Category: Press Releases

[GENERATE] The M6: Meredith Monk Music Third Generation

What: The M6 vocal ensemble perform rarely heard compositions by Meredith Monk, including “Dolmen Music.”
When: Wednesday, May 31, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – The M6, a vocal ensemble dedicating to performing more rarely heard compositions by Meredith Monk as well as new material, performs a collection of solo and group works, including the world premiere of a yet to be titled work for six voices. Selections from Monk’s “Our Lady of Late” (1973) for solo voice and wine glass, “New York Requiem” (1993) written for Tom Bogdan during the AIDS crisis, “Calling” from “American Archeology #1: Roosevelt Island” (1994), “Basket Rondo” (2007) and Monk’s seminal “Dolmen Music” round out the program.

The M6 is a vocal ensemble dedicated to continuing the musical legacy of legendary composer, singer, and director Meredith Monk. The members of the group were among 19 singers chosen from around the world to participate in a professional training workshop offered by Monk and the Weill Music Institute at Carnegie Hall in January 2006, culminating in the Meredith Monk Young Artists Concert at Carnegie’s Zankel Hall. In 2007, The M6 formed out of the desire to continue learning Monk’s work through direct coachings with the composer herself, as well as with past and present members of her Vocal Ensemble. Since the majority of Monk’s work has been created and taught in the oral tradition, the group is devoted to immersion in this process and believes it is vital in order to assure that her extraordinary work lives on. Individual members are also working to transcribe more of Monk’s work in an effort to help document it for future generations. Appearances have included concerts at Zankel Hall, Whitney Museum, La MaMa, Symphony Space, The Stone, Roulette and Issue Project Room, as well as performances and residencies at Trinity College in Hartford, Syracuse University, Bronx Community College, and Sarah Lawrence College. The M6 is Sasha Bogdanowitsch, Sidney Chen, Emily Eagen, Holly Nadal, Toby Newman and Peter Sciscioli.

[GENERATE] JG Thirlwell: Cholera Nocebo

What: JG Thirlwell presents Cholera Nocebo, a 50 minute electro-acoustic surround sound immersive cinematic presentation.
When: Tuesday, May 30, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – JG Thirlwell presents Cholera Nocebo, a 50 minute electro-acoustic presentation performed with software and sampling, autoharp, prepared piano and small electronic and acoustic objects and instruments. By incorporating musique concrète and electronic sound along with live instrumentation, the composition is dynamic, cinematic and diverse with stylistic left-turns, often creating a tension between time and anxiety. Thirlwell was inspired to create a work incorporating live re-composition and improvisation into its structure, which could expand and contract fluidly with flow and spontaneity from pre-ordained building blocks of sound.

Thirlwell will person alongside projections of multiple time-lapse car journeys on the Long Island Expressway, providing the illusion of hurtling into a void. The accompanying projections will culminate in footage captured during the blackout in Lower Manhattan in the aftermath of the Hurricane Sandy. The film was shot and edited by gea with additional footage by Sebastian Mlynarski.

JG Thirlwell is a composer, producer, and performer based in Brooklyn. Thirlwell has completed commissions for Kronos Quartet, Bang On A Can, Thyssen-Bornemisza ArtContemporary, Experiments in Opera, Zephyr Quartet, Great Learning Orchestra and League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots, and is a member of the“freq_out” sound-art collective, curated by CM Von Hausswolff. Thirlwell has also featured as producer, remixer, collaborator or arranger for a wide variety of artists including Karen O, Noveller, Excepter, Zola Jesus, Melvins, Swans, Nine Inch Nails, Lydia Lunch, Coil, Z’s, Nick Cave and many more. In 2007 he was selected to be showcased in the “Composer Spotlight” series at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Thirlwell also creates the musical score for the Adult Swim / Cartoon Network show The Venture Bros and the Emmy-winning FX show Archer, and has created several motion picture scores, including Tony Oursler’s Imponderable. He recently completed a composition for solo contrabass for James Ilgenfritz and a commission for solo cello for Jeffrey Zeigler.

[COMMISSION] Alex Weiser: And All The Days Were Purple

What: Soprano Eliza Bagg premieres a substantial new song cycle from composer Alex Weiser.
When: Monday, May 29, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Soprano Eliza Bagg premieres a substantial new song cycle from composer Alex Weiser. Bagg will also play violin and will be joined by pianist Lee Dionne (of Ensemble Connect), New Morse Code (Hannah Collins and Michael Compitello), and andPlay (Maya Bennardo and Hannah Levinson). Weiser’s songs feature poems meditating on life, love, and death, in both English and Yiddish, by poets Anna Margolin, Abraham Sutzkever, Mark Strand, Rachel Korn and Edward Hirsch. The concert will open with a new arrangement of Weiser’s 2016 song cycle “Three Epitaphs.” Originally performed by Kate Maroney and Cantata Profana, “Three Epitaphs” features texts on love and the transience of life by Williams Carlos Williams, Seikilos, and Emily Dickinson.

Broad gestures, rich textures, and narrative sweep are hallmarks of the “compelling” (New York Times), “shapely, melody-rich” (Wall Street Journal) music of composer Alex Weiser. Born and raised in New York City, Weiser creates cosmopolitan music combining a deeply felt historical perspective with a vibrant forward-looking creativity. An energetic advocate for contemporary classical music and for the work of his peers, Weiser co-founded and directs Kettle Corn New Music. Weiser is Public Programs Manager at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, where he curates and produces programs that combine a fascination with and curiosity for historical context.

Lineup:
Eliza Bagg – Singer
Lee Dionne – Piano

New Morse Code
Hannah Collins – Cello
Michael Compitello – Percussion

andPlay
Maya Bennardo – Violin
Hannah Levinson – Viola

[GENERATE] Joan La Barbara: The Wanderlusting of Joseph C.

What: The world premiere of “The Wanderlusting of Joseph C.,” a new song cycle composed by Joan La Barbara.
When: Wednesday, May 24, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Joan La Barbara is a composer, performer, sound artist, and actor renowned for her unique vocabulary of experimental and extended vocal techniques, influencing generations of composers and singers. Her numerous commissions include composing for multiple voices, chamber ensembles, theater, orchestra, interactive technology, and soundscores for dance, video and film, including a score for voice and electronics for Sesame Street broadcast worldwide since 1977. Recordings of her work include: ShamanSong, Sound Paintings, Voice is the Original Instrument, Tapesongs, and 73 Poems, which was included in The American Century Part II: Soundworks at The Whitney Museum of American Art. La Barbara is a member of the Music Composition Artist Faculty at New York University and the College of Performing Arts Faculty at Mannes School of Music at The New School.

Monique Truong is a Vietnamese-American writer based in Brooklyn. Her first novel, The Book of Salt (2003), was a national bestseller, New York Times Notable Fiction book, and recipient of the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. Her second novel, Bitter In The Mouth (2010), received the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was named a best fiction book of the year by Barnes & Noble and Hudson Booksellers. Truong was named a 2015 U.S.-Japan Creative Artists Fellow, 2012 Visiting Writer at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, and 2010 Guggenheim Fellow. Her essays have been published in the New York Times, Washington Post, and numerous national magazines. A graduate of Yale University and Columbia University School of Law, Truong is also an intellectual property attorney.

[RESIDENCY] Val Jeanty: AfroElectronica Dancing The Divine

What: Haitian electronic music composer Val Jeanty explores sound, body, and spirit in collaboration with Ra Nubi.
When: Monday, May 22, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – For her first residency of the 2017 season, Haitian electronic music composer Val Jeanty explores the correlation of sound, body and spirit in a collaborative sound + dance performance with fire dancer Ra Nubi. Jeanty’s AfroElectronica soundscapes combine the spiritual medium of electronic voudou with a the fire spirit element in order to inspire and engage a wider depth of spirituality.

Haitian composer Val Jeanty creates esoteric sounds that tantalize the subconscious while creating a healing, cosmic frequency. By synergistically combining acoustics with electronics and the archaic with postmodern, Jeanty incorporates her African Haitian musical traditions into the present and beyond.Her AfroElectronica installations have been showcased in New York City at the Whitney Museum of American Art, Museum of Modern Art, The Brooklyn Academy of Music, and The Village Vanguard. She has performed internationally at The SaalFelden Musical Festival in Austria, Stanser Musiktage in Switzerland, Jazz à la Villette in France, and the Biennale Di Venezia Museum in Italy.

Ra Nubi is a Washington, DC-based performance artist and creative director. Her work is focused on the use of movement and dance as a channel to connect to the deep seeds of the Spirit and soul memory. Her most recent works include a self-produced interdisciplinary collaborative performance entitled “The Evolution of Blackness” and a featured performance alongside NagChampa at The John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. Nubi is currently working on her role as the deity Osun in Shaina Simms “AFROFUTURO,” which will be staged in Havana, Cuba in March 2017.

Guy Klucevsek: Bellows Brigade

What: Accordionist Guy Klucevsek presents Bellows Brigade, the most recent in a series of all-accordion groups.
When: Thursday, May 11, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Accordionist Guy Klucevsek presents Bellows Brigade, the most recent in a series of all-accordion groups that Klucevsek has put together over the decades. The repertoire features tunes and compositions by all the members of the band: Guy Klucevsek, Will Holshouser, Nathan Koci, and Kamala Sankaram.

The program includes world premieres including Guy Klucevsek’s “Pauline, Pauline,” in memory of Pauline Oliveros, guest composer David Mahler’s “Shall we have that singing….” based on the poem by William Stafford, and Will Holshouser’s “Dragonflies,” based on a poem by his father.

Guy Klucevsek began playing accordion in 1952 after seeing Dick Contino on television. Since that time, he has performed and/or recorded with Laurie Anderson, Bang On a Can, Alan Bern, Brave Combo, Anthony Braxton, Jason Robert Brown, Charles Busch, Dave Douglas, Bill Frisell, Phillip Johnston, Kepa Junkera, the Kronos Quartet, Natalie Merchant, A.R. Rahman, Todd Reynolds, John Williams, and John Zorn, and was a guest on the children’s television show “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.” His group Accordion Tribe (1996-2008) toured internationally, released 3 albums, and were the subjects of Stefan Schwietert’s documentary film, Accordion Tribe: Music Travels. Klucevsek has released 23 recordings as leader/co-leader, his most recent being Teetering on the Verge of Normalcy, on the Starkland label.

[GENERATE] Miya Masaoka: A Line Becomes a Circle

What: A Line Becomes A Circle is a Shomyo-Noh chamber opera featuring a libretto with Haiku fragments.
When: Wednesday, May 10, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Miya Masaoka presents A Line Becomes A Circle, a Shomyo-Noh chamber opera featuring a libretto with Haiku fragments written by the composer’s ancestor, the poet Shiki Masaoka (1867-1902). Inspired by a Fulbright trip to Japan in 2016 to study Noh, the piece is both sparse and rich, weaving together bel canto opera with Shomyo and Noh vocalizations and percussion. A Line Becomes A Circle was recently performed at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia, and Theater of Yugen in San Francisco.

A Line Becomes a Circle pays tribute to Miya’s distant relative Shiki Masaoka, yet brings the text into a contemporary context by setting the words in both Japanese and English. Masaoka considers the highly condensed and minimal Haiku format to be “the non blank space,” akin to the materiality and minimalism in gagaku music, visual art, and poetry of the traditional Japanese arts. The title of A Line Becomes A Circle is a play on words from the quote by the Indian Hindu Monk, Swami Vivekananda, who lived in the same time period as Shiki Masaoka. Five lines is the number of lines of a Tanka poem, and there are five lines in a pentagon shape that can be curved to morph into the shape of a circle. The implies movement and motion — the act of transformation, evolution and embracing a new identity.

Miya Masaoka resides in New York City and is a classically trained musician, composer and installation artist. She has created works for traditional Japanese instruments, chamber ensembles, symphonic orchestra, mixed choirs, telematic performances and designed interactive wearable textiles. She has composed pieces using spatialization, sonification of data, and has mapped behavior of plants, brain activity, and insect movement to sound. She was a Fulbright Fellow to Japan in 2016, where she researched Noh, Gagaku and the mono chord koto. She is the Director of Sound Art at Columbia University, and has been a faculty member of the Bard College MFA Sound / Music Department since 2003.

Matthew Goodheart & Matthew Ostrowski: Action at a Distance

What: Matthew Ostrowski and Matthew Goodheart play activated objects – sound reembodied in objects, light reembodied in sound.
When: Monday, May 8, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Matthew Goodheart (piano, computer-controlled metal percussion) and Matthew Ostrowski (electronics, fluorescent lights) perform solo compositions based on computer control of musical and non-musical objects, while also performing together as an improvising duo for the first time.

Goodheart’s work centers on transducer activated metal percussion, deriving and designing sounds tailored to each instrument’s the unique acoustic properties, often integrating them with his idiosyncratic pallet of solo piano techniques. Derived entirely from the amplified and processed sounds of a quartet of fluorescent lights, Ostrowski will present Negative Differential Resistance No 2. Limited to a minimalist palette of white light and 60-cycle hum, this work creates an optical and aural theater whose ultimate topic of investigation is our own awareness: as pattern maker, cognitive agent, and embodiment of time. The second half of the evening will feature a duo from these two seasoned improvisors, pairing Goodheart’s piano and extended transducer work with Ostrowski’s gesturally-controlled digital electronics.

Matthew Goodheart is a composer, improviser, and sound artist currently residing in New York. Following an early career as a free-jazz pianist, he has developed a wide body of work that explores the relationships between performer, instrument, and listener. His diverse creations range from large-scale microtonal compositions to open improvisations to immersive sound installations. Goodheart’s approach results in a “generative foundation” for exploring issues of perception, technology, cultural ritual, and the psycho-physical impact of acoustic phenomena. He is currently a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at Columbia University.

A New York City native, Matthew Ostrowski has been creating art with electronic and digital media for over twenty years, having worked as a composer, performer and installation artist, exploring work with music, multimedia, video and theater. Using digital tools and formalist techniques to engage with quotidian materials — sonic, physical, and cultural – Ostrowski’s work explores the liminal space between the virtual and phenomenological worlds. His work ranges from live electronic performance to installations incorporating video, multichannel sound, and computer-controlled objects. Ostrowski has collaborated with a large number of artists in the US and abroad, including David Behrman, John Butcher, Diamanda Galás, more.

John Zorn: Game Pieces

What: Prolific composer John Zorn presents two of his game pieces, Cobra and Hockey at Roulette in May.
When: Saturday, May 6, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $30/25 Online/Doors, $40 Premium
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368 =
Tickets: General Admission $25, Premium $40, $30 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Roulette is thrilled to welcome back prolific composer John Zorn to present two of his game pieces, Cobra and Hockey. This will be the second time Cobra is performed at Roulette since the 2014 performance celebrated the work’s 30th anniversary. A concert experience of extraordinary vitality, the musical thrills and astoundingly visual interaction of the ensemble is deeply satisfying, seductive, and thought-provoking.

Zorn’s game pieces, a series of which these two are superb examples, rely on the use of tactics and strategy in a mix with musical imagination, communal and subversive instincts, personal style, and chutzpah wrapped inside a healthy set of rules. With no time limit, written musical material, or pre-arranged sequence of events, game pieces unfold freely under the prompter’s watchful eye. A number of methods are used to determine communication between ensemble members and the prompter and the direction and evolution of the music, including hand gestures and cue cards. Cobra, which has been recorded several times for various labels, will be performed by an all-star ensemble of some of New York’s most cutting edge improvisers. Hockey is one of Zorn’s earliest and most unique game pieces and features the composer himself on game calls, the classical virtuoso Mike Nicolas on cello and Aaron Edgcomb, the punk-jazz drummer from Trigger on percussion.

John Zorn’s untangling, extending, and illuminating of unresolved, highly potent concepts dangled by artists from Artaud to Braxton to Earle Brown to Hieronymus Bosch, his study of and immersion in Jewish culture, mysticism, military strategy and tactics, aural traditions, cartoons, cinema, and brutal noise has produced one of the most important bodies of musical work of the last century, and opened a path for the next. Beyond his compositions, Zorn is an accomplished saxophonist, bandleader, and an ardent promoter of experimental music. He founded the record label Tzadik in 1995 and has served as curator and artistic director at numerous New York music venues, including the Knitting Factory, Tonic, and The Stone, which he founded in 2005. A highly prolific creator, Zorn has hundreds of recordings and compositions to his name and has toured throughout the U.S., Europe, and Asia.

Cobra:

Eyal Maoz – Electric Guitar
Taylor Levine – Electric Guitar
Matt Hollenberg – Electric Guitar
Ikue Mori – Electronics
Sylvie Courvoisier – Piano
Michael Nicolas – Organ
Trevor Dunn – Acoustic Bass
Simon Hanes – Electric Bass
Ches Smith – Vibraphone
Tim Keiper – Percussion
Kenny Grohowski – Drums
Jim Black – Drums

Hockey:

John Zorn – Game Calls
Michael Nicolas – Cello
Aaron Edgcomb – Percussion

Spectral Streams: ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble) and Ensemble L’Itinéraire

What: ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble) and Ensemble L’Itinéraire present three generations of French and American spectral music.
When: Tuesday, April 25, 2017, 8pm
Where: Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave Brooklyn, 2/3/4/5/A/C/G/D/M/N/R/B/Q trains & the LIRR
Cost: $25/20 Online $20/15 Doors
Info: www.roulette.org / (917) 267-0368
Tickets: General Admission $20, Members/Students/Seniors $15, $25/20 Tickets at the door

Brooklyn, NY – Roulette hosts a French-American collaboration between two leading contemporary music ensembles: ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble) from New York / Chicago and Ensemble L’Itinéraire from Paris, conducted by French-Canadian conductor Jean-Michaël Lavoie. This Spectral Streams tour, initiated to celebrate the 70th birthday of Gérard Grisey (one of the founders of Ensemble L’Itinéraire), features works by French and American composers associated with the spectral school of composition. Three generations are featured throughout the tour: seminal works by Grisey (“Périodes” and “Partiels”), chamber pieces by “post-spectral” French composers (Philippe Leroux, Franck Bedrossian), and works by recent IRCAM-trained Americans such Ashley Fure and Christopher Trapani— whose new work “PolychROME,” commissioned specifically for this collaboration, receives its world premiere at Roulette.

The International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) is an artist collective committed to transforming the way music is created and experienced. The ensemble’s 35 members are featured as soloists, chamber musicians, commissioners, and collaborators with the foremost musical artists of our time. Works by emerging composers have anchored ICE’s programming since its founding in 2001, and the group’s recordings and digital platforms highlight the many voices that weave music’s present.

Ensemble l’Itinéraire is one of the main European ensembles dedicated to the performance of contemporary music, known in particular for its performances of spectral music works. Based in Paris, the ensemble was founded in January 1973 by Michaël Lévinas, Tristan Murail, Hugues Dufourt, Gérard Grisey and Roger Tessier. Since its creation, the ensemble has collaborated with many composers and created hundreds of art pieces.