. Narucki's extensive discography includes Grammy and Cannes Award winning recordings.

  

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March 04, 2010
ANTHONY DAVIS/ALLAN HAVIS OPERA LILITH DEBUTS ON UCSD-TV

Composer Anthony Davis and librettist Allan Havis's new opera Lilith makes its television debut  March 26 at 8 p.m. on UCSD-TV. The new work premiered onstage in the Department of Music's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall in December. The concert was videotaped by producer John Menier and UCSD-TV for on-air broadcast as well as for an upcoming documentary. Lilith is a modern update of the Biblical story of Lilith, Adam, Eve, and humankind's fall from grace. Davis's wife Cynthia Aaronsen-Davis sings the lead role and his son Jonah also plays a part. Davis's earlier operas include Tanya, Malcolm X, Wakonda's Dream, and Amistad.

February 26, 2010
PERCUSSIONIST STEVEN SCHICK SHOWCASED IN NEW YORKER MAGAZINE

In the March 1, 2010, issue of the New Yorker magazine, music critic Alex Ross profiles Greek composer Iannis Xenakis, describing his traumatic injuries during World War II and the "raw, wild" music that followed. Ross cites UC San Diego percussionist Steven Schick as a prime purveyor of Xenakis' music, referring to Schick's "hyperathletic interpretation of 'Psappha'." Ross utilizes Schick's insightful explanation, in his book The Percussionist's Art, of the "state of grace" that is required for a performer to fully convey the complexity of Xenakis' music.

  

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February 26, 2010
SHLOMO DUBNOV APPOINTED DIRECTOR OF UC SAN DIEGO'S NEW CENTER FOR RESEARCH IN ENTERTAINMENT AND LEARNING

Shlomo Dubnov has been appointed director of UC San Diego's new Center for Research in Entertainment and Learning (CREL). The center will explore new opportunities for learning and cross-cultural content in the context of new digital media and social networking. "CREL also fills the gap and the need for interdisciplinary music-science research and addresses grassroots musical practices," Dubnov said. "This will complement and be synergetic with Calit2/CRCA's artistic legacy and experimental art aspirations by creating a gateway to core technology research, the music industry, and current networking-driven culture." UCSD News has complete coverage of CREL and Dubnov's leadership role in the new project.

  

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February 19, 2010
UC SAN DIEGO COMPOSER BRYAN CHRISTIAN WINS PRESTIGIOUS FROMM COMMISSION

In an article featured in "This Week @ UCSD," Bryan Christian explains how he found inspiration in the Old Town of Tallinn, Estonia, and talks about the new piece he will create as winner of a Fromm Commission. Christian says he was lured to UCSD by faculty composer Chinary Ung, who also finds inspiration in history and tradition.

  

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January 15, 2010
HUMANS, BIRDS AND MUSIC: NEUROSCIENTIST ANI PATEL TALKS ABOUT HIS RESEARCH ON JAN. 19

In his latest research, neuroscientist Ani Patel turns to birds to learn more about how the brain processes music and language. On Jan. 19, Patel will discuss his latest work when he visits the Department of Music to give a lecture hosted by the Department's graduate Integrative Studies program. Patel's talk is free and open to the public, and it will take place in Room 367 at the Conrad Prebys Music Center on the UCSD campus. Humans have long regarded birds as musical creatures, and birdsongs have inspired many composers and been the subject of a vast body of scientific research. Yet there has been remarkably little empirical work comparing the structure of birdsong and human music, and little research on how birds respond to human music. Dr. Patel's lecture will cover quantitative comparisons of the structure of human and avian song, and empirical studies of avian rhythmic movement to human music. Patel earned a Ph.D. in organismic and evolutionary biology from Harvard University and in 1997 joined The Neurosciences Institute, where he is now the Esther J. Burnham Senior Fellow. His research into differences and similarities between how the brain processes music and language has utilized techniques ranging from neuroimaging and theoretical analyses, to acoustic research and comparative studies of nonhuman animals. Dr. Patel is the author of more than forty research articles. His new book Music, Language and the Brain (2008, Oxford University Press) won the 2008 ASCAP Deems-Taylor Award, and he also received the 2009 Music Has Power award from the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function. Patel is in the midst of a two-year term as president of the Society for Music Perception and Cognition.

December 09, 2009
HOLIDAY MUSIC GIFT: NAME A SEAT FOR SOMEONE SPECIAL!

A PLUSH RED SEAT in our acoustically perfect new concert hall can be named for the music lover in your life: friend, husband, wife, partner, son, daughter, father, mother, grandparent. For $200, reserve a seat that you can name in honor of that special someone. Give them this lifelong gift and you'll have the satisfaction of knowing that you are contributing to the education of new generations of composers and performers produced by UC San Diego's Department of Music. To find out how you can reserve this unique and special gift, call 858-534-9097, or go online for details.

  

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October 29, 2009
SOPRANO SUSAN NARUCKI AND PIANIST DONALD BERMAN PRESENT THE MUSIC OF CHARLES IVES AT UC SAN DIEGO

Soprano Susan Narucki will be joined by guest pianist Donald Berman in a concert of music composed by Charles Ives on Wednesday, Nov. 4, at 7 pm in the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall at UC San Diego. The event is the second in UCSD Department of Music's new Wednesdays@7 concert series spotlighting renowned faculty performers and composers. Narucki and Berman are longtime collaborators whose recent CD on New World Records, THE LIGHT THAT IS FELT: SONGS OF CHARLES IVES, has earned critical acclaim in international press, including a Five Star/Editor's Choice rating from BBC Music Magazine in February 2009. And in his review in THE WIRE magazine, critic Andy Hamilton wrote, "There's probably no finer introduction to Ives' songs or to his output as a whole." Narucki and Berman will present a range of Ives' songs, from his early student compositions of the 1890s to his mature masterworks, including "The Housatonic at Stockbridge" ( 1921 ).  In addition, Berman, a distinguished performer and champion of works by American composers, will perform solo piano pieces composed by Ives as well as by contemporary American composers David Rakowski and Eric Moe. Narucki joined UCSD's music faculty in September 2008. In a career spanning more than 20 years, she has presented more than 100 world premieres in opera, concerts, and recordings.  She has been a soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra, MET Chamber Ensemble, and Los Angeles Philharmonic, with conductors Pierre Boulez, James Levine and Esa-Pekka Salonen, among many others.  Her extensive discography includes Crumb's  "Star Child," which earned a Grammy in 2001. Ives lived from the height of the industrial age into the modern era. His influences ranged from Sousa marches, Stephen Foster, and church music, to his father George Ives, a U.S. Army bandleader who encouraged young Charles to experiment with unconventional harmonies. Over the years, Ives' music has been championed by Aaron Copland, Elliot Carter, Lou Harrison and other giants of 20th century American music. The concert takes place in UCSD's new critically acclaimed 400-seat concert hall, an intimate and acoustically refined venue that critics have described as "heaven on earth," "a gem" and "remarkable". The hall was designed by Mark Reddington of LMN Architects and renowned acoustician Cyril Harris, who considers this to be the culmination of a career that also includes Avery Fisher Hall, the Metropolitan Opera House, Minneapolis Symphony Hall, and Seattle's Benaroya Hall. Concert tickets are available through UCSD Box Office (858.534.TIXS) and at the door.

October 14, 2009
CONRAD PREBYS MUSIC CENTER HONORED FOR INNOVATIVE DESIGN AND SUPERB CONSTRUCTION

PCL Construction and LMN Architects have earned recognition for the extraordinary design and high quality construction of the new Conrad Prebys Music Center. The building has been honored by California Construction magazine as the best Higher Education/Research Facility in Southern California. Recognition in this category is evidence of the growing reputation the Department of Music is earning not only for quality music education, but for innovative research.

  

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October 07, 2009
DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC INAUGURATES FIRST-EVER CONCERT SEASON SUBSCRIPTION TICKET PACKAGES

With two prestigious concert series opening in October--the Camera Lucida chamber series and the new Wednesdays@7 concerts of eclectic and cutting-edge music--the Department of Music is now offering subscription ticket packages that give music lovers the chance to save 20 percent or more on tickets for the 2009-2010 season. Single tickets for Camera Lucida and Wednesdays@7 are $25. A $130 subscription package for Camera Lucida includes six concerts plus a seventh bonus concert featuring the Myriad Trio. A $100 series subscription for Wednesdays@7 includes five concerts; a $200 subscription includes all fourteen concerts in the 2009-2010 season. Concerts take place in the department's critically acclaimed Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Camera Lucida opens October 5, Wednesdays@7 begins Oct. 7. Convenient parking is available in the Gilman Parking Structure, across Russell Lane from the Conrad Prebys Music Center. For complete details on subscription tickets, see the 2009-2010 concert brochure.

  

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September 10, 2009
WEDNESDAYS@7: DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC LAUNCHES NEW CONCERT SERIES

On Wednesday, October 7, UCSD Department of Music inaugurates its new Wednesdays@7 concert series, a total of fourteen concerts during the 2009-2010 season. Showcasing the internationally renowned UCSD Music Faculty and extraordinary guests, Wednesdays@7 is the place to hear masterworks of modern music, cutting-edge improvisation, distinguished recitalists, and world music in dynamic performances--all in the superb new Conrad Prebys Concert Hall (except for To Be Sung, which will be performed in the Experimental Theatre in Conrad Prebys Music Center). The concert hall was designed by LMN Architects and renowned acoustician Cyril Harris and opened last May to rave reviews. In the words of Department Chairman Miller Puckette, "The Conrad Prebys Concert Hall comes as close to acoustical perfection as any space in the world today." All concerts begin at 7 p.m. Convenient parking is available in The Gilman Parking Structure across Russell Lane from the Conrad Prebys Music Center. Tickets for individual concerts are $25, with a 20% discount for current Friends of Music, members of the UCSD Alumni Association, as well as UCSD faculty, staff, and students. Series subscription tickets offer an additional savings. A five-concert pass is $100; a full-season pass for all— Wednesdays@7 concerts is $250. Tickets are available through UCSD Box Office: 858.534.TIXS.

  

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September 01, 2009
SCULPTING SOUND: NEW VIDEO SPOTLIGHTS CONRAD PREBYS CONCERT HALL

Reviewing the May 7 opening concert in the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, San Diego Union-Tribune music critic George Varga proclaimed the hall "dazzling" and pronounced it one of the finest in the world. In a 12-minute trailer for the upcoming documentary video "Sculpting Sound," world-renowned acoustician Cyril Harris and architect Mark Reddington of LMN Architects explain the five-year design process behind UCSD's superb 400-seat venue. Harris, who is 92 years old, tells his interviewer that the new hall is his "swan song," the final project in a career that began with his acclaimed acoustical design for the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. Harris says there are two sonic phenomena that must be precisely engineered: diffusion and reverberation. He explains how he and Reddington began collaborating nearly fifteen years ago, when they designed Seattle's acclaimed Benaroya Hall. Reddington describes a demanding design process that required hundreds of hours and several computer-cut models of the hall before he and Harris arrived at the ideal merger of architecture and acoustics. And, the architect says, he was so overwhelmed when he first heard live music in the new hall that he cried. "Sculpting Sound" also includes interviews with renowned UCSD composers and performers such as Rand Steiger, Charles Curtis, and Susan Narucki, who share first impressions of the new hall and talk about what it feels like to experience music in such a refined acoustical environment. The video was co-directed by Alex Juutilainen and Dirk Sutro, shot primarily in broadcast quality high-definition video by Michael Gerdes. Juutilainen and Gerdes previously worked together on a documentary about the film critic and artist Manny Farber. Sutro initiated the "Sculpting Sound" project in the fall of 2007, when he took his camcorder to New York City to interview Harris in the highrise modernist apartment where the acoustician has lived for many years. A highlight of "Sculpting Sound" comes when Harris pulls the cord to fire a yacht-racing cannon as part of the acoustical testing process. In the months ahead, Juutilainen and Sutro plan to complete "Sculpting Sound" as a full-length documentary including additional interviews and video of some of the world's other great concert halls.

  

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August 20, 2009
FILM WITH MARK DRESSER'S SCORE HITS THE ROAD

Filmmaker Sarah Jane Lapp's CHRONICLES OF A PROFESSIONAL EULOGIST, with a score by UCSD music faculty member Mark Dresser, premiered last spring at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. This fall it rolls to several major cities including Boston (Harvard University, Seattle (the Asian Art Museum), and New York (The Jewish Museum). Dresser received a Bellagio Fellowship in 2007 to compose and perform music for the film. This is his second collaboration with Lapp, following CHRONICLES OF AN ASTHMATIC STRIPPER. Mr. Dresser is busy this fall. On October 20, he performs with Trio M at the Earshot Jazz Festival in Seattle.

  

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August 04, 2009
ROGER REYNOLDS APPOINTED UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR

By Inga Kiderra Roger Reynolds, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and professor of music at UC San Diego, has been appointed University Professor by the University of California Board of Regents. Reynolds is only the 36th UC faculty member since 1960 to be honored with the title - and the first artist. "We congratulate Professor Reynolds on his latest distinction," said UC San Diego Chancellor Marye Anne Fox. "This designation is the highest honor that can be bestowed on UC faculty, and we are very proud and fortunate that this world-renowned composer and scholar is a member of the UC San Diego faculty." "This honor is reserved for scholars of international distinction who are recognized and respected as teachers of exceptional ability," said Paul Drake, senior vice chancellor for academic affairs at UCSD. The purpose of the University Professorship is to recognize throughout the UC system the special talents of outstanding scholars and teachers. Reynolds joined the UCSD Department of Music in 1969. He became founding director of the Center for Music Experiment (now known as the Center for Research in Computing and the Arts, or CRCA), UC's earliest organized research unit in the arts, in 1972. Reynolds was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 1989 for "Whispers Out of Time," for string orchestra, incorporating musical quotations from Beethoven and Mahler. He is credited with being the second experimentalist, after Charles Ives in 1947, to win the prestigious prize. Reynolds' signature is his multi-dimensionality. His music combines elements of theater, literary texts, digital signal processing, dance, video and real-time computer spatialization - which moves counterpoints of sound around the listener - as well as the perspectives of experimental psychology. His work with spatialization of sounds began in 1961-62 with his renowned music-theater piece "The Emperor of Ice Cream," on a text by Wallace Stevens. He later collaborated with poet John Ashbery in the song cycle, "last things, I think, to think about." Among the first American composers to make significant use of science and new technology, Reynolds continues to work at the cutting edge: In 1998, Mode Records released Reynolds' "Watershed," the first DVD in Dolby Digital 5.1 to feature music composed expressly for five independent channels of audio. He currently serves as the first composer-in-residence at the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2), where he is concentrating on "Sanctuary" and its malleable control of computer sound processing during performance. Premiered at I. M. Pei's East Wing of the National Gallery in Washington, it is scored for percussion ensemble and real-time computer processing and spatialization. "Sanctuary" is scheduled for DVD release on Mode Records this winter. In 1998, the Library of Congress recognized his unique contributions to culture by establishing the Roger Reynolds Special Collection. Reynolds' international presence is underscored by premieres at the Royal Albert Hall (London), Centre Pompidou (Paris), Suntory Hall (Tokyo), as well as at Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center and in such grand public spaces as the Library of Congress and the National Gallery in D.C., New York's Guggenheim Museum, the Cite de la Musique in Paris and Tokyo's National Gymnasium, designed by architect Kenzo Tange. Reynolds' extensive catalog - numbering some 100 compositions - includes commissions from the Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Tokyo and BBC orchestras. Reynolds is also a prolific teacher and writer. He has written four influential books, beginning with the classic Mind Models: New Forms of Musical Experience (1975), which has been called, by composer and theorist Thomas DeLio, "an essential work for anyone who cares deeply about the music of our time." His articles have appeared in Asian, American and European journals, and his music - recorded on Auvidis/Montaigne, Mode, New World, and Neuma, among others - is published exclusively by C. F. Peters Corporation, New York. Reynolds has served as resident composer at numerous international festivals, and his regular master-class activity in North American universities also extends abroad: from Thessaloniki, Greece, to the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland, and IRCAM in Paris, as well as to points in Latin America and Asia. Before beginning his career as a composer, Reynolds studied engineering physics at the University of Michigan and worked briefly as a systems development engineer in the defense industry. After earning his master's degree in musical composition in 1962 from Michigan, Reynolds and his wife, Karen, began a seven-year migration through international hotbeds of today's contemporary music - Germany, France, England and Italy, ending up in Japan. In 1969, he was lured from Tokyo to a tenured position on the fledgling UC San Diego faculty. Writing in The New Yorker, Andrew Porter called him "at once an explorer and a visionary composer, whose works can lead listeners to follow him into new regions of emotion and meaning." The Los Angeles Times' Mark Swed saluted Reynolds as "an all-around sonic visionary."

  

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July 28, 2009
GEORGE RUSSELL (1923-2009): FAMED COMPOSER PRAISED YOUNG UCSD COMPOSER

Innovative composer George Russell, who passed away July 28, 2009, and was known for his use of the Lydian mode and his collaborations with Miles Davis and John Coltraine, also had a connection to UCSD composer Lei Liang. "I am very sad to hear of his passing," said Liang, a member of the Department of Music faculty. "We were featured back to back at the Ditson Festival in Boston last year, and it was great to see him so vibrant. Here is what he wrote to me almost 10 years ago. I will always be grateful for his support and kindness." Lei Liang's composition 'Other Encounter' (1999), places him at the cutting edge of Twenty First Century music.  His innovative combinations of timbres, rhythms, states of being create a  gripping panorama that results in musical theater that commands the attention of the listener throughout the piece as its emotional intensity expands and contracts until the composer, the very gifted Lei Liang, allows the listener to disengage...perhaps as a slightly different being than the one who existed at the beginning of the piece.  We should keep an ear open to Lei Liang and his startling music." - George Russell

  

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July 22, 2009
ENSEMBLEXII PERCUSSORS STORM SAN DIEGO FOR RECORDING SESSIONS AND CONCERTS

Twelve percussionists from five countries descend on San Diego in early August for a 17-day residency in UCSD's Department of Music that includes several days in the recording studio and two concerts. Recording sessions will focus on percussion music composed by Liza Lim (Australia); Yann Robin, Philippe Shoeller, Yan Maresz (France); and Johannes Fischer (Germany). ensemblexii will also begin recording the music of famed Swiss percussionist Fritz Hauser, a special guest during the residency who will also perform in one of the concerts. On August 15 at 8 p.m. in UCSD's new Conrad Prebys Concert Hall (in the Conrad Prebys Music Center, on Russell Lane across from Gilman Parking Structure), ensemblexii will perform works from the recording sessions, under the direction of Steven Schick. On August 16 at 8 p.m. at Sushi in downtown San Diego (390 11th Ave.), Hauser will be featured as the group presents his music. Both concerts include pre-concert talks at 7&Rhoε p.m. and a post-concert "instrument petting zoo" that lets visitors check out more than 100 percussion instruments. Tickets for each concert are $15 general, $10 for students. For more information on the UCSD concert, call 858.534.3229. For more information on the Sushi concert, call 619.987.6214.

  

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July 20, 2009
SOUND CHECK IV: DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC'S SMASHING CD

Sound Check IV is the new CD of music by graduate-level composers and performers, the latest in the annual series showcasing the Department of Music. The new CD includes five pieces: James Wood's Rogosanti, Derek Keller's Eruptive Plains, Farangis Nurulla-Khoja's Scarabe, Javier Alvarez' Temezcal, plus Drei Lieder, op. 18, by early 20th century Austrian composer Anton Webern. Instrumentation ranges from Alvarez and Wood's pieces for solo percussion to Keller's composition for a nine-piece ensemble. While the Department of Music curriculum runs from classical music to jazz and Indian, the Sound Check series emphasizes the grad program's experimental side dating back to founding composers Will Ogdon and Robert Erickson. To request a copy of Sound Check IV, e-mail your name and address to: publicity@music.ucsd.edu

July 17, 2009
SUSAN NARUCKI MENTORS STUDENTS AT NORFOLK CHAMBER MUSIC FEST

Soprano Susan Narucki was a guest faculty member at the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, summer home of the Yale School of Music, for a two week seminar in contemporary music. The program, led by composer Martin Bresnick, brought together young composers, instrumentalists, poets and singers to collaborate on new pieces of vocal chamber music. The pieces were written specifically for singers in the program, with texts by poets in residence. There was also extensive exploration of  American Song, particularly the influence of composer Virgil Thomson and his views on text setting and prosody. In addition to advising the young composers about writing for the voice, Susan served as a coach and instructor for the five singers in residence - including two students from UCSD, soprano Stephanie Aston and baritone Brian Wahlstrom (photo: Narucki, Wahlstrom, Norfolk faculty member and pianist Lisa Moore, Aston).  On June 27, Susan presented a recital of American music with pianist J.J. Penna and percussionist Ian Rosenbaum in the recital hall at Norfolk, and on July 2 and 3, the singers and ensemble presented two programs, including ten world premieres for voice and ensemble and a wide range of American songs.  The seminar was featured in an article in the July-August issue of Chamber Music magazine, which includes an extensive interview with Susan. The program was supported in part by the NEA's American Masters Chamber Music Initiative.

  

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July 17, 2009
BANGKOK PREMIERE AND NEW CD FOR LEI LIANG

Lei Liang's new saxophone concerto Xiaoxiang (for alto sax and orchestra) was premiered at Mahidol University in Bangkok in early July at the World Saxophone Congress by Eastman Professor Chien-Kwan Lin and the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra. Brush-Stroke is Liang's new CD on Mode Records featuring Aleck Karis and Takae Ohnishi from UCSD's music faculty along with the Arditti Quartet, Paula Robison, Stephen Drury and the Callithumpian Orchestra. Prof. Yayoi Uno Everett of Emory University wrote the liner notes. The CD is funded in part through a grant from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music.

July 16, 2009
JANN PASLER'S NEW BOOK: A 20-YEAR ODYSSEY

Jann Pasler's new book Composing the Citizen: Music as Public Utility in Third Republic France has been published July 6 by University of California Press, and Pasler has reason to celebrate. The book marks the culmination of 20 years of research, travel, and writing. At 817 pages, Composing the Citizen is a weighty achievement for Pasler, who joined UC San Diego's music faculty in 1981 and was the driving force behind the creation of the graduate degree program in Critical Studies and Experimental Practices. Pasler is internationally renowned for her research and writing. In 2005, she won the coveted Colin Slim award from the American Society of Musicologists for an article on music and French colonialism, the subject of her next book. In Composing the Citizen, Pasler explores how, as France recovered from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871, republicans used music to help people negotiate their conflicting past; not to forget it, but to assimilate it in new ways. Composing The Citizen is earning excellent reviews. One critic wrote that is "reaches well beyond what any book concerned with music in society has ever attempted," while another said that Pasler "offers nothing less than a new paradigm for the study of musical cultures." Clearly, her book contains ideas that are very relevant to today's world of warring political factions and diverse music, some of which utilizes state-of-the-art computers, software, and other technologies. What role, one wonders, might music play in rebounding nations in the decades ahead? In early July, the website ROROTOKO published an in-depth interview with Ms. Pasler.

  

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June 02, 2009
ICAM DISCOVERS RECOMBINANT SERENDIPITY: MULTIMEDIA FEST RUNS JUNE 8 TO JUNE 12

Cutting edge computer and multimedia projects art at the heart of this month's Recombinant Serendipity festival featuring ICAM (Interdisciplinary Computing & the Arts Major) and Media Major senior projects. The festival opens Monday, June 8, with a 5 pm reception at Mandeville Gallery. Other highlights from the five-day event include an evening of Media Film Screenings Thursday June 11 at 6 pm in the Calit2 Auditorium, and Keynote Speakers Tana Sprague (June 10, 6 pm, Calit2 Auditorium) and Naut Humon (June 12, 1:30 pm, Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theatre). Thanks to visionary partnerships and collaborations among UCSD's Department of Music, Department of Visual Arts, Calit2, and CRCA (Center for Research in Computing and the Arts), UCSD is internationally renowned as a leading center for cutting edge work at the intersection arts and technology. All events are FREE and open to the public.

  

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May 26, 2009
SHLOMO DUBNOV APPOINTED TO IEEE COMPUTER GENERATED MUSIC COMMITTEE

UCSD music faculty member Shlomo Dubnov has been elected to the IEEE's Technical Committee on Computer Generated Music. Dubnov's appointment comes with the election of Goffredo Haus as the new chairman of computer music at IEEE. Haus, who heads the Department of Informatics and Communication at the State University of Milan, has announced ambitious plans to heighten the profile of computer music through web-based outreach and recognition of newer specialties such as video gaming and interactive music (interactivity is one of Dubnov's primary research interests). "Among our goals," Dubnov says, "are promotion of generative applications that make music navigable and participatory, paying attention to new media and related industries, and engaging the liberal arts and humanities in the new Technical and Conference Board. I hope that UCSD's Department of Music will become one of the world's leading centers for computer-generated music." In recent months, Dubnov's research has included the Kamza and Bar Kamza project, an exploration of a Talmudic legend through interactive multimedia performance. Kamza and Bar Kamza's most recent performance took place in January 2009 at The Loft, the experimental performance venue on the UCSD campus. Dubnov graduated from the Jerusalem Music Academy in composition and holds a Ph.D. in Computer-Science from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. He served as a researcher at the Institute for Research and Coordination of Acoustics and Music (IRCAM) in Centre Pompidou, Paris and was a faculty at Ben-Gurion University in Israel. The results of his research are regularly published in scientific journals and feature in several state of the art computer music and multimedia systems, and his musical works have been recorded and performed internationally. He has been involved in a number of state of the art research projects  in digital media, such as a recent EU sponsored "Semantic HiFi" project, the OMax machine improvisation system and more. Dubnov's main interests are developing new ways for interacting, understanding and creativity in digital media, such as machine improvisation, participatory performance systems and computer audition. Currently he is co-editing a book on, "The Structure of Style: Algorithmic Approaches to Understanding Manner and Meaning" to appear in Springer in 2009. IEEE--the Institute of Electrical and Electronies Engineers--is a leading authority on areas ranging from aerospace systems, computers and telecommunications to biomedical engineering, electric power and consumer electronics. IEEE serves professionals as well as educators and students around the world.

May 23, 2009
SOUNDISFACTION: SPRING FEST PUSHES THE EDGES APRIL 16-23

Showcasing the most innovative work of grad-level composers and performers, the 2009 Spring Festival of New Music--aka SOUNDISFACTION--puts the new Conrad Prebys Music Center through a rigorous road test. Opening May 16 at 7 pm in the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall with Fragments and Music Unheard, the festival offers a provocative program ranging from the Middle Ages (Hildegard of Bingen) to the Baroque era (Henry Purcell), Modern masters (Takemitsu), and emerging artists from the Department of Music. In the past, the Festival has been spread out among venues that were often inadequate, but this year, it takes full advantage of the new 400-seat Prebys Concert Hall, with its superb acoustics and 12-channel Meyer Sound system; the experimental theatre, with its flexible configurations and 60-mic simulation of acoustical environments; and the 150-seat lecture/recital hall, with excellent sound. Best of all, the music is FREE.

  

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May 21, 2009
MAY 21 CONCERT: CAGE'S SONGBOOKS

Is it music? Is it theater? Is it anarchy? John Cage's Songbooks consists of 90 solo pieces, including songs, Buddhist sayings, films, gestures, recordings of a pile driver, juxtaposed in time and space. Students from UCSD's graduate and undergraduate performance program, along with faculty member Susan Narucki, will present a 123 minute performance of the work on May 21, 2009 beginning at 3 minutes to 3 p.m., in the courtyard of the new Conrad Prebys Music Center in the heart of the UCSD campus. This performance of John Cage: Songbooks has been developed through one of graduate performance seminars offered at UCSD (Projects in New Music Performance.) Performers, as a group, have made decisions about all of aspects of the performance. We have read and discussed writings of Cage, Zen Buddhism, and Thoreau and our decisions have been informed by this. Songbooks was written in 1970. Cage's compositional choices were influenced by his belief in Zen Buddhism and his use of the I Ching. We have decided, to offer a contmemporary response to the piece, within the performance; our response grows out of our beliefs. John Cage: Songbooks (Mus 201A: Projects in New Music Performance) ************************************* Pavlos Antoniadis Stephanie Aston Pzemyslaw Bosak Rich Bott Pablo Gomez Aaron Helgeson Susan Narucki, faculty Christine Tavolacci Berglind Tomasdottir Susanna Waiche

  

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May 21, 2009
JÁNOS NÉGYESY ELECTRIFIES CROWD IN NEW EXPERIMENTAL THEATRE

It's not often that fans of new and experimental music get a chance to hear UCSD's renowned violinist János Négyesy on electric violin. So it was not unexpected when a capacity crowd turned up for Mr. Négyesy's Vlolin+ performance in the department of music's new Conrad Prebys Music Center. The occasion was the GALA OPENING weekend, where Mr. Négyesy's concert was among special performances during a May 9 Open House. Clad in a long black kimono, Mr. Négyesy strode into a pool of light and stood next to an earth-like globe of metal triangles like something out of a Buckminster Fuller sketchbook. Then the violinist embarked on a virtuosic program of pieces by Sariaaho, Hajdu, and Parmegiani, as well as his own collaborative composition with Lee Ray, who graduated from UCSD with a Ph.D. in composition a few years ago. The audience of nearly 200 ranged from experimental music aficianados to neophytes. All were captivated by the music, as Négyesy bowed his specially built electric violin to create rich layers of light and sound, joined by Trevor Henthorn (live electronics), Rebecca Bruno (movement), Fred Thieme (sculpture), and Tom Dugdale (director and designer). Mr. Négyesy performed inside the department of music's new high-tech experimental theater, within the new $53 million music center. Prior to the new center's opening, the department did not have a venue for such an elaborate, multimedia performance. Following the concert, Mr. Négyesy awarded high marks to the new theatre. He said he looks forward to staging many more experimental works there in the future. In addition to the experimental theatre, the Conrad Prebys Music Center includes a 400-seat concert hall, a 150-seat lecture/recital hall, an orchestral rehearsal room, computer labs, recording studios, and many other state-of-the-art facilities.

  

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May 13, 2009
MUSIC ALUM MING TSAO IS HEADED FOR SWEDEN

Ming Tsao, who earned his Ph.D. in composition at UCSD and is currently a Faculty Fellow, has been appointed Professor of Composition at the University of Gothenberg in Sweden beginning in the Fall. Tsao is a prolific composer whose works have been performed by the Arditti String Quartet and the Australian group ELISION. At UCSD, Mr. Tsao was mentored by Chaya Czernowin. For his dissertation, he composed "Pathology of Syntax" ("saturated with fragments that I transcribe from the late Beethoven string quartets") and "One-Way Street" (an allusion to the Western film genre, where "a sense of inevitability determines the structure"). Gothenburg is a port city of 510,491 with a diverse arts scene including the National Orchestra of Sweden conducted by Gustavo Dudamel. The Gothenburg Museum of Art includes paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Gogh, and Cezanne.

  

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May 09, 2009
CONRAD PREBYS MUSIC CENTER OPENING CONCERTS ANNOUNCED

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, the jewel of UC San Diego's new Conrad Prebys Music Center, will host grand opening concerts May 8 at 7 pm and May 9 at 8 p.m. The program is identical each night and features premieres of new pieces by UCSD composers Anthony Davis, Philippe Manoury, Roger Reynolds, and Rand Steiger, as well as music by Chopin, Ives and UCSD's Lei Liang, and performances by Mark Dresser, Aleck Karis, Susan Narucki, Steven Schick, the KaiBorg duo, and The The (Ed Harkins and Phil Larson). On Saturday May 9 from noon to 4, an Open House will give visitors the opportunity to tour the new building and hear live performances by Cecil Lytle, J?nos N?gyesy and Aleck Karis. Tickets for the opening concerts go on sale April 24.

  

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May 07, 2009
NAME A SEAT! SET THE STAGE FOR THE FUTURE

Opening night at the Conrad Prebys Music Center is only weeks away, and music lovers and patrons of UC San Diego Department of Music now have a rare opportunity. They can demonstrate their support by naming one of the 400 seats inside the new Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. Seat-naming gifts will help the Department enhance its reputation as a leading place for new and experimental music. And you or a friend or family member will be honored with a personalized plaque in the new hall. By naming a seat, you join a special group of visionaries led by San Diegan Conrad Prebys, whose $9 million contribution made the music center possible.

  

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May 06, 2009
MAY 6 CONCERT CANCELLED: JESSE MANDAPAT AND NATHAN SINGHAPOK

CANCELLED: May 6 Honors Composition Recital featuring works by Jesse Mandapat and Nathan Sinhapok.

May 05, 2009
MAY 5: KATALIN LUKACS CANCELLED

Pianist Katalin Lukacs' May 5 concert is cancelled and will be re-scheduled for FALL.

April 30, 2009
COMPOSER LEI LIANG WINS 2009 GUGGENHEIM FELLOWSHIP

Composer Lei Liang has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for 2009. This year's winners were announced earlier today by Edward Hirsch, president of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Awards go to leading artists, scientists and scholars in the United States and Canada. According to the foundation's website, "Guggenheim Fellows are appointed on the basis of stellar achievement and exceptional promise for continued accomplishment." This description certainly fits UC San Diego's latest winner. Since joining the music faculty in the fall of 2007, Liang, 36, has been on a prodigious creative streak. This month alone, his Trio for cello, piano and percussion was performed by The Verge Ensemble at The Library of Congress, while The Formalist Quartet will play Liang's piece "Serashi Fragments" at venues including Disney Hall's REDCAT performance space in Los Angeles. Liang's CD March Cathedral came out in 2007, and his recent composition "Gobi Gloria" is on Dim Sum, a CD released last year by the Ying Quartet. A new CD of Liang's music is due for release on Mode Records later this year. "The award gives me the most precious gift: time to focus on composing," says Liang, who has not yet been notified as to the amount of the award. "There are a few pieces I am eager to concentrate on, including a new work commissioned by the New York Philharmonic." Mr. Liang joins several prominent UCSD music faculty who have been honored over the years, including Pulitzer Prize-winner Roger Reynolds, Grawemeyer winner Chinary Ung, and MacArthur Fellow George Lewis (now teaching at Columbia University).

  

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April 23, 2009
OUTREACH PERFORMANCE SERIES CLOSES APRIL 25 IN BALBOA PARK

Saturday April 25 at 2 pm, UCSD Department of Music presents the final performance in its spring Music From UC San Diego outreach concert series. This Saturday's performance takes place in a gallery at the Museum of Photographer Arts in Balboa Park, where current exhibits include "Lou Stoumen: The Naked Truth," as well as gorgeous black and white photos by renowned photographer Edward Steichen. Music From UC San Diego is directed by faculty members Susan Narucki and Anthony Burr and features top vocal and instrumental performers from the Department of Music. Admission to this Saturday's concert is free with admission to the museum.

April 10, 2009
ROSS KARRE GETS FUNDING, FISH GET DIERSTEIN'D

Ross Karre (at left) has been awarded $10,000 from the French American Cultural Exchange to record and perform with his group EnsembleXII at UCSD for 17 days this summer. Karre's international percussion ensemble has worked with legendary French composer Pierre Boulez since 2004, in recent months on a new piece that will be recorded in the upcoming sessions, which Karre hopes will lead to a CD. On another percussion front, members of UCSD's resident percussion emsemble Red Fish Blue Fish (including Mr. Karre) had a rare opportunity to take lessons and master classes with renowned German percussionist Christian Dierstein. Thursday this week, the turbo-powered percussionist began working with the Fish in the morning and continued until well after dark in a show of dedication that impressed the UCSD crew. Following his visit to UCSD, Dierstein headed to Los Angeles for a performance in their Monday Evening Concerts, a showcase for new and experimental music where Steve Schick and Red Fish Blue Fish have performed on many occasions. Dierstein has recorded music by UCSD alumnus Brian Ferneyhough, as well as by Helmut Lachenmann, Beat Furrer, Elliott Carter, John Cage and other composers whose music is performed and studied at UCSD.

  

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April 07, 2009
JÁNOS NÉGYESY + STUDENTS IMPRESS MATURE LISTENERS

La Costa Glen is an inviting retirement community in North County with lush landscaping, a formal dining room, and a busy calendar of arts and performance events. On March–, János Négyesy and a large group of his students made the trek northward to perform for a large group of classical music fans there. The audience was much impressed with the talented performers. They received a standing ovation an an invitation to return ASAP.

April 02, 2009
MUSIC DEPARTMENT LAUNCHES COMMUNITY CONCERT SERIES

In April, UC San Diego Department of Music launches the LIVE FROM UCSD concert series with four concerts around San Diego. Under the direction of faculty performers Susan Narucki and Anthony Burr, the series brings music to branch libraries in Pacific Beach (April 4), Encinitas (April 5), and Valencia Park (April 18) (photo at left), as well as the Museum of Photographic Arts in Balboa Park (April 25). Concerts feature a range of music from classical to contemporary, performed by some of the best Department of Music singers and instrumentalists. All three branch libraries are exciting buildings designed by San Diego architect Manuel Oncina as part of a new generation of local libraries that serve as leading centers for the arts, in addition to their traditional role as vital centers for books and research. Concerts all begin at 2 p.m., and all of them are free. For more information, contact the branch libraries.

March 23, 2009
WE'VE MOVED! CONRAD PREBYS MUSIC CENTER

After weeks of packing and in the process discovering ancient relics from more than forty years of life in the Department of Music, the Department of Music has moved into the new Conrad Prebys Music Center on Russell Lane near Gilman Drive. Department staff occupied new offices in late February, and faculty are in the process of moving into theirs, many of which double as acoustically refined studios. As we acclimate, we are inspired every day by the new building's beautifully refined details: performance spaces including the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, a flexible 'black box,' and a bright red recital/lecture hall (at left, with cartwheel); a percussion wing for Steven Schick and his fellow red fish blue fish; an expansive orchestra rehearsal room; a landscaped courtyard with amphitheatre-like seating; long outdoor benches custom formed from steel; and, of course, spanky new staff offices where we are newly energized by warm natural light, wide carpeted hallways, elegant dark wood office furniture where everything can be stowed away out of sight; and a large employee lounge that's perfect for a St. Patty's lunch or Friday potluck. Our new ergonomic chairs have undoubtedly increased productivity around here! As we ramp up for our opening concerts May 8 and May 9, we invite you to take a closer look at our beautiful new home. You are bound to see some very happy faces here in our new neighborhood, near the striking new Student Center and the Visual Arts building, and a short walk away from Price Student Center.

March 23, 2009
FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION: MUSIC CENTER ON DISPLAY

Our new Conrad Prebys Music Center is a stunner, as we're sure you'll agree when you visit an exhibition near the Seuss Room on the main floor of Geisel Library. Here are large color images of the new building, a photo of $9 million naming donor Conrad Prebys, pictures from the Department's past and present, and photos from the spectacular West Coast premiere of Roger Reynolds' new work "Sanctuary" at the Salk Institute last fall. In addition, a display case contains a large array of CDs by Department of Music faculty (you'll be amazed by the volume and variety) and an architectural model of our building. Stop by and take a look at this colorful display, on view through May 1. And we'll see you at a concert soon!

February 17, 2009
MOZART PAR EXCELLENCE! CAMERA LUCIDA FEB. 24

Camera Lucida--the lighted room, the illuminated chamber--the radiance great works of chamber music lend to a space shared by musicians and listeners. Camera Lucida is the name selected by UCSD faculty cellist Charles Curtis for UCSD's new chamber music series. Curtis is the artistic director, and he hopes these intimate performances create strong connections between audience and performers. On Tuesday, Feb. 24, 8 p.m., at the Neurosciences Institute in La Jolla, the third of five Camera Lucida concerts features Late Works of Mozart: the Trio in E-flat Major for clarinet, viola and piano, K.498 'Kegelstatt"; the String Quintet No. 4 in G minor, K. 516; and Divertimento in E-flat Major for string trio, K. 563. Camera Lucida is a collaboration between top players from the Department of Music faculty and renowned musicians from San Diego Symphony. Seldom do San Diegans hear such high quality chamber music performed by world-class musicians who live and work right here in San Diego. You don't need to fly to New York City! The performance takes place in the cozy, acoustically superb hall at The Neurosciences Institute. The hall was designed by master acoustician Cyril Harris, who also designed UCSD's new Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, which opens in May (the fifth and final Camera Lucida concert will be held there on June 1). Performers for the Feb. 24 Mozart program are UCSD's Curtis, clarinetist Anthony Burr, and pianist Aleck Karis. They are joined by San Diego Symphony's Jeff Thayer and Alexander Palamidis (violins), Che-Yen Chen (viola), and Yao Zhao (cello); plus special guest (and Che-Yen Chen's brother) Che-Hung Chen. Camera Lucida is made possible through a generous contribution from the Sam B. Ersan Chamber Music Fund. Tickets are $25 general, free for all students, available at the door or from UCSD Box Office (858.534.TIXS).

January 22, 2009
TELEMATIC TRANSPORT: MARK DRESSER TRANSCENDS TIME AND SPACE

Last October, musicians at U.C. Irvine and San Diego presented "Multiplicities: An Inter-Arts Telematic Performance". Directed by UCSD contrabassist (and faculty member) Mark Dresser, the concert also featured painter Nancy Ostrovsky and drummer Billy Mintz with Dresser at UCSD; and pianist Myra Melford (associate professor at U.C. Berkeley), trombonist Michael Dessen (at UCSD alum and assistant professor at UCI), and Butoh dancer Oguri at U.C. Irvine. Thanks to something called telematics, performing music, composing and improvising simultaneously with people in different locations will soon be commonplace. Telematics refers to the "interface of computers, communication, and performance," according to Dresser. He stresses this isn't a replacement for live concerts, but rather an innovative way to address issues of musical community, space, and even instruments with an innovative use of technology. The concept isn't entirely new, though it does have its roots at UCSD. Noted composer and improviser Pauline Oliveros pioneered the use of technology to bring together performers in the seventies when she taught at UCSD (Oliveros is now a Distinguished Professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York). In Fall 2008, Dresser co-taught a telematic course at UCSD with artist and VisArts faculty member Adriene Jenik as well as sound designer/composer and theatre/dance faculty member Shahrokh Yadegari. It was fortuitous that Dresser's class coincided with classes taught by Oliveros at RPI and Chris Chafe at Stanford, and the three groups were joined in a telematic collaboration and concert. Dresser's telematic project utilizes Internet II, a proprietary high bandwidth network available only to research and education institutes. At concert locations, webcams and video screens are installed, along with essential audio and computer equipment. Performers in multiple locations are able to hear and see each other as they collaborate in real time. Given the large, sometimes transcontinental distances involved with telematic performance, there is a time lag between performers as sounds and images travel thousands of miles, but this latency doesn't have a significant impact, according to Dresser. Any delay is generally less than 25 milliseconds, rendering a "wet" (reverb-like) sound. Nonetheless, it's a challenging issue, and Dresser's team makes musical choices that integrate such latencies. "Its interesting how your mind equalizes or compensates ," Dresser says. "There's nothing more abstract than speaking on a telephone. You have no doubt that you're speaking to someone, but the communication transcends distance." Dresser's telematic collaborations have always included improvisation. In his larger works, he utilized Soundpainting, a sign language for structured improvisation developed by composer/performer Walter Thompson. This system of more than 750 gestures allows the conductor to direct improvisers including dancers, actors, musicians, and video artists, in a form that includes structured improvisation and even notation. Dresser sees this as an important bridge between composition and improvisation, and an ideal interface for large-group telematic performance. Telematics, Dresser says, is a new hybrid of instrument and venue. "An instrument has properties of its own," he explains, "and certainly it can give you possibilities that are inherently unique to itself." Telematics transcends distance. Suddenly, the idea of musical 'space' acquires a new meaning. Telematics brings together artists who might never have the chance (because of physical and political barriers) to share the same stage. Dresser's telematic community attracts artists who share similar artistic aspirations. Dresser is excited about the evolution of his telematic project over the past year. He had no idea it would take off with such speed. Meanwhile, he also uses traditional technology in an unconventional manner, amplifying his acoustic bass with magnetic pickups embedded beneath the fingerboard, which adds new digital potential to his sound. In the months ahead, Dresser will collaborate with an internationally renowned group of bassists on the Deep Tones for Peace project. On April 25, 2009, they will gather in Jerusalem and New York City for their first performance with the hope that music can help humanity transcend politics and violence. "Our intention is to add our deep voice to the growing worldwide appeal for peace in the Middle East," says the group's online mission statement. "We sincerely hope that our music (classical, jazz and contemporary) can be received as it is being offered, as a sharing of distinct musical languages and structures that co-exist and are appreciated by all participants."

  

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January 21, 2009
JÁNOS NÉGYESY: VIOLINIST...AND VISUAL ARTIST

When he's not busy with his career as a world-renowned performer and recording artist, department of music faculty member János Négyesy is a prolific visual artist whose medium is the computer. In recent years, Mr. Négyesy has produced dozens of these colorful abstract images, which, although they are produced with a machine, take on the organic forms and colors of nature. Through February, you can see fourteen computer paintings by Négyesy in an exhibit of his work at the San Marcos Community Center (3 Civic Center Drive, San Marcos). Mr. Négyesy's interest in visual art began with collages and photo montages he created as a teenager coming of age in Budapest, Hungary. The abstract, experimental nature of his work is in keeping with his passion for new and experimental music by composers including John Cage, Will Ogdon, and Rand Steiger, as well as his experiments with new technologies including synthesizers and electric violin. "The computer paintings are a continuation of my collages," Négyesy says. "I'm working with the same changes of mood from picture to picture, but on an abstract plane of imagery. Silence is the way to approch these 'windows,' and time is the code to open them." Mr. Négyesy was an "early adopter" of personal computers who spent hours experimenting with painting and graphics software. Although his images may be influenced by nature, they are completely original - unlike other computer art, they do not use photos, drawings, or other existing images as a starting point. "The homogeneity and the synthesis in his research is that of rhythm - the rhythm of sound and the rhythm of the image," writes UCSD literature professor Alain Cohen, who has studied Négyesy's computer paintings as well as his music. "In parallel with Baudelaire's synesthesia of all the senses, János apprehends a synergy between various artistic rhythms. The means of artificial intelligence are put to use in masterful control and randomness, the better to render computer simulations of artistic, cosmic, and scientific configurations. The means of artificial intelligence are put to use in masterful control and randomness, the better to render computer simulations of artistic, cosmic and scientific configurations. "János's methods and hermeneutics of Virtual Reality run the spectrum of a postmodern canvas with a vast array of filters, techniques and variations for the cybernetic brush and pen. They are the syntactic recursivities that govern the various iconic vocabularies and topics. Retouching or blurring the image, or brightening and contrasting it, changing the wavelength, playing with painterly lines, strokes and smears, János invests himself in the syntactic world of the computer's programs. He can invert, burn and dodge a color, fade it or make it more luminous, but he can also multiply and dissolve it. Similarly, photographic distortions, grain, texture and pointillist effects, pixelate effects, 3-D effects, and even the computer means of hiding the computer's effects, all combine the better to orchestrate the remarkable virtual cosmic recursivities, the impressionistic paintings and the references to art history, drawing and the algorithms thereof." Coinciding with the exhibit, Négyesy performs his popular Soirée for Music Lovers featuring romantic classical music on Valentine's Day, February— at 8 p.m., in the foyer at San Marcos City Hall. Admission is $10.

  

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January 15, 2009
KAMZA AND BAR KAMZA: PROVOCATIVE, POLITICAL, JANUARY 15, 7 PM AT THE LOFT

Refined from its experimental debut last year, Shlomo Dubnov's Kamza and Bar Kamza becomes a more intense and focussed multimedia piece in its January 15 presentation at The Loft, UCSD's new experimental performance venue. Dubnov, a member of the music faculty, was inspired by the Talmud and how its spiritual themes might apply to today's global politics and conflict. While it prominently features live performance and video, Kamza and Bar Kamza is more than a multimedia production. It's an interactive event that depends on audience response to achieve its full impact.  "The ultimate work of art is what the audience perceives of it," Dubnov says. "The whole idea is to get the audience perspective on the story, the music, the presentation. It's vital to learn what the audience takes from the experience and shares with us during the event." In its unusual combination of human interaction, live performance, and technology, Kamza and Bar Kamza explores new modes of expression and communication inspired by today's fast-paced, technology-driven culture.

  

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January 09, 2009
ICE MUSIC: KATHARINA ROSENBERGER IN BERLIN

Gray and frozen in December, Berlin crackled with creativity inside the Elektroakustische Musik Hoeren conference, where faculty composer/multimedia artist Katharina Rosenberger presented "New Works and Projects from UCSD Studios". Sound artists, computer musicians, teachers and other artists and academics packed the Grosse Studio of the Elektronische Studio at Berlin's Technische Universitat. "There was a good amount of discussion," Katharina says, "particularly about the concern that too much technology can crush the artistic part of an art work. The projects I brought from UCSD showed a high standard of composition skill, overall musicality, and artistry. The audience was impressed by the cross-disciplinarity at all levels here, and of course by facilities at CRCA (Center for Research in Computing and the Arts), Calit2, and our new Conrad Prebys Music Center." For attendees who might not realize that UCSD is a longstanding leader in new music, Ms. Rosenberger recounted some history dating back to founding chairman Will Ogdon and his commitment to experimental music, as well as interdisciplinary and multimedia performance. Exploring new territory continues today, Katharina told her audience, citing the department's close working relationship with Calit2 and CRCA; and courses such as the Seminar in Live Computer Music taught by Miller Puckette and Philippe Manoury, which teams a performer, composer, and scientist on a collaborative project. Katharina told the audience about Roger Reynolds' Sanctuary and Mark Dresser's Telematics performances, as well as her own interactive sound installation Room V. She also summarized impressive graduate works from UCSD. "Using image, text, video, and twelve-channel surround sound, I presented projects by Jaime Oliver and Matthew Jenkins (Silent Drum Controller); Nicholas DeMaison, Jason Ponce, and Mark Polesky (When the Light, Black); and William Brent and Kevin Larke (Ludbots)," Katharina says. She also showcased projects produced in CRCA's studios by Ben Hackbarth (Open End) and Joachim Gossman (In Space We Can Be Different and The Ballyferriter Prototype). Gossman was on hand to run the equipment, and fellow UCSD grad student Philip Skaller also attended. Katharina joined the music faculty last fall. Clearly, she has already become an international emissary for music at UCSD.

  

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