What: Roulette spring season highlights include John Zorn presenting two of his game pieces, Joan La Barbara honoring her 70th birthday with the premiere of new work, and [DANCEROULETTE] performances from Stephanie Skura, Sally Silvers, and Biba Bell.
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Roulette is pleased to announce the release of their spring season from April 4 to June 30, 2017.
The month of April begins with the duo Matt Mitchell and Tim Berne playing music from Førage, a new recording on Screwgun Records, followed by downtown veterans Phil Kline and Jim Jarmusch performing a feedback improvisation over a composed bed played on 24 boomboxes, with projections of footage of NYC shot by Thomas Edison. Former Merce Cunningham Dance Company composer Fast Forward presents Octopoda, a selection of works for solo and ensemble featuring bicycle handlebars and steel pan as instruments; Contemporaneous presents Transcendental Geometry, a performance project that will explore new music written with non-traditional tunings from around the world; and Lucie Vítková presents OPERA, a new commission based on utopian thinking and its environment, including sound, visuals, fashion, and movement. For two back-to-back evenings, choreographer Stephanie Skura directs seven elder-inclusive stellar improvisers to present Surreptitious Preparations For An Impossible Total Act, and International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) and Ensemble L’Itinéraire collaborate to present three generations of French and American music spectral music.
May kicks off with John Zorn performing two of his game pieces, Xu Feng and Cobra, followed by Matthew Goodheart and Matthew Ostrowski presenting Action Without a Distance, a program of solo compositions based on computer control of musical and non-musical objects. Composer and installation artist Miya Masoaka performs A Line Becomes a Circle, a Noh chamber opera, with text from Haiku fragments of the dying poet, Shiki Masaoka. Haitian electronic music composer Val Jeanty presents Dancing The Divine, a collaboration between her AfroElectronica soundscape with fire dancer Ra Nubi as part of her artist residency; Guy Klucevsek debuts his accordion quartet Bellows Brigade, featuring the premiere of “Pauline, Pauline,” in memory of Pauline Oliveros; Alex Weiser presents And All The Days Were Purple, including a new work commissioned by Roulette; and Joan La Barbara honors her 70th birthday year with the premiere of The Wanderlusting of Joseph C, inspired by the obsessions, visions, and dreams of visual artist Joseph Cornell. The month concludes with Cholera Nocebo, JG Thirlwell‘s surround sound immersive cinematic presentation. and The M6 vocal ensemble performing rarely heard compositions by Meredith Monk, as well as the world premiere of a new piece by Monk.
June is a strong month for Roulette’s dance programming and residencies + commissions series. Residencies include James Brandon Lewis presenting Heroes Are Gang Leaders, a program of original works inspired by Amiri Baraka, David Murray, and Sun Ra Arkestra; the Tomeka Reid Large Ensemble; and Brendon Randall-Myers premiering Dynamics of Vanishing Bodies, which features two large pieces by Randall-Myers written from opposing angles: a set of microtonal electro-folk songs for soprano Eliza Bagg, and an ethereal electric guitar quartet for Dither. Gemma Peacocke’s commissioned piece, Waves + Lines, is a multimedia song cycle adapted from Afghan women’s folk poems collected in Eliza Griswold’s book, “I Am the Beggar of the World.” The Curated by Meredith Monk series concludes with Song Out! Folk ‘n’ Pop Fantasies featuring new songs by Dick Connette, Rachelle Garniez, and Mimi Goese, followed by Ensemble Connect celebrating the voices of immigrants in the nation, featuring works by Esa-Pekka Salonen, Shulamit Ran, and Anna Clyne. Other performances include Hans Tammen’s Third Eye Orchestra performing Clepsydra, a score produced from electronic sample and hold procedures, and Bill Frisell and Thomas Morgan supporting the release of their duo album, Small Town, on ECM Records. The spring season concludes with two series of [DANCEROULETTE] from Biba Bell and Sally Silvers.