Scholarly discussion of the music of John Cage.

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Title: SEM Ensemble May 2016 Concerts

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The Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble

Petr Kotik, Director
 
May 2016 Events
 
Joseph Kubera, Piano
Roscoe Mitchell, Saxophone
Seth Parker Woods, Violoncello
Lucie Vítková, Accordion
Petr Kotik, Conductor

For more info, see event pages at Bohemian National Hall and Roulette Intermedium.

Preview performance: May 8th at 8pm at Willow Place Auditorium, 26 Willow Place, Brooklyn: Not Alone; Music for 3; Be Natural; String Noise William; Ryoanji; They Rode For Them;  Zeitmaße; and Group Improvisation

Free Admission

Roscoe Mitchell, Composer

Lucie Vítková, Composer

The S.E.M. Ensemble’s May 9 and 11 concerts combine new works by Lucie Vítková, Petr Kotik, George Lewis, and Roscoe Mitchell with a focus on the legacy of John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Also, we will perform music from the post-war era by composers associated with the Darmstadt Institute and Festival:

– Music for 3 In Memoriam Jan Rychlik (1964) by Petr Kotik
– Be Natural (1974) by Alvin Singleton (the best composition award at the Darmstadt festival that year)
– Why Patterns? (1978) by Morton Feldman
 
It is interesting that Lucie Vítková, George Lewis, Petr Kotik, and Roscoe Mitchell, all four of the composers who have new works on the May 9th program, have taken part in Ostrava Days, founded in 2001. The Institute and Festival Ostrava Days (Ostrava, Czech Republic), similarly to Darmstadt’s programming of the ‘50s and ‘60s, provides an opportunity for the creation and performance of major compositions for large ensembles by composers who have for the most the part been marginalized by the mainstream music world. With an international group of 35 young and emerging composers, two resident orchestras, and some of today’s most distinguished composers, Ostrava Days sets itself apart from other new music projects. All four of these composers have realized large-scale compositions at Ostrava Days, including operas and music for 3 orchestras.

George Lewis, Composer

Seth Parker Woods, Violoncellist

Over the years, the S.E.M. Ensemble has programmed music by John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen, in part due to the close relationship Petr Kotik had with Cage and Stockhausen. Kotik met Cage in 1964 and Stockhausen in 1965.

John Cage and Petr Kotik following their performance at Paula Cooper Gallery, 1990.

Ladislav Kupkovic, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and Petr Kotik in Darmstadt, 1967
 

Since their first meeting, Petr Kotik and John Cage collaborated regularly on various performance projects. In this respect, Kotik is Cage’s longest musical collaborator alive. They performed for the first time together in the spring of 1964 in Vienna. A few months later in Prague, Kotik organized musicians for a performance of the Concert for Piano and Orchestra (David Tudor at the piano, Cage conducting). During rehearsal, Cage divided an orchestra part into two separate units to enable two players to perform a single part. Similarly, on May 11th, the orchestra parts of the Concert for Piano and Orchestra will be split into two, doubling the size of the ensemble from 13 to 26. SEM performed such a two-orchestra version, this time also with two piano solos with David Tudor and Joseph Kubera, at Alice Tully Hall in 1993.

Excerpt from John Cage's Concert for Piano and Orchestra, 1958.

In 1987, when rehearsing for performances at Cage’s 75^th anniversary event at WDR in Cologne (24 hours of public performances broadcasted live), Cage created a special version of Ryoanji for SEM, adjusting the piece to the instrumentation of the ensemble.  This version, without pre-recorded sections and with some parts transposed, will be performed on May 9^th.
 
When Kotik was travelling through Cologne in 1965, he visited the Electronic Music Studio at WDR, where he met Karheinz Stockhausen. Stockhausen asked to see one of his compositions, and the recording of Music for 3 was played, right in the studio. This led to a commission for Kotik from the WDR Electronic Music Studio (Stockhausen was the studio’s director). In 1967, Stockhausen invited Kotik to assist with the performance of his Mixtur in Darmstadt. Kotik and Stockhausen met for the last time in 1997, at the occasion of a performance of Gruppen at Cologne’s Triennale Festival. Meeting Stockhausen and being present at the rehearsal and performance of Gruppen inspired Kotik to organize and perform the piece at the Prague Spring Festival in 1999, which led to the idea of starting Ostrava Days shortly afterwards.
 

Excerpt from Karlheinz Stockhausen's Zeitmaße, 1956

Excerpt from George Lewis' Not Alone, 2015

 
Stockhausen’s Zeitmaße, along with Gesang der Jünglinge (4-channel electronic music) and Gruppen for 3 orchestras, constitute a major musical statement of the time. Stockhausen’s music influenced musical thinking in the 20^th century, similarly to the work of John Cage, especially his Concert for Piano and Orchestra and Atlas Eclipticalis. Performing major works by the two composers together on both programs is one of the highlights of SEM’s present season.
 

Excerpt from Petr Kotik's Music for 3, 1964

Excerpt from Alvin Singleton's Be Natural, 1974

Joseph Kubera and Petr Kotik

S.E.M. Ensemble’s 2015/16 Season has been made possible with the generous support of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature; with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council; The Edmund H. Case Chair in American Music at Columbia University; The Phaedrus Foundation; The Low Road Foundation; The Fifth Floor Foundation; Rackstraw Downes; Noni Pratt; Virginia Dwan; Raymond Learsy; Linda Wadsworth; Sheldon Berlow; Martina Forman; and Beth Greenberg and Jim Wright. Special thanks to Jasper Johns and Werner Kramarsky.
                                                        

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