Michael Gordon + Bach Ensemble Signal Kristian Bezuidenhout, harpsichord Courtney Orlando, violin Christa Robinson, oboe Brad Lubman, conductor

Transcription

1 Miller Theatre at Columbia University th Season Bach, Revisited Michael Gordon + Bach Ensemble Signal Kristian Bezuidenhout, harpsichord Courtney Orlando, violin Christa Robinson, oboe Brad Lubman, conductor Thursday, March 12, 8:00 p.m.

2 From the Executive Director March certainly began with a roar. The Portrait of Augusta Read Thomas featured an unscored snowstorm to greet the world premiere performance of her new octet Selene (named after the Greek goddess of the moon), a string quartet from her Sun Threads series, and the New York premiere of Resounding Earth. Written for Third Coast Percussion, Resounding Earth features a unique collection of over 125 bells from around the world which the ensemble drove from Chicago to New York (through another snowstorm) to make the performance possible. Tonight marks the start of this season s Bach, Revisited series. Pairing musical trailblazers across the centuries makes for dynamic programs and, sometimes, fierce challenges for the performers. Michael Gordon, Helmut Lachenmann, and Sofia Gubaidulina are composers familiar to Miller audiences from the Composer Portraits series. They each strike me as a natural fit with Bach. They are also composers whose work requires musicians with an intrepid spirit and the utmost skill. Some of the repertoire pairings in these concerts are the musical equivalent of an Ironman! We re lucky that Ensemble Signal has fully embraced the challenge as resident ensemble for the series. We close the month with the final performance of this season s Early Music series. Les Délices will join us at Miller Theatre on March 28 for a gorgeous evening of Baroque works inspired by Homer s Odyssey. This program, Myths & Allegories, weaves together a selection of Baroque works to illuminate the story of Ulysses. Works by Jean-Féry Rebel, Thomas-Louis Bourgeois, and Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre (the first French woman to compose an opera) paint a fascinating picture of how artists across the centuries connect to this story of homecoming. Let s look forward to welcoming spring with an amazing lineup of concerts at Miller. Thank you for being a part of it! Melissa Smey Executive Director

3 Miller Theatre at Columbia University th Season Bach, Revisited Thursday, March 12, 8:00 p.m. Michael Gordon + Bach Ensemble Signal Brad Lubman, conductor Concerto for Harpsichord in G minor, BWV 1058 J. S. Bach ( ) I. Allegro II. Andante III. Allegro assai Kristian Bezuidenhout, harpsichord Concerto for Violin and Oboe in C minor, BWV 1060 Courtney Orlando, violin; Christa Robinson, oboe I. Allegro II. Adagio III. Allegro Bach INTERMISSION Dry (2013) U.S. premiere Michael Gordon (b. 1956) Hyper (2014) New York premiere Gordon This program runs approximately one hour and forty-five minutes including intermission. Major support for Bach, Revisited is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts. Please note that photography and the use of recording devices are not permitted. Remember to turn off all cellular phones and pagers before tonight s performance begins. Miller Theatre is ADA accessible. Large print programs are available upon request. For more information or to arrange accommodations, please call

4 About the Program Johann Sebastian Bach Concerto for Harpsichord in G minor, BWV 1058 Energized lines playing over one another in a mirror maze: this could be referring to Bachian counterpoint or equally to the music of Michael Gordon. All four of this evening s pieces, whether from the first half of the eighteenth century or of the twenty-first, race with driving rhythm and self-similarity. All four engage small groups of instruments, alike and unalike: six parts in the Bach concertos, eight and ten in the Gordon pieces. Like many composers of our own time, Bach had a flexible notion of the orchestra as a group of soloists, probably no more than twenty in number. The court at Cöthen, the small city where he was music director from 1717 to 1723, had a documented ensemble of eighteen instrumentalists, for whom Bach wrote a lot of his larger instrumental scores (probably including both this evening s concertos in their original versions, and also the Brandenburg set), as well as solo and chamber pieces. Much of this music he brought out again and revised during the next phase of his life, in Leipzig, where he not only ran the church music but also, between 1729 and 1741, directed weekly concerts at Zimmermann s coffee house. The source for his seven solo keyboard concertos is a draft he made around 1738, though some or all of the works may have been designed in Cöthen for other solo instruments. That is certainly the case with this G minor concerto, originally for violin. We might imagine Bach himself playing this concerto, whether at Cöthen or in the Leipzig coffee house, but at the latter venue he might have given the solo part to one of his elder sons, Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Philipp Emanuel. The first movement of a concerto customarily alternated the principal theme with contrasting episodes in which the solo instrument or instruments could shine, but Bach was always after a firmer integration, with the episodes drawing material from the theme, as it is here and will be again in the C minor concerto for violin and oboe. Three strong descending thrusts at the outset thus determine the character not only of the theme but of the whole opening movement. When the keyboard soloist takes over, it is to reconsider rather than diverge, and the movement continues through a nice interweaving of variation and innovation.

5 So it goes, again, in the subsequent movements, the andante set on a spacious rhythm but exploring harmonic byways from its base in B flat. The finale is a gigue in 9/8, with the piano rushing into sixteenth notes before a pause on a dominant seventh chord, and racing on again afterwards. Concerto for Violin and Oboe in C minor, BWV 1060 Most of Bach s concertos for multiple keyboard instruments two, three, and four were again transcriptions, the original of what survives as a C minor double concerto probably having been for two violins or for violin and oboe, the possibility here restored. Among the symmetries in the first movement s main theme is a kind of double echo effect, for not only does its fourth measure end with the soloists immediately repeating alone the full ensemble s falling fifth, but this whole element, A D A D in eighth notes, is an expansion of the E flat D E flat D in sixteenths at the end of the second measure. In keeping with concerto form, and this example of it in particular, the soloists otherwise play in unison with the first violins in the theme and, when the two intermittently break away, the solo oboe has the melody, dazzlingly accompanied by the solo violin. The interplay of the main theme with its episodes is at once subtle and logical, depending on how a few ideas can be reused in manifold ways. The slow movement is a siciliana (a dance with the spacious meter of four three-note groups per measure), arriving into the calm of the relative major, E flat. With the oboe taking the principal line at the start, the movement gains a pastoral air. The violin replies a fifth above, and the movement continues with the soloists fully forward, in alternation at different degrees, to end on a G major chord in preparation for the returning C minor of the finale. With the swing and drive and robust harmony of a country dance, this finale shows how Bach, as much as Gordon, had his ear to the dance patterns of the epoch. Again there is a small element that recurs in different forms, here consisting of a threefold repetition of a note at quarter-note intervals. Right at the unharmonized beginning, the note is C, interspersed with a falling scale: C G C F C E flat. Four measures later, this is turned upside down, and later still, the repeated notes are played alone, with no intervention. Motivic integration of a similar kind knits the recurrences of the fully scored main theme to the episodes more intimately scored for the soloists with minimal support. Now the violin has its chance to astonish, in swoops of sixteenth notes, later sped up to triplets, which freeze the orchestral strings. But everything here is conjoined: soloist with soloist, soloists with ensemble, the brilliant and the plain. About the Program

6 Michael Gordon Dry (2013) Gordon wrote this piece for the Crash Ensemble of Dublin, who gave the première at the Kilkenny Arts Festival in The scoring is for alto flute, clarinet, trombone, electric keyboard, electric guitar, tuned gongs, and four strings, all amplified. At the start, and in much that follows during the course of this eighteen-minute piece, instruments are repeating notes in repeating rhythms, as if signaling to one another, generally with fading dynamics. They hold on to their identities; clarinet, keyboard, and electric guitar, for instance, keep up patterns of long-long-long-long-short. As more instruments join in the number of speeds and patterns increases, and eventually some of the instruments, beginning with the tuned gongs, break away from simple note-bouncing into slower or faster alternations, in music that is constantly expanding and contracting in density. Then a new sound arrives: a slow glissando, up and down, on cello soon joined by electric guitar and later by the trombone. These melodized groans grow and remain through much of the piece through further extensions of the sound mass (into high melody from the electric guitar, for instance) and returns to how things were before. It is, however, with a stretch of excited repetitions and oscillations that the piece breaks through to its conclusion. Hyper (2014) Written for the ensemble DC8, which gave the first performance in February last year in Los Angeles, this piece plays for twelve minutes and is scored for a slightly smaller ensemble than Dry, with again three instruments in the struck-plucked domain (piano, acoustic guitar, and vibraphone), but no trombone and just three strings. In Hyper, the composer has written, I attempt to create the musical equivalent of an impossible object, an optical illusion in which an impossible geometry is represented. Impossible objects fall up, open in and out, and twist irrationally in space. One impossible object is the Penrose Stairs stairs that climb upward but somehow loop in a circle, so that no matter how far one climbs they always return to the same place. Similarly, music can travel through keys and end up where it began. These types of illusions, which are common in the art of M. C. Escher, are taken to absurdist ends in literary works like Alice in Wonderland: Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. In Hyper I create quixotic geometries without concern for the laws of physics. - Program notes by Paul Griffiths

7 About the Artists Michael Gordon s music merges subtle rhythmic invention with incredible power embodying, in the words of The New Yorker s Alex Ross, the fury of punk rock, the nervous brilliance of free jazz, and the intransigence of classical modernism. Over the past 25 years, Gordon has produced a strikingly diverse body of work, ranging from large-scale pieces for high-energy ensembles to major orchestral commissions and works conceived specifically for the recording studio. Transcending categorization, his music represents the collision of mysterious introspection and brutal directness. Gordon s commissions include Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Stuttgart Ballet, the New World Symphony, the BBC Proms, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Dresden Festival, and the Sydney 2000 Olympic Arts Festival. His music has been performed at the Kennedy Center, Theatre De La Ville, Barbican Centre, Oper Bonn, Kölner Philharmonie, and the Southbank Centre, among others. The recipient of multiple awards and grants, Gordon has been honored by the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His recordings include Timber (Cantaloupe), Weather (Nonesuch), Light is Calling (Nonesuch), Trance (Argo/Cantaloupe), and Van Gogh (Cantaloupe). Harpsichordist Kristian Bezuidenhout was born in South Africa in He began his studies in Australia, completed them at the Eastman School of Music, and now lives in London. Bezuidenhout is a frequent guest artist with the world s leading ensembles, including The Freiburger Barockorchester, Chicago Symphony, and Collegium Vocale Gent, in many instances assuming the role of guest director. He divides his time between concerto, recital, and chamber music engagements, appearing in the early music festivals across Europe; the festivals of Salzburg, Edinburgh, Schleswig Holstein, Tangelwood, Luzern, and Mostly Mozart Lincoln Center, and at many of the world s most important concert halls, including the Berlin and Köln Philharmonie, Suntory Hall, Symphony Hall, Konzerthaus Vienna, Wigmore Hall, and Carnegie Hall. Recent recordings include three volumes of the complete keyboard music of Mozart (prizes include Diapason D or, a Caecilia Prize, and Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik); Mendelssohn piano concertos

8 with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra; and Schumann Dichterliebe with Mark Padmore (both won Edison Awards). Heralded by The New York Times as a violinist of tireless energy and bright tone, Courtney Orlando specializes in the performance of contemporary and crossover music. She is a founding member of the acclaimed new music ensemble Alarm Will Sound, which has premiered works by and collaborated with some of the foremost composers of our time, including John Adams, Steve Reich, Meredith Monk, Michael Gordon, and David Lang. Performances with AWS include those at Carnegie Hall, the Lincoln Center Festival, Amsterdam s Holland Festival, and a tour of Moscow and St. Petersburg. She is also a member of Ensemble Signal. Courtney serves on the faculty of the Peabody Conservatory. Prior to her appointment at Peabody, she received her doctorate from and taught at the Eastman School of Music. Oboist Christa Robinson moved to NYC from Saskatchewan, Canada, where she performed as Principal Oboe with the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra and the Saskatoon Opera. She now lives in Brooklyn, NY and is a member of new music ensembles Alarm Will Sound and Ensemble Signal. She can frequently be heard performing with the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra of St. Luke s, Gotham Chamber Opera, the Westchester Philharmonic, and on Broadway. In 2010, Christa premiered the oboe quartet Going Home by Martin Bresnick commissioned through the Meet the Composers organization, and awarded to the Double Entendre Music Ensemble. She has performed and recorded with Anthony Braxton, Jonsi, Five for Fighting, Dave Chappell, and is a featured performer on season three of the Louis C.K. show. In addition to performing, Christa is a faculty member of Mannes The New School s Preparatory Division and of the Third Street Music School Settlement. Brad Lubman, conductor/composer, is founding Co-Artistic Director and Music Director of Ensemble Signal. Conducting a broad range of repertoire from classical to contemporary works, Lubman has led major orchestras including the NDR Sinfonieorchester Hamburg, DSO Berlin, RSO Stuttgart, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the National Symphony. He has worked with some of the most important ensembles for contemporary music, including Ensemble Modern, London Sinfonietta, Musik Fabrik, LA Phil New Music Group, Chicago Symphony MusicNOW, and Steve Reich and Musicians. Lubman has conducted at newmusic festivals across Europe, including those in Lucerne, Salzburg, Berlin, Paris, Cologne, Frankfurt, and Oslo. Lubman has conducted numerous world premieres, in-

9 cluding Steve Reich s Three Tales, Daniel Variations, Radio Rewrite, and Variations for Vibes, Pianos and Strings, Helmut Lachenmann s Concertini, Michael Gordon/David Lang/Julia Wolfe s Shelter, and works by Philip Glass, Charles Wuorinen, John Zorn, and Hilda Paredes. His own music has been performed in the USA and Europe, and can be heard on his CD, Insomniac, on Tzadik. Brad Lubman is on faculty at the Eastman School of Music and the Bang on a Can Summer Institute. Ensemble Signal, described by the New York Times as one of the most vital groups of its kind, is a New Yorkbased ensemble. Since its debut in 2008, the Ensemble has performed over 100 concerts and has given the New York, world, or U.S. premieres of over 20 works. Signal was founded by Co-Artistic/ Executive Director Lauren Radnofsky and Co-Artistic Director/ Conductor Brad Lubman. A new music dream team (Time Out New York), Signal regularly performs with Lubman and features a supergroup of independent artists from the modern music scene. Signal has performed at Lincoln Center Festival, BIG EARS Festival, Carnegie Hall s Zankel Hall, Ojai Music Festival, Miller Theatre, Cleveland Museum of Art, and the Bang on a Can Marathon. Signal has worked with artists and composers including Steve Reich, Helmut Lachenmann, Irvine Arditti, Kristian Bezuidenhout, David Lang, Julia Wolfe, Oliver Knussen, Hilda Paredes, and Charles Wuorinen. Signal s recordings are available on Cantaloupe, Mode, Orange Mountain, and New Amsterdam Records. Recent highlights include a headliner performance of Steve Reich s Music for 18 Musicians and Radio Rewrite at the 2014 BIG EARS Festival in Knoxville, TN. Upcoming highlights include the co-commission of a new work by Steve Reich, the performance of Reich s video opera Three Tales, and the performance of David Lang, Michael Gordon, and Julia Wolfe s video opera Shelter at Walt Disney Concert Hall in May Additionally, Signal makes its harmonia mundi debut in May 2015 with Music for 18 Musicians. Ensemble Signal Paul Coleman, sound director Kelli Kathman, flute Ken Thomson, clarinet Christa Robinson, oboe Steven Parker, trombone Oliver Hagen, piano Bill Solomon, percussion Brendon Randall-Myers, guitars Courtney Orlando, violin Lauren Cauley, violin Will Knuth, violin Isabel Hagen, viola Lauren Radnofsky, cello Greg Chudzik, bass About the Artists

10 About Miller Theatre Miller Theatre at Columbia University is the leading presenter of new music in New York City and one of the most vital forces nationwide for innovative programming. In partnership with Columbia University School of the Arts, Miller is dedicated to producing and presenting unique events, with a focus on contemporary and early music, jazz, and multimedia. Founded in 1988, Miller has helped launch the careers of myriad composers and ensembles, serving as an incubator for emerging artists and a champion of those not yet well known in the U.S. A fourtime recipient of the ASCAP/Chamber Music America Award for Adventurous Programming, Miller continues to meet the high expectations set forth by its founders to present innovative programs, support new work, and connect creative artists with adventurous audiences. Advisory Committee Paul D. Carter Mary Sharp Cronson* Stephanie French* Marcella Tarozzi Goldsmith Karen Hagberg Columbia University Trustees Jonathan D. Schiller, Chair A Lelia Bundles, Vice Chair Noam Gottesman, Vice Chair Mark E. Kingdon, Vice Chair Esta Stecher, Vice Chair Rolando T. Acosta Armen A. Avanessians Andrew F. Barth Mark Jackson Eric Johnson Philip Mindlin Linda Nochlin Peter Pohly Lee C. Bollinger, President of the University William V. Campbell, Chair Emeritus Lisa Carnoy Kenneth Forde Joseph A. Greenaway, Jr. James Harden Marc Holliday Margo Viscusi* Mr. and Mrs. George Votis* Cecille Wasserman* Elke Weber I. Peter Wolff* * Miller Theatre Advisory Board member Benjamin Horowitz Ann F. Kaplan Jonathan Lavine Charles Li Paul J. Maddon Vikram Pandit Michael B. Rothfeld Claire Shipman Kyriakos Tsakopoulos Columbia University School of the Arts Carol Becker Dean of Faculty Jana Hart Wright Dean of Academic Administration Miller Theatre Staff Melissa Smey Executive Director Brenna St. George Jones Director of Production Nora Sørena Casey Marketing & Communications Associate Katherine Bergstrom Artistic Administrator Rhiannon McClintock Executive Assistant Charlotte Levitt Director of Marketing & Outreach James Hirschfeld Business Manager Megan Harrold Audience Services Manager Taylor Riccio Production Coordinator Aleba & Co. Public Relations The Heads of State Graphic Design

11 Thanks to Our Donors Miller Theatre acknowledges with deep appreciation and gratitude the following organizations, individuals, and government agencies whose extraordinary support makes our programming possible. $25,000 and above Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts National Endowment for the Arts Dow Jones Foundation H. F. (Gerry) Lenfest $10,000 - $24,999 William V. Campbell The Aaron Copland Fund for Music Mary Sharp Cronson $5,000 - $9,999 The Amphion Foundation Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation Fritz Reiner Center for Contemporary Music at Columbia University The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation New York State Council on the Arts CLC Kramer Foundation The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation The Evelyn Sharp Foundation Margo and Anthony Viscusi Craig Silverstein $1,000 - $4,999 Rima Ayas Barbara Batcheler Susan Boynton Paul D. Carter Hester Diamond R. H. Rackstraw Downes Marcella Tarozzi Goldsmith Christine and Thomas Griesa $500 - $999 Oliver Allen Regula Aregger Mercedes Armillas ASCAP Elaine S. Bernstein Cedomir Crnkovic / Cavali Foundation Kristine and Joseph Delfausse Carol Avery Haber / Haber Family Charitable Fund Karen Hagberg and Mark Jackson Donella and David Held Roger Lehecka Philip Mindlin Linda Nochlin Jeanine and Roland Plottel Stephanie French Claude Ghez Mary and Gordon Gould James P. Hanbury John Kander Mark Kempson and Janet Greenberg Paul J. Maddon Jessie and Charles Price Peter Pohly Christopher Rothko J. P. Sullivan Cecille Wasserman Janet C. Waterhouse Elke Weber and Eric Johnson Anonymous Marian M. Warden Fund of the Foundation for Enhancing Communities Katharina Pistor James Sharp Cia Toscanini Kathryn Yatrakis $100 - $499 Gail and James Addiss Edward Albee Roger Bagnall Sandra and Marc Bernstein Andrew Birsh Jim Boorstein Alexandra Bowie and Daniel Richman Elizabeth and Ralph Brown Caplan Family Foundation Richard Carrick and Nomi Levy-Carrick Rashmy Chatterjee Ginger Chinn and Reggie Spooner Gregory Cokorinos Merry Conway Norma Cote David Demnitz Vishakha Desai and Robert Oxnam Rosamund Else-Mitchell Peter and Joan Faber Ruth Gallo Marc Gilman June O. Goldberg Richard Gray Barbara Harris Frances and Raymond Hoobler Bernard Hoffer Alan Houston and Lisa DeLange Frank Immler and Andrew Tunick Sandra and Malcolm Jones William Josephson Rebecca Kennison L. Wilson Kidd, Jr. Sandra Kincaid Barbara and Kenneth Leish Arthur S. Leonard Richard H. Levy and Lorraine Gallard Peter C. Lincoln Patricia Lowy and Daniel Frank Caroline and Anthony Lukaszewski Marghretta McBean Gerald McGee Susan Narucki Mary and Andrew Pinkowitz Edmée B. Reit Monique Rinere in honor of James F. Rinere Carol Robbins Esther Rosenberg and Michael Ostroff William Ryall Mariam Said Eliisa Salmi-Saslaw James Schamus and Nancy Kricorian Elliot Schwartz Anita Shapolsky Timothy C. Shepard and Andra Georges Gilbert Spitzer and Janet Glaser Spitzer Peter Strauss Jim Strawhorn Larry Wehr Seymour Weingarten Ila and Dennis Weiss Elizabeth Wheeler Anonymous as of January 20, 2015

12 Upcoming Events Tuesday, March 24 doors at 5:30 p.m., music at 6:00 p.m. POP-UP CONCERTS Yarn/Wire Saturday, March 28, 8:00 p.m. EARLY MUSIC Myths & Allegories Les Délices Thursday, April 9, 8:00 p.m. BACH, REVISITED Helmut Lachenmann + Bach Tuesday, April 14 doors at 5:30 p.m., music at 6:00 p.m. POP-UP CONCERTS Ensemble Signal Thursday, April 23, 8:00 p.m. COMPOSER PORTRAITS Anna Clyne STAY TUNED IN Want to learn about new concerts, special announcements, and more? Join our mailing list at millertheatre.com or scan the QR code below on Twitter 2960 Broadway at 116th Street, MC 1801, New York, NY 10027