Dutch Composer Louis Andriessen Highlighted In Carnegie Hall Residency

MUSIC BY ACCLAIMED DUTCH COMPOSER LOUIS ANDRIESSEN HIGHLIGHTED IN
MONTH-LONG Carnegie Hall RESIDENCY, APRIL 9 TO MAY 10

Nine Programs Include the New York Premiere of Andriessen's Newest Opera,
La Commedia, Performed in Concert Version in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage

Featured Performers Include John Adams, American Composers Orchestra,
Asko | Schoenberg and Reinbert de Leeuw, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Iva Bittová,
Greetje Bijma, Maurice chestnut, Ensemble ACJW, Evan Parker, Ernst Reijseger,
Dawn Upshaw, and Cristina Zavalloni

Louis Andriessen, one of Europe's most eminent and influential composers, commences his Richard and Barbara Debs Composer's Chair residency at Carnegie Hall in April. The series of concerts, which spans all three of the performance spaces at Carnegie Hall-Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage, Zankel Hall, and Weill RecitAl Hall-features numerous premieres of new works by the Dutch composer, as well as music by composers that Andriessen has mentored and a series of intimate late-night concerts devoted to improvisation-a key influence on Andriessen. The month-long residency, which runs from Friday, April 9 to Monday, May 10, features performances by musicians who have been longtime champions of Andriessen's music, including Asko | Schoenberg, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Reinbert de Leeuw, and John Adams, as well as friends and newfound muses such as Greetje Bijma, Martijn Padding, and Cristina Zavalloni. All will join together to celebrate the music of Louis Andriessen, widely regarded as the leading composer working in the Netherlands today and a highly influential figure in the international new music scene.

For more information on Louis Andriessen, including a video interview with the composer, visit Sound Insights at carnegiehall.org.

Spring 2010 Carnegie Hall Presentations Featuring Music by Louis Andriessen:

April 9: Louis & The Young Americans
American Composers Orchestra kicks off the Andriessen residency on Friday, April 9 at 7:30 p.m. with Jeffrey Milarsky conducting a concert entitled Louis & The Young Americans featuring the New York premiere of Andriessen's Symphony for Open Strings as well as three world premieres by young American composers Andriessen has taught: Missy Mazzoli, Michael Fiday, and John Korsrud. Andriessen, who studied with Luciano Berio in the early 1960s, was highly influenced by American jazz and minimalism, as well as Stravinsky. An instructor at the Royal Conservatory of the Hague since the 1970s, Andriessen has taught a number of notable composers, and his music has been extremely influential on an entire generation of American performers.

Mazzoli's These Worlds in Us was originally composed in 2006 and was selected for the Minnesota Orchestra Composers Institute and Readings that same year. The Carnegie Hall performance will be the world premiere of a re-orchestrated version. In 2002 Mazzoli received a Fulbright Grant and traveled to the Netherlands, where she studied with Andriessen at the Royal Conservatory of the Hague. Fiday's Gonzo Variations - Hunter S. Thompson in memoriam, will be a full-spectrum portrayal of the journalist and author, taking into account the contradictions inherent in this fabled American iconoclast and embedding musical elements into the work that reflect the times that affected and shaped the man. Fiday studied composition at the University of Colorado and the University of Pennsylvania, before working with Louis Andriessen in Amsterdam under the auspices of a Fulbright Grant. Korsrud, a composer and trumpeter, hails from Vancouver, British Columbia, and his new work, Come to the Dark Side, will be informed by his interest in experimental music and jazz. He studied composition with Andriessen at the Royal Conservatory of Music in the Netherlands from 1995 to 1997.

April 14-17: Three Naughty Boys and Three Crazy Girls
For three nights in Weill RecitAl Hall-April 14 through 17-Louis Andriessen has programmed three special late-night concerts of musical improvisation entitled Three Naughty Boys and Three Crazy Girls. The double-bill concerts will feature a wide variety of adventurous artists known for breaking musical boundaries. Says Andriessen: "I think if you are a good improviser, you surprise your listeners, and that could mean for the public that you are a little bit crazy; you go in that direction, instead of the direction they would expect. That's the definition of what I like in improvisation: a little bit naughty and a little bit crazy."

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