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Roscoe Mitchell and George Lewis performing at Bohemian National Hall, April 2015
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Lucie Vítková
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This evening will feature three world premieres. Roscoe Mitchell’s They Rode for Them (2016) is the latest of a series of pieces Mitchell has developed, in which improvisations from his 2014 album, Conversations I, are transcribed and orchestrated for large ensembles. Petr Kotik’s String Noise William (2016) is the instrumental part of his new dance opera, William William, to be premiered at the new opera festival NODO (Czech Republic) in June 2016. The work is composed for the violin duo String Noise (Conrad Harris and Pauline Kim Harris), and includes autobiographical text by Natalie Babel (daughter of the great Russian poet Isaac Babel). Places to Meet by Lucie Vítková – one of the young emerging composers from the Czech Republic – is also written for String Noise, and will feature the composer on voice and accordion.
Also on the program is George Lewis’ Not Alone (2015) for Violoncello and interactive electronics. The piece uses digital delays, spatialization and timbre transformation to create a counterpoint between live and processed music created by the soloist. A group improvisation will conclude the program, featuring Roscoe Mitchell, George Lewis, and Thomas Buckner with members of the S.E.M. Ensemble.
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String Noise Violin Duo
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Seth Parker Woods, Violoncello
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The program has a special focus on the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen and John Cage. SEM has included music by John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen since its inception, in part due to the close relationship Petr Kotik had with both composers. Kotik met Cage in 1964 and Stockhausen in 1965. Kotik and Cage performed for the first time together in the spring of 1964 in Vienna. They continued to collaborate on various performance projects for the rest of Cage’s life. Their last collaboration was the first complete performance of Atlas Eclipticalis at Carnegie Hall in 1992, by The Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble. (In this respect, Kotik is Cage’s longest musical collaborator alive). In 1987, when rehearsing for performances at Cage’s 75th 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 will be performed at Bohemian National Hall. Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Zeitmaβe (1956), for woodwind quintet, is his first attempt to create cycling segments of non-simultaneous performance – a technique developed, a year later, in the seminal Gruppen for three orchestras.
The Bohemian National Hall is located at 321 E. 73rd St., NYC. The concert is free of charge and is presented by the Czech Center New York, in co-production with SEM.
Seating is limited; please reserve your ticket here. Reservations will be held until 15 minutes prior to the concert.
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