Review Roundup: ALARM WILL SOUND at Zankel Hall
György Ligeti's life was filled with drama. He escaped Nazi extermination in a Jewish labor camp and eventually fled totalitarian oppression at the hands of the liberating Soviets in Hungary. His music's dense melodic webs and conflicting rhythms-along with a host of other experimental sounds, shapes, and forms-embody the dreams, fantasies, and nightmares of a life lived on the edge.
Alarm Will Sound Presents All-Ligeti Multimedia Performance
Alarm Will Sound, the contemporary music ensemble known for testing the boundaries of musical performance, presents a program resembling a live podcast, featuring the music of György Ligeti and titled This Music Should Not Exist on Friday, March 16 at 7:30 p.m. in Zankel Hall.
Renowned Artist Tim O'Brien Captures New Radical Portrait of Mozart
A radical new portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has been commissioned by Royal Northern Sinfonia, to reflect what they and their Music Director Lars Vogt see as the 'true' face of a composer we all think we know. “Somehow we've come to think of his music as pretty, brilliant and maybe even a little two-dimensional,” says Vogt, lamenting what he calls the 'chocolate box' idea of Mozart, “But in fact the more you listen to him the more you realise that we've got him wrong. That music is often dramatic, daring, edgy and, yes, dark, and those qualities must have been there in the man.”
Miller Theatre Opens Season with COMPOSER PORTRAITS, 10/10
The music of Georg Friedrich Haas possesses “an otherworldly beauty,” writes The New Yorker. His compositional toolbox includes exotic scales and alternative tunings. He often draws on centuries past for inspiration, as in this program, which includes homages to the music of Desprez and the poetry of Sappho. Newly appointed to the Columbia University faculty, Haas will participate in an onstage discussion about his music during the performance. After his first Composer Portrait in 2009, The New York Times wrote: “One of the pleasures of frequent concertgoing is discovering an exciting new or little-known work. The American premiere of 'In Vain,' a kaleidoscopic masterpiece by Austrian composer Georg Friedrich Haas, proved an exhilarating experience.”