Number the Birds: Till by Turning Performs New Music by Erica Dicker, Matt Marble, and Katherine Young

Chamber music collective Till by Turning will debut a new quartet for violin, viola, bassoon, and piano by composer Matt Marble, as well as perform a first portion of an ongoing investigation into interactions between sound and image. The piece will be a structured improvisation for the musicians and Brock Monroe’s visual projections.

The program will also include a duo version of BiaÅ‚ystok for strings by Erica Dicker and selections from Katherine Young’s multi-movement meditation on Quartet for the End of Time, which explores Messiaen’s musical materials and time-suspending techniques, while grafting material and mundane apocalyptic suggestions onto and across his religious consciousness.

Till by Turning is the collective effort of Amy Cimini, Erica Dicker, Emily Manzo, and Katherine Young. Working as performers, educators, improvisers, scholars, composers, and songwriters–Till by Turning performs new chamber music by established and emerging artists. Our programming features original songs, compositions, and arrangements by our core members.

As Time Out Chicago said: “There’s an old Shaker dance number, written in 1848 by Elder Joseph Brackett, that likely serves as inspiration for…Till by Turning. It’s called ‘Simple Gifts’ and what it describes is a kind of serendipitous joy in movement through time and space: When true simplicity is gain’d / To bow and to bend we shan’t be asham’d / to turn, turn will be our delight / Till by turning, turning we come round right.”

“The group belongs to a new generation of adventurous musicians….[who] dip into the modern canon…and give breath to new works by their peers.”

Lesley Flanigan is a New York-based sound sculptor, composer, vocalist, and performer. Inspired by the physical materiality of sound, she focuses on amplification itself as the subject of her performances, which weave sound from her voice with hand-built feedback electronics. Tonight she is joined by guitarist James Moore of Dither.