Lou Harrison's "Varied Trio" at Midwood House Concert Series

Several years ago I made a pilgrimage to Bard college to hear Morton Feldman's "Rothko Chapel", a piece that I was really into at the time and was excited to hear live, as it is rarely performed. The concert was part of a festival of music by composers associated with the New Albion record label, which features "New Music from the 14th Century to the End Of Time."
A lot of the music on their catalog is devoted to contemporary music, much of it very meditative and beautiful. They champion a lot of west coast composers like Ingram Marshall, John Luther Adams, and Lou Harrison. It was on this program at Bard that I first heard Harrison's "Varied Trio", a short piece in 5 movements for Piano, Percussion and violin. I was really taken by the music, and when I heard the piece again in New York a few months later I resolved to get the score.
I was lucky enough to have two great musician friends who were up for working on the piece with me. Martin Urbach and Erika Kapin. After rehearsing on and off for many months we performed the piece in the intimate setting of a house concert series hosted by Mariel Berger and Dustin Carlson.
Here's the first movement of the piece, "Gending".



Mariel played later that evening in a trio with Dustin Carlson and Shannon Barnett. I think this is a song by Brad Shepik.

The Monday Night Ramble at Branded Saloon

This Monday I played a set at Branded Saloon in Prospect Heights which is hosting a weekly music series curated by Martin Urbach and Zach Brock. I played my beloved Yamaha organ and sampler with Jonathan Goldberger on baritone guitar and Ryan Ferreira on guitar. Jonathan and Ryan have such a great command of the sonic possibilities of the guitar and electronics and they achieved a pretty dizzying array of textures.

Unfortunately Ryan is cut out from most of this clip...



We were sharing a bill with trumpeter and composer Josh Deutsch's group Pannonia. It was a great band, really cool writing and interesting instrumentation with Brian Drye on trombone, Zach Brock on violin, Gary Wang on bass and Ronen Itzik on percussion.

A short clip before my camera battery died!

Triple Bill at I Beam

Last Friday was a really fun night of music at I Beam. First up was Vavatican, performing as a trio with Owen Stewart-Robinson, Nathaniel Morgan, and Weston Minisalli. I see this group as part of a continuum of composers/improvisors in Brooklyn that is starting to coalesce into a movement of sorts. The compositions incorporate free improvisation often using extended instrumental techniques, but in a very calculated, compositional way that reminds me of early AACM music. The thing that really makes this music a different kind of experience is the use of spoken texts in the pieces. The other bands who are working in this kind of area are Buckminster, and This Sporting Life, whose performances are part avant-chamber-improv and part surrealist theatre.



Next up was pianist/accordionist/composer Mariel Berger leading a new group playing all new compositions, featuring Martin Urbach, Will McEvoy, and Nathaniel Morgan. The music had a very ambitious scope, and all the pieces made a journey through diverse and complex musical material. But there was also a very organic development to the music, and Mariel told me after the performance that she had composed the music without writing anything down until she could hold the entire piece in her memory. Everyone in the band played great and showed a real commitment to realizing the music.




Then I played a set of solo piano, focusing on the music of guitarist and composer Bill Frisell. I've been exploring this repertoire for a few months now and I've really been enjoying the process of re-imagining this music for piano. Bill Frisell is one of my favorite musicians, and has been a big influence on my composing. I find playing solo to be a formidable challenge, but I feel like I've learned a lot in the few gigs that I've done. My head got cut off in this video, oops...

Bolivia Tour Photo Essay

We are fortunate that the violinist in our band, Erika Kapin, is also a skilled photographer and took many wonderful photos on our tour. I also just got some pictures of some of the shows we played, taken by people from the Bolivian embassy.



This was a concert we played at the Portales Palace in Cochabamba. It was built by a "tin baron" in the early 1900's and is now a cultural center. It was pretty amazing playing in such a luxurious atmosphere.



These are from a concert we did at the Grand Hotel in Cochabamba. This was the biggest show we did, there were about 400 people there! The audiences at all these concerts were awesome. So attentive and appreciative.



Our fearless leader and Bolivian star-child Martin Urbach on drums.



Javier Moreno Sanchez, playing all manner of basses on this trip. He was also Kenny's Spanish tutor...



Erika Kapin on violin, who made it out of Bolivia with her vegetarianism intact!



Kenny Warren on trumpet, who was becoming impressively fluent in Spanish!



Me.



This is us playing at an orphanage in Santa Cruz. Definitely one of the most rewarding experiences of the trip.

Home again.

Just got back to Brooklyn last night from an amazing tour in Bolivia with Martin Urbach's Quintet for World Peace. Martin got a grant from the US State Department to go to his home country of Bolivia and do a series of performances and masterclasses. It was an incredible experience, and my first time in South America. I took copious amounts of Flip camera footage, which I'll be sifting through and creating some sort of mini-documentary of the trip. Hopefully it'll be posted here soon!