Composers Concordance: Eclectic Bands featuring Gene Pritsker's Sound Liberation, Laurie Towers/John Pietaro Duo, Dan Cooper Quartet
Free
- Adriana Valdés, soprano
- Franz Hackl, trumpet
- José Moura, double bass
- David Cossin, drums
- Lara St. John, violin
- John Pietaro, percussion & poetry
- Laurie Towers, electric bass
- Dan Cooper, electric bass
- Evan Francis, flute & alto saxophone
- Yayoi Ikawa, piano & keyboard
- Tommy Campbell, drum set
Gene Pritsker — Bartók's Transylvania
Dan Cooper — Selected works
On Halloween, Tuesday October 31st at 7pm, Composers Concordance brings together three bands, each with distinctive voices and vibes, for an evening of high-velocity music, as well as great food and drink at NYC's hip East Village venue Pangea.
The event will start with Gene Pritsker's Sound Liberation premiering their new Ghoulish Suite written specifically for this event based on poems by Erik T. Johnson, Imelda O'Reilly, and Robert C. Ford. The exquisite soprano Adriana Valdés, trumpeter Franz Hackl, bassist Jose Moura, and drummer David Cossin join Sound Liberation in this performance. Poets Erik T. Johnson and Robert C. Ford will also be there to recite and special guest, the accomplished violinist Lara St. John, will join Sound Liberation for the premiere of Bartok's Transylvania for the finale.
The event will continue with poet and percussionist John Pietaro and electric bassist Laurie Towers. The duo have collaborated for decades on numerous projects including the poetry/punk-jazz ensemble the Red Microphone. Pietaro's literary works have been lauded as "groundbreaking" and "punk rock dirges," with comparisons to Nelson Algren and the Beats. Towers' perpetual-motion lead bass style, inspired by Motown as much as Prime Time, is as primal as it is melodic, causing one journalist to refer to her as a "mystic rhythm-stirrer."
The evening will conclude with the Dan Cooper Quartet. Dan's compositions have been described as "full of instrumental virtuosity and sly humor" (Fanfare), and "invigoratingly eclectic to the max" (Strings Magazine). Performing on 6-string bass guitar, Dan shares the stage with Evan Francis (flute and alto saxophone), Yayoi Ikawa (piano and keyboard), and Tommy Campbell (drum set).
This event will be live streamed on Composers Concordance's Facebook page.
About Composers Concordance
Staying in rotation for 40 years in NYC is a rare feat. In the case of a new music presenting organization, it requires not only diligence and cognizance of achievements of the past but also an ethic of keeping one's ear to the ground for emerging stylistic and technological developments, as well as talented new composers on the scene.
Composers Concordance, founded in 1984 by Joseph Pehrson and Patrick Hardish, advised by Otto Luening, strives to present contemporary music in innovative ways, with an emphasis on thematic programming. Directors Gene Pritsker and Dan Cooper co-curate the programs and lead the CompCord Ensemble, Chamber Orchestra, String Orchestra, and Big Band. Associate Directors are Milica Paranosic, Peter Jarvis, Debra Kaye, and Seth Boustead.
Composers Concordance has also created a Naxos-distributed record label: Composers Concordance Records, co-directed by Peter Jarvis. Composers Concordance's overriding vision is to promote contemporary music, composers, and new works as a rightful and respected part of society. Good music performed and recorded well, pushing the boundaries of sound and composition.
http://www.composersconcordance.comAbout Sound Liberation
Sound Liberation, an eclectic chamber ensemble/band, was formed in 1996. The band has gained exposure in the New York city area and has generated a loyal core following playing such notable venues as Joe's Pub, Wetlands, Knitting Factory, The Blue Note, Downtime, New Music Cafe, Cutting Room, Le Poisson Rouge, and many other performing spaces.
Sound Liberation's musical philosophy, developed by band founder Gene Pritsker, is based upon "ending the segregation of sound vibration (i.e. musical Genres)". The group incorporates its philosophy by performing compositions that encompass a diverse range of musical genre, heavily influenced by hip-hop and rock rhythms. This enables one to hear elements from classical music to Jazz to music of various cultures at a Sound Liberation show.
The group performed at the Outreach Festival '06 and '07 and '14 in Schwaz, Austria. In '07 Sound Liberation performed at the Estonian House and presented Gene Pritsker's opera Money at the Players Theatre and Flea Theatre in New York. In May of '08, Money was performed at the Etna music Festival in Catania, Sicily and Sound Liberation played in Ragusa, Sicily. In July '08, they performed at the Blaine jazz Festival in Blaine, Wa. In May of '09, Sound Liberation presented 2 nights at the Flea theater, performing Gene Pritsker's one-hour VRE Suite written for the Sound Liberation Quintet and a concert with B3+ of music from their albums on Col-Legno records. In September 2011, they performed at the Bremen Musik Fest in Germany. In past years the group was part of the Peekaboo Festival of New Music, 21st Century Schizoid at Cornelia Street Cafe and Theater, and toured Newfoundland, Canada in April of '99.
In August of '09 the Song No Truth was featured in the Universal Home Videos motion picture The Wedding Bothers. In the fall of 2010, Human Condition was featured on PBS's Road Trip Nation series. The band played a very publicized concert at New York's Le Poisson Rouge in January '10. The New Yorker wrote: "Pritsker, a rule-breaking composer-guitarist (and rapper) who impresses funk and rock beats onto classical structures, fronts this eclectic jazz-type combo of singers and instrumentalists."
https://noizepunk.wixsite.com/soundlibAbout Adriana Valdés, soprano
Cuban born Adriana Valdés Santibáñez, studied violin at Manuel Saumell in Cuba, and majored in Voice at the Escuela Superior de Música (Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, INBA) in Mexico City. Adriana has been a Soloist Soprano in Mexico, the United States, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Honduras.
She is the Winner of four National Competition Prizes in Mexico: First Place and The Roberta Peters Prize by Opera de San Miguel, and Second Prize and First Zarzuela Prize by Contest Carlo Morelli in Mexico.
https://www.adrianavaldessoprano.com/About José Moura, double bass
About David Cossin, drums
David Cossin is a specialist in new and experimental music who has worked across a broad spectrum of musical and artistic forms to incorporate new media with percussion. He has recorded and performed internationally with composers and ensembles including Bang on a Can All-Stars, Steve Reich and Musicians, Philip Glass, Yo-Yo Ma, Meredith Monk, Tan Dun, Cecil Taylor, Talujon Percussion Quartet, and the trio Real Quiet. Numerous theater projects include collaborations with Blue Man Group, Mabou Mines, and director Peter Sellars.
Cossin was featured as the percussion soloist in Tan Dun's Grammy and Oscar-winning score to Ang Lee's film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. He joined Sting for the world tour Symphonicities and has performed as a soloist with orchestras around the world, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, São Paulo State Symphony, Sydney Symphony, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and Singapore Symphony Orchestra.
His ventures into other art forms include sonic installations, which have been presented in New York, Italy, and Germany. He is an active composer and has also invented several new instruments that expand the limits of traditional percussion. David Cossin is the curator for the Sound Res Festival, an experimental music festival in southern Italy, and he also teaches percussion at Queens College in New York City.
https://www.msmnyc.edu/faculty/david-cossin/