HOUSE BLEND IV:
A double bill: Bonnie Whiting performs Wang Lu‘s Stages for solo speaking/singing percussionist, with stage design by Polly Apfelbaum, and Frederic Rzewski‘s To the Earth for speaking percussionist and four flower pots. Plus a recital by bass-baritone Davóne Tines singing Eastman Evensong.
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Wang Lu’s Stages (2023) for solo speaking/singing percussionist, performed by Bonnie Whiting, with stage design by Polly Apfelbaum, and and Frederic Rzewski's To the Earth for speaking percussionist and four flower pots (text from the Homeric Hymn to Gaia, Mother of All).
Wang Lu composed Stages collaboratively with Whiting, to a text adapted from Lucy Corin’s “Questions in Significantly Smaller Font,” in One Hundred Apocalypses and Other Apocalypses. Wang’s music incorporates urban environmental sounds, linguistic intonation and contours, traditional Chinese elements, and free improvisation, and Stages grew out of Wang and Whiting’s memories of confusion and struggle, Wang as a Communist Young Pioneer in China and Whiting caught between family and religious extremism. The work uncovers and explores hidden stages of consciousness, expressed through the sounds of urban environments, physical movement, vocal intonations, traditional Chinese music, recited and improvised texts, and contemporary instrumental techniques, with familiar objects—pot lids, infant music boxes, radios, SOLO cups, thermal sheets—deployed as musical instruments.
“If you want to be a percussionist in the 21st century, you’ve got to play a lot more than just drums. From flower pots to file racks and found objects, . . . if you can hit, shake, or strike it, it’s a percussion instrument. That’s what drew Bonnie Whiting to the big, wide world of contemporary percussion. . . . a sense of flexibility and possibility — finding music in everyday objects.” — Maggie Molloy, NPR Slingshot
A double bill with:
Davóne Tines singing Eastman Evensong, three solo vocal works by Julius Eastman: “Prelude to The Holy Presence of Joan D’Arc,” “The Lord has given, the Lord has taken,” and “O love, into thy bosom let me rest”
“Davóne Tines is changing what it means to be a classical singer” — Alex Ross, The New Yorker
Bass-baritone Davóne Tines’s daring recitals stretch the boundaries of what classical music can be and the impact it has on audiences. In works such as Recital No. 1: MASS, he interweaves elements of the Catholic Mass by composers from J. S. Bach to Carolyn Shaw and his own experiences to explore themes of spirituality, justice, and identity. LA Times critic Marc Swed called him “one of the most powerful voices of our time, as mesmerizing as a singer can be. His voice can fill a space and then some, ringing gloriously.”
Among Tines’s thematic compositions are The Black Clown, a searing rumination on Black history and identity based on the Langston Hughes poem co-created with Michael Schachter, who wrote the rollicking musical-theater score, and VIGIL, in memory of Breonna Taylor, who was shot by police in her own home, a collaboration with fellow AMOC members pianist Conor Hanick and composers Igée Dieudonné and Matthew Aucoin.
Alex Ross called Tines’s performance of the Handel aria “Shake the Heavens” “one of those moments which anyone who attends concerts lives to witness: within thirty seconds, I knew I was in the presence of a major artist.”
PS21 HOUSE BLEND programs are conceived for our theater with an eye toward bringing virtuosic and thoughtful musicians together in genre-defying combinations. The series opens a creative space unique to our venue, surroundings, and audiences that yields programs that can only be heard at PS21.
Enjoy all four exciting concerts for one low price with a House Blend Series Pass.
EXPLORE HOUSE BLEND 2024
AUGUST 18, 6 pm – PS21 HOUSE BLEND I
Conor Hanick plays Johannes Brahms and Galina Ustvolskaya
AUGUST 19, 8 pm – PS21 HOUSE BLEND II: A double bill
Skylighght, Gelsey Bell (voice) & Erin Rogers (saxophone). Plus, composer/multi-instrumentalist Patrick Higgins (guitar, drums, electronics), improvisations on five tracks from Versus, his latest record
AUGUST 20, 8 pm – PS21 HOUSE BLEND III:
Miranda Cuckson (violin) & Conor Hanick (piano)
Iannis Xenakis: Mikka S.; J.S. Bach: Sonata in D minor (BWV 1004); Charles Ives: selections from Songs (Opus 114); Aaron Copland: Sonata for Violin and Piano
READ THE FULL HOUSE BLEND PRESS RELEASE
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