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All-Star quintet: Joey Baron, Robert Black, Larry Polansky, Robyn Schulkowsky, Christian Wolff present the music of Christian Wolff both old and new - including a premiere of new long form piece written specifically for this quintet.

Christian Wolff was born in 1934 in Nice, France. He's lived mostly in the U.S. since 1941. He studied piano with Grete Sultan and composition, briefly, with John Cage. Though mostly self-taught as a composer, the work of John Cage, Morton Feldman, David Tudor and Earle Brown have been important to him, as well as long associations with Cornelius Cardew and Frederic Rzewski. A particular feature of his music is the various freedoms it allows performers at the time of performance as well as the variable results possible for any one particular piece, for which various new notations have been invented. Underlying notions in the work are shared freedom, self-determination and democratically-spirited collaboration. The music is published by C.F. Peters, New York and much of it is recorded, on many labels. A number of pieces, starting in 1953, have been used and commissioned by Merce Cunningham and his dance company. Wolff has been active as a performer and as improvisor - with Takehisa Kosugi, Steve Lacey, Christian Marclay, Keith Rowe, William Winant, the group AMM, Kui Dong and Larry Polansky. His writings on music (up to 1998) are collected in "Cues: Writings and Conversations", published by MusikTexte, Cologne. He has received awards and grants from the American Academy and National Institute of Arts and Letters, the Ford Foundation, DAAD Berlin, the Asian Cultural Council, the Fromm Foundation, the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts (the John Cage Award for music) and the Mellon Foundation. He is a member of the Akademie der Kuenste in Berlin and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2004 he received an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from the California Institute of the Arts. Academically trained as a classicist, Wolff was professor of classics and music at Dartmouth College from 1971 to 1999.

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Curated by Dan Joseph

"Melody and Counterpoint"
Esteemed American composer Christian Wolff will lead this exceptional group of experimental musicians in a program which re-examines the fundamental aspects of melody and counterpoint in music. The program will include a complete performance of Wolff's recent Micro Exercises, and the World Premiere performance of a new work by Swiss composer and clarinetist Jürg Frey.

Featuring: Christian Wolff, Fender Rhodes electric piano, melodica; Jürg Frey, clarinet; Larry Polansky, electric guitar; Craig Shepard, trombone; Jeremy Lamb, cello; others TBA.

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Chrstain Wolff at 70 in person with The Barton Workshop to mark the release of new double CD, (re):Making Music (Made 133). Plus portraits of Jerry Hunt (Tzadik Record) and James Tenney (Double CD New World Record).

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James Fulkerson (trombone/electronics) and John Anderson (clarinet/bass clarinet) of The Barton Workshop team with Taimur Sullivan (baritone sax) to perform the music of Christian Wolff and Fulkerson. The Barton Workshop is an Amsterdam based ensemble that has collaborated with composers such as Alvin Lucier, Christan Wolff, Nicolas Collins and Frank Denyer and has premiered works by Galina Ustvolskaya, Henryk Gorecki, Alvin Lucier, Jerry Hunt and others. Their CD recordings of music by John Cage, Morton Feldman and Wolff are widely acclaimed.

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"The Music of Christian Wolff performed by pianist Richards and the composer. The two will premiere Wolff�s 1960 work, Duet I (piano four hands) and perform his Keyboard Miscellany from 1997. Wolff performs Melody and assorted pieces from the 1990's and Richards plays the 11 Preludes (for Yvar Mikhashoff) from 1980-81 plus works from as far back as 1950. "