Musiqa Opens 12th Season with Free Concert TIME TRAVEL, 9/28

Musiqa, winner of the 2013 Chamber Music America/American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers Award for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music, opens its 12th season with a free public concert, Time Travel, downtown at the Louis and Annie Friedman Clock Tower/Market Square Clock Tower, in downtown Houston's Historic District on Saturday, September 28 at 7:30 p.m.

The concert showcases vibrant new works from the perspective of time and movement by iconic and internationally renowned composers Louis Andriessen and John Corigliano; several young composers who are receiving significant exposure internationally, Michel van der Aa, Missy Mazzoli and Bill Ryan; and Musiqa composer RoB Smith.

The concert opens with Andriessen's lively Hout, work for tenor saxophone, electric guitar, percussion and piano that pushes the boundaries of melody. A global theme of love is evoked in Corigliano's Three Irish Folk Songs Settings for soprano and flute, which is contrasted with van der Aa's exploration of a paranoid woman's twisted views of reality in And how are we today? for soprano, double bass and piano. Ryan's Blurred, performed by the entire ensemble of performers, Mazzoli's Magic With Everyday Objects,for flute, clarinet, electric guitar, piano and double bass and Smith's driving Dance Mix for alto saxophones, trumpets, trombones, double bass, marimbas, vibraphone and percussion all put a new spin on familiar gestures and ideas and challenge our views of time and movement.

The program's featured performers include Stephen Badreau (electric guitar), Karol Bennett (soprano), Dan Gelok (saxophones), Craig Hauschildt (percussion), Tali Morgulis (piano), Caity Piccini (flute), Andrew Staupe (piano), Michael Webster (clarinet) and Dennis Whittaker (double bass). In addition, members of the University of Houston Moores School of Music Wind Ensemble and Saxophone Studio will join Musiqa's musicians.

The concert immediately follows the unveiling of What Time Is It? by Jo Ann Fleischhauer, a public art installation and collaboration of Musiqa, the Blaffer Art Museum and the Houston Arts Alliance. The unveiling takes place prior to the concert at 7:30 p.m. in Market Square Park with special remarks, the first "tolling" of the musical portion of the installation and Musiqa's concert. The entire event is free.

Musiqa's Time Travel:

Saturday, September 28, 2013

Market Square Park

Downtown Houston's Historic District

7:30 p.m.: Art unveiling celebration, free to the public

7:45 p.m.: Welcoming remarks; admission is free

Lawn seating (bring blankets or chairs)

More information is available at www.musiqahouston.org

To inaugurate its 12th season, celebrate the art installation and welcome guests to the Historic District area, Musiqa selected its works from a range of emerging young artists. Van der Aa, Andriessen, and Corigliano have each won the Grawemeyer Award and Corigliano also has earned a Pulitzer.

What Time Is It? Celebration and Collaboration

Blaffer Art Museum and the Houston Arts Alliance have joined forces to present What Time Is It? by Jo Ann Fleischhauer in collaboration with Musiqa, a public art installation at the Louis and Annie Friedman Clock Tower, also known as the Market Square Clock Tower, in downtown Houston's Historic District. Fleischhauer may be remembered for her previous downtown installation of Parasol Project, that was opposite the George R. Brown Convention Center.

What Time Is it? explores the concept of time and the relevancy of its physical markers in a digital age by interrogating the place of a clock tower in our everyday lives. In What Time Is It? applied mirror panels effectively dematerialize the physical structure of the clock tower to the point of disappearance. A spiral staircase winds its way up and into the tower leading to the actual clock hovering at the top. Together, mirrors and staircase deemphasize the architecture of the tower and instead put visual emphasis on the clock and bell, a clock however, which is not tolling time as expected.

Backlit images of historical notes and calculations about space and time that appear as constellations in the sky become the backdrop for the actual clock faces, their visibility and prominence shifting in intensity as the projected light circles through different shades of brightness and temperature.

Musiqa's collaboration addresses the auditory nature of the clock tower by replacing the scheduled chimes of bells with original musical works inspired by the site. C O'Clock,composed by Anthony Brandt and Chapman Welch, runs through the entire duration of the six month exhibition by replacing the ringing of the bell with a progression of chords that rise and set like the sun. Each chord is complemented by ringing sounds that are randomly generated by a computer and make each tolling unique and unpredictable. The sound source of both the underlying chords and the improvisations is Market Square itself, recorded street noise, which is filtered to the extent that it turns into pure tones. The computer-generated sounds are complemented by monthly live performances of compositions by students of the Rice University Shepherd School of Music and the University Of Houston Moores School of Music. These events are sponsored by Musiqa.

The exhibition is on view 24-hours a day (music component audible daily 7 a.m. to midnight) on the corner of Travis and Congress Streets at Market Square from September 28, 2013 through March 29, 2014.

About What Time Is It?

What Time Is It? is organized by the Houston Arts Alliance and Blaffer Art Museum in collaboration with Musiqa. Major support comes from the Houston Downtown Management District and the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance. Community partners include the Houston Parks and Recreation Department, Moores School of Music at the University of Houston and the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University.

For additional information on ticketing for any of Musiqa's programs, go to www.musiqahouston.org.

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