The Boston Globe: Tyshawn Sorey Pushes Past the Boundaries of Classical and Jazz
The Boston Globe's Bill Beuttler interviewed Tyshawn Sorey about his residency at NEC, which begins today and culminates in a performance with the Contemporary Improvisation department on October 3:
Tyshawn Sorey laughs appreciatively when a description of his composition “Movement,” from Sorey’s 2014 album “Alloy,” is read to him during a recent telephone interview.
“It’s a bit like Alban Berg playing piano in a hotel lounge at the end of the world,” the New Yorker’s Alex Ross had written in a piece on Sorey this past spring.
“I love that line,” says Sorey, who arrives Tuesday for a three-day residency at New England Conservatory that will culminate with a free concert at Jordan Hall. “It’s one of the best, best ways of describing the piece.”
“Movement,” which will be among several Sorey compositions he’ll perform with NEC students and faculty members, is a work that blurs boundaries separating 20th-century classical music and jazz. The piece, like Sorey himself, is a perfect match for NEC’s Contemporary Improvisation department, which got its start at NEC in the 1970s under Gunther Schuller and Ran Blake. Back then it was called the Third Stream department, named for the term Schuller had used during a 1957 lecture at Brandeis to describe music that mixes classical and jazz.
Thursday's concert is also a concert pick in the Boston Globe and ArtsFuse.