IMAGINATION DEAD IMAGINE Announces Los Angeles Return

Red Hen Press is thrilled to announce, as an encore to last year's triumphant Red Hen produced sold-out LA premiere at the Broad Stage in Santa Monica, that Imagination Dead Imagine, a music/theatre piece for string quartet, recorded voices, and laptop, will come to Pasadena for an exclusive two-day event, the first musical presentation in the new Red Hen performance space, the Hen House!

With a text by Samuel Beckett and music by the award-winning composer Michael Roth, featuring Quartet Nouveau, Imagination Dead Imagine will be the main event in a program of new American music, with a special appearance by poet Brendan Constantine. Come to the Hen House in Pasadena for two "transcendent" and "stunningly beautiful" performances, May 5 at 8 and May 6 at 3.

Imagination Dead Imagine will have its European premiere in Prague in September, so don't miss this exclusive two-day-only event in LA, and support the artists who will bring this special Red Hen event to an international audience!

Praise for Imagination Dead Imagine:
"IMAGINATION DEAD IMAGINE has, without question, a forceful impact - for works like this, a first performance is only a beginning." --San Diego UNION-TRIBUNE

"IMAGINATION DEAD IMAGINE is transcendent, a work to be treasured and cherished. The artistry, the bravery, the musicianship is of the very highest rank. I'm so proud that San Diego REP hosted the world premiere!" --Sam Woodhouse, Artistic Director, San Diego Rep

"IMAGINATION DEAD IMAGINE must be experienced live - to witness the imaginative & emotional life, so vivid and irresistible! ... the musical sequence towards the end, surrounding the word "elsewhere" is absolutely brilliant and heartbreaking, like Barber's ADAGIO. And the ending is stunning - the players vanishing one by one as that incredible high overtone by the first violin sings out over them and she plays in the darkness --" --Mark Harelik, award-winning actor, writer, & director

"I was so moved by IMAGINATION DEAD IMAGINE and was blown away by the strength and extraordinary skill the quartet brought to the performance. I had tears in my eyes by the end!" --Cricket Myers, Tony-nominated sound designer

"Beckett was my friend, he and I worked together. He tells the truth, and Roth and Quartet Nouveau are his messengers. Whether or not you like the message, hear it. This team will captivate you and make you think. It is an extraordinary experience, and must be experienced live. Don't miss it." --Don Boros, Beckett scholar & collaborator, Binghamton University

The Artists:

Samuel Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, poet, director, and translator. Born in Ireland in 1906, he moved to Paris and played an active role in the French Resistance during World War II. He is perhaps best known for his plays, especially Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Happy Days, Not I, Footfalls, and Rockaby, in addition to his poetry and novels, including the trilogy (Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable). Awarded the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature, Beckett died in Paris in 1989.

Michael Roth, a composer, musician, and sound artist whose work has been called "music one could imagine Charles Ives composing had he lived long enough to encounter rock-and-roll and beat poetry," has created a body of work encompassing chamber music, music for film, experimental opera, music/theatre, dance, work for PBS, Disney, many projects with Randy Newman as a music director and arranger, and especially music and sound for theatre - over 250 productions at major theatres throughout North America, including Broadway, off-Broadway, the Stratford Festival in Canada, and as a resident artist at both South Coast Repertory and La Jolla Playhouse. His music and soundscape will be featured in the upcoming HENRY IV in Los Angeles with Tom Hanks, directed by Daniel Sullivan.

Recent projects - THE TEMPEST with Christopher Plummer, onstage and filmed, and Mr. Plummer's solo show A WORD OR TWO; the PBS documentary JEWS & BASEBALL, narrated by Dustin Hoffman; two American premieres with Tom Stoppard; collaborating with Stacy Keach on PAMPLONA, his solo show as Hemingway; and his piano sonatas FATS NOVEMBER, TUESDAY FOR TOY PIANO, and SHEETCAKE. Michael's many collaborations with Randy Newman include musical direction for THE PRINCESS & THE FROG (Disney Animated Features), orchestrations for FAUST - recently revised for concert presentation in New York - and editing five definitive anthologies for Alfred Music.

Michael has also collaborated with, among many others, Anne Bogart, Des McAnuff, Culture Clash, Peter Sellars, Mac Wellman, MacArthur Fellows Sarah Ruhl and Samuel Hunter, and has accompanied singers from Alice Ripley to Madonna, Marni Nixon, and Alicia Keyes. He is a founding board member of the Theatrical Sound Designers & Composer Association, a spokesperson for Finale, was a fellow at the 2011 Sundance Composers Lab and the 2013 Baku Humanitarian Forum, and has composed for UCLA International Medicine and the UN. Michael graduated cum laude from the University of Michigan where he studied with William Bolcom, and his THEIR THOUGHT & BACK AGAIN, is available via iTunes. For more information:http://rothmusik.wixsite.com/rothmusik

Quartet Nouveau, the adventurous new San Diego based all-female string quartet, has earned a reputation as an exciting emerging group known for their energizing and deeply emotional performances. The quartet has embraced an eclectic philosophy in their programming, their members being New Music specialists who perform, in addition to the standard quartet repertoire, many lesser known works, world premieres, even jug-band music. They are the ensemble in residence with the California Chamber Orchestra, and are dedicated to sharing their music with as wide-ranging an audience as possible, including acclaimed performances at the San Diego Rescue Mission.

Since forming in 2011, Quartet Nouveau has performed at numerous venues in the San Diego area including The Merc in Temecula, Hope United Methodist Church, University of San Diego, Christ Lutheran Church, First United Methodist, La Jolla Community Church, and the Encinitas Library. They have collaborated with pianist Daniel Pesca, singer/organist Paula Mowbray, and San Diego Symphony violinist Edmund Stein, and their concert programming includes a wide range of composers including Vasks, Glass, Piazzola, Shostakovich as well as Haydn, Beethoven and Schumann. In addition to being avid performers, Quartet Nouveau is committed to music education. All of the members maintain private studios and the group runs "Quartet Lab", a program that gives student groups the chance to be coached by Quartet Nouveau and perform in a formal recital.

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