Author: Kerry

Bobby Previte’s Rhapsody Band

What: Nels Cline, Zeena Parkins, Jen Shyu, and others perform Rhapsody, an acoustic song cycle exploring the experience of travel.
When: Friday, March 2, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Rhapsody is an acoustic, narrative song cycle which incorporates written music, improvisation, and vocals with lyrics to create an evening length performance. Rhapsody twists and turns, landing on song ‘events’ but never ending there, instead, spinning off in other directions, only to land again on a vocal moment, sung by Jen Shyu. Using acoustic harp (Zeena Parkins), piano (John Medeski), acoustic guitars (Nels Cline), and drums, autoharp, harmonica and percussion (Bobby Previte) the piece places the listener ‘in transit’ — traveling to an unknown place that subtly changes over the course of time, until in the end, they arrive at a surprise destination. Rhapsody was commissioned by the 2015 Greenfield Prize in Music at the Hermitage Artist Retreat. The recording will be released in March 2018 on RareNoise Records.

Bobby Previte is a composer and performer whose work explores the nexus between notated and improvised music. One of the seminal figures of the 1980s New York Downtown scene, Previte is the recipient of the 2015 Greenfield Prize for music, and was a Guggenheim Foundation Fellow in 2012. Leading a plethora of diverse ensembles from the drums, he has collaborated with many of the leading lights in and beyond the world of music.

String Orchestra of Brooklyn: String Theories III: Meditations: Music by Pauline Oliveros, John Cage, Tony Conrad, and Zach Layton

What: Meditative works for strings using drones and improvisation woven together into an evening-length sound installation.
When: Friday, March 30, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — The final evening of the String Orchestra of Brooklyn‘s String Theories Festival features meditative works for string orchestra using drones, masses of sound, improvisation, and time-based structures woven together into an evening-length sound installation.

Founded in 2007, the String Orchestra of Brooklyn has become an integral part of New York City’s vibrant and diverse musical landscape, bringing together creative instrumentalists, composers, and like-minded organizations and ensembles to collaborate on adventurous musical projects and present them to the public at an affordable price.

Program:
Tony Conrad – Empire *
Pauline Oliveros – Tuning Meditations and 70 Chords for Terry
John Cage – Twenty Three
Zach Layton – Stridulations *

* String Orchestra of Brooklyn commission

String Orchestra of Brooklyn: String Theories II: The Rhythm Method: Siren Songs

What: Stylistically diverse, subversive music by three members of The Rhythm Method alongside American composer Lewis Nielson.
When: Thursday, March 29, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Inspired by the feminist writings of Margaret Atwood and the protest song as artistic genre, the second night of the String Orchestra of Brooklyn’s String Theories celebrates stylistically diverse, subversive music by three members of The Rhythm Method alongside American composer Lewis Nielson‘s powerful work Le journal du corps. From the anti-capitalist sentiment prevalent in Nielson’s work, to the post-cabaret songs of Meaghan Burke, the intricate graphic scores and suffragette-inspired work of Leah Asher, and a reflection on immigration from Marina Kifferstein, this program covers a wide range of musical material while maintaining a steady hand on the pulse of contemporary issues and aesthetics. With improvisation, vocalization, theatre, and a virtuosic spectrum of extended techniques, the performer/composers of The Rhythm Method defy expectations of genre and preconceptions of what a string quartet ‘can’ or ‘should’ do.

Praised for their “uncompromising and unreserved… intense, and sensuously gestural” performances (Examiner), The Rhythm Method strives to reimagine the string quartet in a contemporary context. Since their founding in 2014, the group has given soulful, spirited performances in New York, Vienna, Paris, and Lucerne, and tackled works ranging from classics by Ligeti and Webern to newer works/premieres by Tonia Ko, Dai Fujikura, Andrew Norman, John Zorn, and other living composers, including members of the ensemble. Through a mixture of thoughtful programming, captivating performances, and collaborations with sound artists, visual artists, and songwriters as well as composers, they present concert experiences that engage and challenge their audiences. The Rhythm Method recently completed their inaugural Austrian tour, featuring world premieres of new works by sound artists Bernd Klug and Andreas Trobollowitsch, a collaboration with the singer-songwriter collective Loose Lips Sink Ships, and premieres of works by all members of the ensemble. This season marks the kickoff of the quartet’s Hidden Mothers Project, a research-performance-recording initiative highlighting works by historical women composers. It will also bring the first installment of Broad Statements, a celebration of music-making by women in a wide array of artistic styles. This year, The Rhythm Method will also be releasing records of music by two of its members, Leah Asher and Meaghan Burke, as well as Dai Fujikura’s “Silence Seeking Solace.”

String Orchestra of Brooklyn: String Theories I: String Noise + Greg Saunier

What: String Noise teams up with String Orchestra of Brooklyn in a high-octane event with drummer Greg Saunier of Deerhoof.
When: Wednesday, March 28, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Opening night of the String Orchestra of Brooklyn‘s String Theories Festival promises to be a “trailblazing” example of one of the most ambitious collaborative initiatives yet by “New York’s most daring violin duo,” String Noise. The program will be comprised of short pieces written for the duo, as well as the two ensembles dueling at maximum speed in a Double Concerto by Eric Lyon. This “formidable display of virtuosity” will be fueled even further with interludes in between each movement of the Double Concerto by drummer, Greg Saunier. Hybridizing punk rock and classical music, with Brahmsian bleed throughs, the drum visitations invites chaos from all quarters.

String Noise is a classical, avant-punk violin duo comprised of violinists Conrad Harris and Pauline Kim Harris. Since its inception in 2011 at Ostrava New Music Days, they have expanded the two violin repertoire in over 50 new works to include larger collaborations with multimedia art, electronics, video projections, opera and dance.

Eric Lyon is a composer whose work focuses on articulated noise, chaos music, oracular sound processing, and spatial orchestration for high-density loudspeaker arrays. Lyon’s music has been selected for the Giga-Hertz prize, MUSLAB, and League ISCM World Music Days. His audio software packages FFTease and LyonPotpourri are widely used in the computer music community.

Greg Saunier is a drummer, composer, producer, singer and/or guitar player for Deerhoof and many other musical projects.

John Abercrombie: Timeless: A Tribute To His Life And Music

What: A dream lineup pays tribute to the life + music of John Abercrombie in a concert underscoring his legacy and influences.
When: Monday, March 26, 2018, 7:30pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $40 Online $45 Doors // $60 VIP $20 Student
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — One of the most influential guitarists to earn initial renown in the mid-1970s, John Abercrombie continued to make exceptional music as he grew and explored, ever-refining his approach across the decades. As NPR declared, he was “an intrepid and deeply lyrical guitarist who made a formative contribution to jazz-rock before refining a judicious, poetic iteration of post-bop.” Like his breakthrough LP as a leader – the aptly titled Timeless of 1975 – John’s final album, Up and Coming, was released by ECM Records in January 2017. In between came dozens of albums primarily for ECM as a leader, co-leader and key sideman, an evergreen body of work that helped define the label and will continue to confirm his stature as an innovative, individual artist who inspired his great colleagues as well as multiple generations of guitarists. Nels Cline, one of those guitarists shaped by recordings, performances and conversations from across John’s long career, said in an appreciation published in Premier Guitar: “It’s so hard to imagine our collective musical life without him.” Cline will join a dream lineup of John’s dear friends and close collaborators – Ralph Towner, Jack DeJohnette, Joey Baron, Marc Copland, Mark Feldman, Drew Gress, Adam Nussbaum, Bill Frisell, Joe Lovano, Marc Johnson, and Thomas Morgan – to pay tribute to the beloved guitarist’s life and music in an evening-length event underscoring his legacy and influences. Along with his career as performer, composer and recording artist, John was also a teacher, lecturer and mentor at Purchase College of the State University of New York.

All proceeds from the concert will go to the John Abercrombie Jazz Scholarship Fund. Tax deductible donations to benefit the John Abercrombie Scholarship Fund, a 501c3 non-profit organization providing tuition assistance for jazz students in need, will be accepted at the venue.

An Evening of Transmedia Performance Curated by Angie Eng

What: Media artist Angie Eng highlights Asian artists and composers working in transmedia and computerized instruments.
When: Wednesday, March 21, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Media artist Angie Eng curates an evening of Asian artists and composers working in transmedia and computerized instruments, featuring premieres from Ikue Mori, Zeena Parkins, Carole Kim, Atau Tanaka, and more.

Chasers: Un Pugno di dollari versus Yojimbo *

Director/Videobass: Angie Eng
Musician/Myo: Atau Tanaka
Videobass: Akio Mokuno

Chasers is A/V videobass band that cross compares culture through film remakes. Using custom computerized instruments this trio breaks down narrative into fragmented and repetitive gestures of sound and image.

Iconoclashgiftsfeld or the ambiguity of the destruction of images in a poison field *

Director/Video: Angie Eng
Music by: Hoppy Kamiyama
Movement by: Celeste Hastings
installation/Gift Shop: Angie Eng

Iconoclashgiftsfeld or the ambiguity of image destruction in a poison field is a parody on the fragility of collective memory, the power of the image and the struggle to replace the landscape with dominant voices. Dancer Celeste Hastings imitates statues being destroyed while Hoppy Kamiyama improvises music to both video and dancer.

Myogram **

Solo Music Performance by Atau Tanaka

Myogram by Atau Tanaka is a performance with the Myo bio-electrical interface as musical instrument where sensors capture electromyogram (EMG) signals reflecting muscle tension. The system renders as musical instrument the performer’s own body, allowing him to articulate sound through concentrated gesture.

Chew **

Director/Video: Carole Kim
Music by Zeena Parkins and Ikue Mori

Media artist Carole Kim and musicians Zeena Parkins and Ikue Mori will gnaw and ponder their way through an exploratory set of live visuals and sound. Kim experiments extensively with the moving image, engaging the materiality of projected light with the organic, textural surfaces she hand-constructs.

* World Premiere
** New York Premiere

Angie Eng is a visual artist who works in experimental video, conceptual art and time-based performance. In 1993 she moved to New York City and soon discovered time-based arts. During this time she became involved in the downtown electronic arts scene where she experimented with video sculptures, interactive installation and live video performance. She collaborated on numerous video performance projects, including The Poool, a live video performance group she co-founded and co-directed with Nancy Meli Walker and Benton Bainbridge in 1996-1999. Her experimentation with interactive installation began during her first solo show at Artists Space in 1997. Her work has been performed and exhibited at established venues such as the Whitney Museum at Philip Morris, Lincoln Center Video Festival, The Kitchen, New Museum of Contemporary Art, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Eyebeam Art and Technology Center, Roulette Intermedium, Artists Space, Art in General , Anthology Film Archives, Experimental Intermedia, CNES, and Cité de la Musique.

Will Mason Electroacoustic Quintet

What: New compositions for quintet by Will Mason featuring extensive live processing and electronic sounds, plus improvisation.
When: Sunday, March 18, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $15 Online $20 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Will Mason‘s compositions are based around shimmering and otherworldly harmonies, novel formal structures, and a shifting interplay between periodic and aperiodic rhythms and grooves. In his new electroacoustic quintet, he is joined by four world-class improvisers, and will be augmenting the performers with live vocal processing and a variety of samples and backing tracks.

Will Mason is a composer, drummer, and electronic musician from Maine. He has composed and performed in an eclectic range of settings and the bulk of his compositional output has been geared toward producing albums for ensembles he leads and in which he performs. His music draws influence from both the European modernist and American jazz avant-gardes. His debut album Beams of the Huge Night was released by New Amsterdam Records in 2015. All About Jazz writes that “Mason has an acute talent for composing very complex, extended pieces, creating an absorbing synthesis of jazz, technology, classicalism, and an organic construction that includes any or all of those components.” He also leads the noise-rock quartet Happy Place, which released its debut album in 2016 on Exit Stencil Records. The New York Times writes that the band “succeeds at fusing experimental rock and chamber music… The cathartic two- guitar attack has the feel of avant-rock, while the astringent harmony recall experiments by Charles Ives.” Mason is currently a visiting faculty member at Oberlin Conservatory and is completing his PhD at Columbia University.

Aaron Burnett and the Big Machine: New Spectrums in Electronic Acoustics

What: Electronic instruments coincide with acoustic instruments for improvised music from saxophonist Aaron Burnett.
When: Wednesday, March 14, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $15 Online $20 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Founded in 2008 by saxophonist Aaron Burnett, the Big Machine reflects on society’s urgency for freedom and peace in a world ruled by corporations and overwhelming technology. In a small ensemble setting, the Big Machine attempts to incorporate the aspects of modern day electronic music and world music with the traditional classical and jazz practices of the past innovators of our time. New Spectrums in Electronic Acoustics will be the first instance where Burnett will use a an audio-to-midi converter, along with Ableton, to process midi and the actual audio from the tenor saxophone at the same time with virtually no latency. The program will also feature new compositions as well as improvisation.

Born with a natural talent for visual art, Aaron Burnett began to study classical saxophone at the age 11. After attending the University of North Carolina at Greensboro for Classical and Jazz Performance (1999-2001), he relocated to Berklee College of Music in Boston for Classical Composition (2005-2008), graduating with a degree in Professional Music. Burnett has always stressed the importance of establishing a unique sound for himself while in college, studying classical Baroque composition techniques, advance harmony, world music, and atonal composition. He has performed with many renowned musicians such as Vijay Iyer, Teri Lyne Carrington, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Michelle Rosewoman, Jeff Tain Watts, and Kim Thompson, and toured with three-time Grammy winner Esperanza Spalding in her 2012 world tour with Radio Music Society. Burnett retains true nature of jazz in his music and his playing, always searching for new ways of interpreting the music while remaining modern and consistent with the times we live in.

Jin Hi Kim, Elliott Sharp, William Parker, Hamid Drake: Four Directions

What: Musical ideas merge from four directions by four creative musicians all moving in four directions.
When: Tuesday, March 13, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Four Directions, a new ensemble formed by Jin Hi Kim, will present an all-improvised performance in a combination of solos, duos, quartets focusing on freely improvised, cross-cultural, and techno sound.

Jin Hi Kim, innovative komungo virtuoso and Guggenheim Fellow in Music Composition, has performed as a soloist in her own compositions at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Kennedy Center, Smithsonian Freer Gallery of Art, Asia Society, and more. She is known as a pioneer for introducing komungo (geomungo) to American contemporary music scene through her “Living Tones” cross-cultural chamber and orchestral compositions and her extensive solo performances of the world’s only electric komungo with interactive MIDI computer system.

Elliott Sharp, a central figure in the avant-garde and experimental music scene in New York City for over 30 years, has released over eighty-five recordings ranging from orchestral music to blues, jazz, noise, no wave rock, and techno music. Recipient of the Berlin Prize for 2015 and a Guggenheim Fellowship winner for 2014, Sharp has composed for Ensemble Modern, RadioSinfonie Frankfurt, and Arditti Quartet. His opera Port Bou premiered in the United States at Issue Project Room in October 2014 and in Berlin at Konzerthaus in April 2015. In 2010, Sharp created About Us, a sci-fi opera for all-teenage performers at the Bayerische Staatsoper..

William Parker is a bassist, improviser, composer, writer, and educator from New York City. He has recorded over 150 albums, published six books, and taught and mentored hundreds of young musicians and artists. The Village Voice calls Parker, “the most consistently brilliant free jazz bassist of all time” and Time Out New York named him one of the 50 Greatest New York Musicians of All Time.

Hamid Drake is widely regarded as one of the best percussionists in improvised music incorporating Afro-Cuban, Indian, and African percussion instruments and he has collaborated extensively with top free jazz improvisers.

Bearthoven: New Works

What: Piano trio Bearthoven teams up with four critically lauded composers to perform new works for modern anxieties.
When: Wednesday, February 27, 2018, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $20 Online $25 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org // (917) 267-0368

Brooklyn, NY — Fresh off the release of their 2017 album Trios, Bearthoven performs three NYC premieres by a collection of America’s strongest upcoming compositional voices — Kristina Wolfe, Adam Roberts, Shelley Washington, and Scott Wollschleger.

Bearthoven [ \’bâr-toh-vən\ ] is a piano trio creating a new repertoire for a familiar instrumentation by commissioning works from leading young composers. Karl Larson (piano), Pat Swoboda (bass), and Matt Evans (percussion) have combined their individual voices and diverse musical backgrounds to create a versatile trio focused on frequent and innovative commissioning of up-and-coming composers. Bearthoven is rapidly building a diverse repertoire by challenging composers to apply their own voice to an instrumentation that, while common amongst jazz and pop idioms, is currently foreign in the contemporary classical world.

Shelley Washington writes music to fulfill one calling- to move. With an eclectic palette, Washington tells sonic stories with a range of direction and change. Her major body of work is written for saxophone and large or small chamber ensembles. Besides composition, Washington is an active baritone saxophonist and vocalist.

Adam Roberts writes music that takes listeners on compelling journeys while drawing on a vivid array of sonic resources. Roberts’ music has been performed by ensembles such as the Arditti Quartet, the JACK Quartet, le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, the Callithumpian Consort, Earplay, andPlay duo, Transient Canvas, Ums ‘n Jip, Fellows of the Tanglewood Music Center, the Boston Conservatory Wind Ensemble, the Association for the Promotion of New Music, violist Garth Knox, Guerilla Opera, and at festivals such as Wien Modern (Vienna), Tanglewood, the Biennale Musique en Scene (Lyons), and the 2009 ISCM World Music Days (Sweden).

Kristina Wolfe spent many of her formative years wandering through the forests of Mols Bjerge (near the city of Aarhus) in Denmark listening to the sounds of space and place. This environment, rich with neolithic graves, stone markers, and ancient roadways cultivated her imagination and creative focus on the spirits of the past, and has inspired her composition and listening practices up to the present day.