Celebrating its 40th anniversary year of continuous activity, the extraordinary String Trio of New York ensemble will be closing out the 30th anniversary season of New York’s renowned Interpretations Series along with String Noise at Brooklyn’s Roulette on Thursday, June 6, 2019, at 8pm. Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY, tickets are $20 for adults / $15 for students & seniors, and available on Roulette.org and Interpretations.info.

The ubiquitous violin duo ​String Noise​ (Conrad Harris and GRAMMY®-nominated Pauline Kim Harris​) present four world premieres, including a premiere​ by ​George Lewis titled Introduction to Memory ​– the first in his new series of works for ensembles and computer sound processing. Opening the night is Pauline Kim Harris’ ​100 Thimbles in a Box for Syrinx​ (acoustic synthesizer) and two violins (featuring Spencer Topel​), sharing its title from a book on the spirit and beauty of Korean handicrafts. Much like a bojagi (Korean wrapping cloth), the piece weaves its instruments in a sonic tapestry using 100 techniques wrapped and stitched together. Rounding out the program are The Life of Information​ by ​Jessie Cox​, focusing on identity and information; and ​April by ​Sam Yulsman​, a multi-movement work about gestures and memories, envisioned specifically for String Noise.

For this very special performance, The String Trio of New York (S3NY) will feature James Emery (guitarist and founding member); Rob Thomas (violin); and Michael Formanek (bass, replacing an indisposed Tony Marino), who will perform vignettes of notable early works by S3NY co-founders, including Billy Bang’s Bang’s Bounce and John Lindberg’s Twixt C & D, plus a new realization of a piece they commissioned from the legendary Muhal Richard Abrams, Strings and Things. Taking a World Music view of this stunning work, S3NY will be joined by percussionist Thurman Barker – a long-time collaborator with Abrams and Emery – playing balafon, drums, and marimba. The program will be rounded out by some of Emery’s most popular works for the ensemble, The Pursuit of Happiness, Cobalt Blue, and E Pedal.

Fore more information, please visit interpretations.info.

On Thursday, May 2, 2019, at 8pm, the seventh concert of the 2018-2019 Interpretations series’ Thirtieth Anniversary Season features the acoustic-electronic hybrid composer Edmund Campion, and sound artist and composer Annie Gosfield, whom the New York Times calls “master of musical feedback.” The performance is held at Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY, tickets are $20 for adults / $15 for students & seniors, and available on Roulette.org and Interpretations.info.

Annie Gosfield presents a world of things transformed, in a varied program of new work that generates and recycles musical materials, creating a common thread from intricately notated music to free improvisation. Commissioned by the Library of Congress, Gosfield presents the NYC premiere of A Mother’s Note and a Single Vote, written for the centenary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote. Performed by Pauline Kim Harris on violin and pianist Vicky Chow, A Mother’s Note… is about making one’s voice heard in a noisy world. Harris then premieres Silken Splinters and Feather Stitches, which sets a partly improvised violin part against an electronic assemblage of sampled fragments from A Mother’s Note…. Lastly, the sounds are transformed into fully improvised form, by Gosfield playing sampler with Sylvie Courvoisier (piano) and Roger Kleier (electric guitar).

Edmund Campion​ will present ​Recumulations,​ a piece for metal triangles, electronics and video animations by ​Claudia Hart (with a post-analog media reconsideration of Primary Accumulation, the 1972 seminal dance film by Trisha Brown)​; ​Four Bells For Tom, with programming from Jeff Lubow;  the NY premiere of Auditory Fiction II, for computer-driven percussionists ​Russel Greenberg​ and ​Bill Solomon​ controlling Hart’s virtual dancers in real-time; and the ​world premiere​ of ​Late Bloomer​, a virtuosic 4-hand piano work with electronics, composed for NYC pianists ​Marilyn Nonken​ and ​Manuel Laufer, and a resonating piano device designed by Jeremy Wagner at the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies. Late Bloomer is dedicated to the memory of David Lester Wessel (1942-2014).​ (Campion is the Director of the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies at the University of California Berkeley.)

About Interpretations: 

“When we started, this was a real need, especially for the more experimental new music,” says Founder and Artistic Director Thomas Buckner. “Now we are experiencing a blossoming of new music groups and solo performers, which makes the series necessary in a new way. There are so many exceptional composers and performers who need a great place to perform.”

The Interpretations series, now in its thirtieth season, is a New York-based concert series focusing on the relationship between contemporary composers and their interpreters. Sometimes the interpreters are the composers themselves; more often, the series features performers who specialize in the interpretation of new music. 

For its 30th Anniversary, Interpretations has assembled an eclectic line-up of innovative composers and their interpreters, representing a wide variety of approaches to music making. The Interpretations Series is dedicated to nurturing the relationship of innovative composers with the growing community of new music virtuoso performers.

For more information, please visit interpretations.info.

UPCOMING IN THE 2019 SERIES LINEUP

Thursday, June 6, 2019: String Noise (Pauline Kim Harris and Conrad Harris); The String Trio of New York (featuring James Emery, Toni Marino, Rob Thomas)

On Thursday, April 4th, 2019, at 8pm, the sixth concert of the 2018-2019 Interpretations series’ Thirtieth Anniversary Season presents a special performance by founder and artistic director Thomas Buckner, who in turn celebrates his thirtieth annual performance with the series. Held at Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY, tickets are $20 for adults / $15 for students & seniors, and available on Roulette.org and Interpretations.info.

The baritone Thomas Buckner is joined by pianist ​Joseph Kubera​, percussionist ​William Winant, harpist ​Melanie Genin​, and bassist James Ilgenfritz. This concert​ continues to uphold that tradition of presenting a concert of commissioned pieces, nearly all world premieres, every season.

Buckner will present Roscoe Mitchell​’s voice and piano take of ​e. e. cummings’​ poems “because it’s”, “this”, and “dim”; as well as New York premieres of ​Michael Byron’s Tenderness in Late Afternoon Light, for voice and piano (text by Anne Tardos); as well as French composer ​Christian Dachez​’s Stimmen, for baritone, vibraphone, and harp (text by Rainer Maria Rilke); Steed Cowart’s [where late the sweet] BIRDS SANG, for baritone and percussion (with text by Stephen Ratcliffe); and ​James Ilgenfritz​’s ​A Bell in Every Finger,​ settings of poems by New York poet ​Steve Dalachinsky ​for baritone, piano, percussion, and contrabass, dedicated to ​Muhal Richard Abrams ​and ​Cecil Taylor​. (Harpist Melanie Genin will also perform Dachez’s Vers toi les etoiles for solo harp.)

For more information, please visit interpretations.info.

About Interpretations: 

“When we started, this was a real need, especially for the more experimental new music,” says Founder and Artistic Director Thomas Buckner. “Now we are experiencing a blossoming of new music groups and solo performers, which makes the series necessary in a new way. There are so many exceptional composers and performers who need a great place to perform.”

The Interpretations series, now in its thirtieth season, is a New York-based concert series focusing on the relationship between contemporary composers and their interpreters. Sometimes the interpreters are the composers themselves; more often, the series features performers who specialize in the interpretation of new music. 

For its 30th Anniversary, Interpretations has assembled an eclectic line-up of innovative composers and their interpreters, representing a wide variety of approaches to music making. The Interpretations Series is dedicated to nurturing the relationship of innovative composers with the growing community of new music virtuoso performers.

REMAINING 2019 SERIES LINEUP

Thursday, May 2, 2019: Annie Gosfield (with Harris, Chow, Kleier, and Courvoisier); Edmund Camplon (with Marilyn Nonken, Manuel Laufer, and others)

Thursday, June 6, 2019: String Noise (Pauline Kim Harris and Conrad Harris); The String Trio of New York (featuring James Emery, Toni Marino, Rob Thomas)

On Thursday, March 14th, 2019, at 8pm, the fifth concert of the 2018-2019 Interpretations series’ Thirtieth Anniversary Season presents striking music sets from both vocalist and composer Joan La Barbara, and mixed-instrumentation group Ensemble Metrix, led by violinist Tom Chiu.

Held at Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY, tickets are $20 for adults / $15 for students & seniors, and available online.

The perennially influential and innovative vocalist/composer Joan La Barbara presents new material from her ongoing opera-in-progress, Dreams of Water Beyond One’s Depth, inspired by the lives and work of the iconic Virginia Woolf and the enigmatic Joseph Cornell, with lyrics by the award-winning Vietnamese-American novelist Monique Truong, and featuring an ensemble of voices, instruments, synthesizer, and sonic atmosphere.

Tom Chiu’s Ensemble Metrix is a mixed-instrumentation group exploring the recontextualization of music in a variety of styles and genres. Using material from the broad canon of popular and underground music, Chiu deconstructs and distorts melodic hooks and motivic riffs, and weaves the material into an extended, minimalistic jam. The resulting structured score represents an analogue to a dee-jay’s pre-determined playlist. Replacing turntables and records, the musicians produce the music live, each injecting personal flair in the final mix. Joining Ensemble Metrix will be some of Chiu’s favorite collaborators, including Meaghan Burke, Sara Schoenbeck, Charles Waters, Peter Zummo, and other special guests.

About Interpretations: 

“When we started, this was a real need, especially for the more experimental new music,” says Founder and Artistic Director Thomas Buckner. “Now we are experiencing a blossoming of new music groups and solo performers, which makes the series necessary in a new way. There are so many exceptional composers and performers who need a great place to perform.”

The Interpretations series, now in its thirtieth season, is a New York-based concert series focusing on the relationship between contemporary composers and their interpreters. Sometimes the interpreters are the composers themselves; more often, the series features performers who specialize in the interpretation of new music. 

For its 30th Anniversary, Interpretations has assembled an eclectic line-up of innovative composers and their interpreters, representing a wide variety of approaches to music making. The Interpretations Series is dedicated to nurturing the relationship of innovative composers with the growing community of new music virtuoso performers. 

REMAINING 2019 SERIES LINEUP

Thursday, April 4, 2019: Thomas Buckner (with Joseph Kubera, Melanie Genin, William Winant, & James Ilgenfrtz)

Thursday, May 2, 2019: Annie Gosfield (with Harris and Chow); Edmund Camplon (with Marilyn Nonken, Manuel Laufer, and others)

Thursday, June 6, 2019: String Noise (Pauline Kim Harris and Conrad Harris); The String Trio of New York (featuring James Emery, Toni Marino, Rob Thomas)