Contemporary Musical Arts Dept: Pushing the Limits (Broadcast)

Ran Blake: Looking Back, Looking Forward

Recorded medley, selected by Hankus Netsky and edited and compiled by David Shane:

Good Morning, Heartache
by Irene Higginbotham, Dan Fisher, Ervin Drake; recorded 1973
The Death of Edith Piaf 
by Ran Blake; recorded 1979
'Round Midnight
by Thelonious Monk; recorded 1993
You Stepped Out of a Dream
by Nacio Herb Brown; recorded 2010
The Magic Row
by Ran Blake; recorded 2019

Thelonious Monk | Pannonica

Ran Blake, piano
Emily MItchell, voice

Ran Blake | Memphis

Ran Blake, piano
 

Program  note

A tribute to our founding chair, including excerpts from five decades of Jordan Hall solo piano performances, culminating with a live duo performance featuring Blake with current CMA student Emily Mitchell performing Thelonious Monk's tribute to Baroness Nica de Konigswater, Godmother to New York's bebop jazz scene.

Tribute to Peter Row

Hindustani Song and Raga | Yaman Kalyan, Raaga Sanga Ragini

Nima Janmohammadi, introduction
Sahana Priyadarshini Narayanan, vocals
Tejas Nair, esraj
Ritvik Yaparpalvi, tablas
Mattias Kaufmann, Hankus Netsky, accordion

Program note

Two current NEC students, Tejas Nair and Sahana Priyadarshini Narayanan, perform a song and improvisations on one of Peter's favorite ragas in honor of the school's longtime Provost and cherished faculty member.

Carla Kihlstedt | The Lamed Wufnik from "Necessary Monsters"

Serena Bixby, narrator
vocals: Sarah Bernadette Matsushima, Kaia Berman-Peters, Agne Giedraityte         
Lemuel Marc, trumpet, bass harmonica
Katie Knudsvig, violin
Carla Kihlstedt, viola
Karl Henry, cello
Mattias Kaufmann, accordion
Emiliano Lopez, guitar
Avi Randall, Haoyu Zheng, piano
Moyu Zhang, auxiliary piano
Jamie Eliot, electric bass
Henry Wilson, percussion

Program note

The Lamed Wufnik(s) (One of Thirty Six) is a part of Necessary Monsters, a nine-movement song cycle after J. Luis Borges' Book of Imaginary Beings.  It's based on the Talmudic concept that the world is only sustained at any time by the work of thirty-five unsuspecting righteous individuals.  You can find the entire album at  carlakihlstedt.bandcamp.com.Words by Rafael Osés, arranged by Carla Kihlstedt and Mark Orton

Tribute to Nedelka Prescod

Farayi Malek, introduction


Ysaye Barnwell (arr. Farayi Malek)| Breaths

Program note

Our CMA Contemporary Vocal Ensemble performs Farayi Malek's arrangement of
Breaths in honor of our founding director of our African Roots, Contemporary Gospel, and Rhythm and Blues Ensembles. 

Breaths

Listen more often to things than to beings
Listen more often to things than to beings
Tis' the ancestors' breath
When the fire's voice is heard
Tis' the ancestor's breath
In the voice of the waters
Ah -- wsh Ah – wsh

Those who have died have never, never left
The dead are not under the earth
They are in the rustling trees
They are in the groaning woods
They are in the crying grass
They are in the moaning rocks
The dead are not under the earth

Listen more often to things than to beings …

Those who have died have never, never left
The dead have a pact with the living
They are in the woman's breast
They are in the wailing child
They are with us in our homes
They are with us in this crowd
The dead have a pact with the living

Listen more often to things than to beings…

Birago Diop
 

CMA Contemporary Vocal Ensemble

Sarah Bernadette Matsushima, Litha Ashforth, Emily Mitchell
Hayley Qin, Serena Bixby, Kayden Carter, Emmy Guo, Flora Sun
Agne Giedraityte, Adrian Chabla, Yannick Yan, Haoyu Zheng
Avi Randall, Weza Jamison-Neto

Dominique Eade | Before I Go

Program note

Dominique originally wrote and arranged Before I Go for a Jazz/CI a cappella group that she initiated at NEC in the 1990s.

Death, don't crouch in my doorway,
Please let me be, I've got far to go.
Just let me slip from your watchful eye,
I won't squander the time bestowed.

With each new turn,
I think I learn,
but lessons vanish.
Will distance tell the tale
My heart's to unfold?

I won't waste a minute more!
Won't you at least give me
the chance to do, just one good turn
before I go?

CMA Contemporary Vocal Ensemble

Sarah Bernadette Matsushima, Litha Ashforth, Emily Mitchell
Hayley Qin, Serena Bixby, Kayden Carter, Emmy Guo, Flora Sun
Agne Giedraityte, Adrian Chabla, Yannick Yan, Haoyu Zhang
Avi Randall, Weza Jamison-Neto

Anthony Coleman | Shoym (Froth)

Katya Popova, narrator
Litha Ashforth, Kaia Berman-Peters, Agne Giedraityte, vocals
Nikita Manin, bass clarinet
Christopher Ferrari, tenor saxophone
Miranda Agnew, trumpet
Aiden Coleman, trombone
G Rockwell, banjo
Grant Beale, guitar
Mattias Kaufmann, accordion
Avi Randall, piano
Solomon Caldwell, bass
Henry Wilson, marimba
Jeff Guan, drums

Program note

This piece was a section of Streams, the work that I wrote in 2018 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of New England Conservatory. In February of that year, writer Natalie Lifson published an article in Haaretz where she spoke about the anti-Semitic nature of the Parkland Massacre, and about the fact that this was not widely reported. One of the sections of Streams was meant for the Jewish Music Ensemble, and I was having some trouble trying to figure out what I wanted to write about. But this triggered everything. I had some very strong ideas about what I wanted to do with the text and, after some searching, I was able to collaborate with Daniel Kahn. Daniel lives in Berlin, so we were collaborating over e-mail which was tricky, especially considering the fact that I wanted most of the text to be in Yiddish. But I knew he would understand what I was trying to say. This piece is a romp through my Jewish Subconscious – lots of references, for those who want to play along…
– Anthony Coleman

Shoym (Froth)

Cry out, children!  Speak out all over the world!  Cry out!
Cry out, children! A “Jewish school”

If a known hater of minorities blatantly and frequently spoke about abhorrence for any other minority (other than Jews) and then shot up a school - even one he used to attend - that consisted mostly of members of that ethnic group, people (who care about social justice) would at least be discussing the possibility that it was a hate crime.

Good and blessed/ Crazy Dog/ Skinhead Moonbat
Fight for your life!
Seventeen crosses, fight for your life!
Oh, my little children, we must all cry out.
You see what they’re trying to do to us?
It’s a lie, a dirty lie.  A blatant lie from the old days,
Oh Jews, rise up, they can go to Hell!
It’s a tune, a lively tune,a heroic tune from the old days,
Children, it’s a punishment.
Cry out, say it, go out and speak the truth!!!
Rebel against fear and hatred,
Make a loud noise, fill the streets with your cries against the enemy’s silence.
Make a loud noise!!!

INTERMISSION

Linda J. Chase | Sister Cries Out

Sarah Bernadette Matsushima, Carla Kihlstedt, Yannick Yan, Edward Sun, vocals
Maggie Zang, Yannick Yan, Edward Sun, Avi Randall, Serena Bixby, Roman Barten-Sherman, whisperers
Nikita Manin, bass clarinet
Stan Strickland, soprano saxophone
Rob Flax, Carson McHaney, Michele Zimmerman, violin
Karl Henry, Giulia Haible, cello
Yoona Kim ajaeng
Solomon Caldwell, bass
Henry Wilson, percussion
Emiliano Lopez, electronics
Yu Qin, conductor

Program note

Sister Cries Out is one of 26 movements from the new oratorio, For Our Common Home - Resounding Ecojustice by Linda J. Chase. This new cross-genre oratorio for choir, soloists and chamber orchestra, was inspired by Laudato Si’ an encyclical issued by Pope Francis calling on humanity to acknowledge the urgency of the environmental crisis and work toward building a more just and sustainable world. Chase interprets the text as a call to action through music and draws from contemporary classical, jazz, gospel and klezmer musical traditions. The libretto of this movement is based on this quote from Laudato Si' : "Saint Francis of Assisi reminds us that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us. This sister now cries out to us because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her…"

#MeToo
Listen to the whispers.

Sister cries out, she has been misused
Sister cries out, she has been abused
Destruction, devastation, deforestation
Pollution, production, injustice, corruption
Extinction, rebellion, radiation, desecration
Industry fumes, burning fossil fuels
Pipelines leak, water we can’t drink
Species go extinct
Rhino, cheetah, macaw, whooping crane
Wildfires burn, Ice does not return
Butterfly, penguin, monk seal, dolphin
Pesticides kill bees, plastic in the sea
Drilling, spilling oil, cutting, clearing trees
Sister cries out, sister cries out 

#MeToo
Listen to the whispers.

Tribute to Joe Maneri

Traditional Greek (arr. Joe Maneri) | Kalamatiano and Zeibekiko

soloists:
Itay Dayan, clarinet
Yoona Kim, ajaeng                                                             

Adrian Chabla, piano
Jamie Eliot, bass
Nadav Friedman, percussion

Program note

Joe Maneri, NEC's long-time music Theory, Composition, and Contemporary Improvisation faculty member, introduced the traditional Greek Kalamatiano and Zeibekiko to our department's repertoire.

Gordon Beeferman | The Sway

Eden MacAdam-Somer, vocals, violin, percussive dance
 

Program note

In writing The Sway for Eden MacAdam-Somer, I wanted to highlight her exceptional abilities as a performer —violinist, improviser, singer, dancer — and weave these strands together in one piece.
        I structured the piece via a series of short original texts, each transitioning into the next without pause. Some texts are either drastically compressed into a minimal number of words, like a tiny prism for the music to project itself through. Others spiral out through repetition, variation, and association, and the music sustains them through kinetic momentum and rhythmic counterpoint. In each, I tried to connect with a different aspect of aliveness — sensation, self-awareness, relation to others and the world we live in — and create an individual sound-world and physical relationship to the body, voice, and instrument. Throughout, notated music flows directly into improvisation and back out again. Improvised passages develop and connect the written ones. They bring the performer into the inner workings of my composition, and keep the music fully connected to the moment.
        Some words about this piece’s connection to NEC. I’ve not only been influenced by my early studies with Hankus Netsky and Ran Blake, who helped me develop my ear and my sense of harmony, but also my many close colleagues in improvised music who came through the school and developed their own unique ways of playing. For example, I never studied with the late Joe Maneri, but I learned about his 72-note microtonal system via some of his former students, and The Sway incorporates my take on that world of possibilities. Mostly, I’m grateful that from a young age I was supported in my inclination that — as they said in those days — there was a “third stream” where different worlds of music need no longer be separated.                                                                                           
– Gordon Beeferman

Lautaro Mantilla | La Maria

Solomon Caldwell, Carson McHaney, Mattias Kaufmann, Michele Zimmerman, Haoyu Zhang, Yannick Yan, Sarah Bernadette Matsushima, Moyu Zheng, Itay Dayan, Emiliano Lopez, Emily Mitchell, Yu Qin, Nikita Manin, Giulia Haible, Yoona Kim, Jamie Eliot, Avi Randall, vocal sounds
Grant Beale, Olivia Wilkins-Becker, guitar, voice
Andrew Fordyce, drums
Lautaro Mantilla, conductor, voice

Program note

This is the fourth piece of an ongoing project entitled Por La Fuerza that presents 10 selected accounts of kidnappings that occurred in Colombia between 1990 and 2010, the years with the highest kidnapping rates in the world.  
        The accounts were the result of collecting data from families, victims, and perpetrators and present different perspectives related to these crimes.
         In 1999, the entire congregation of La Maria church in the southwestern city of Cali (Colombia), was abducted during Sunday Mass by a band of 40 members of the National Liberation Army. The guerrillas entered the church during the homily, shouting that there was a bomb in the building and that they were going to deactivate it, but they needed everyone to get into covered trucks and head for the city’s mountainous outskirts.
        The military later reported that about 144 people were abducted and deprived of their human rights. The NLA mined a road during their escape and used some of the victims as human shields as the military advanced. After several weeks all the victims were released, and no guerrilla members were caught or had to respond for the crime.                                                               
– Lautaro Mantilla

Akram Haddad | Al-Madina

Emiliano Lopez, Maggie Zang, Adrian Chabla, Edward Sun, Yannick Yan, vocals
Itay Dayan, clarinet
Chris Ferrari, tenor saxophone
Miranda Agnew, Lemuel Marc, trumpet
Aiden Coleman, trombone
Carson McHaney, Rob Flax, Michele Zimmerman, violin
Avi Randall, viola
Karl Henry, Giulia Haible, Yu Qin, cello
Mal Barsamian, Mattias Kaufmann, oud
Emily Mitchell, G Rockwell, guitar
Akram Haddad, piano
Solomon Caldwell, bass
Nadav Friedman, drums

Program note

Al-Madina is an excerpt from Haddad's recent score for the play, The Maestro. Tonight's performance features improvised solos by NEC faculty member Mal Barsamian on the oud, Chris Ferrari on tenor saxophone, Miranda Agnew on trumpet, G Rockwell on guitar, and Akram Haddad on piano.