source file: mills2.txt Date: Mon, 26 May 1997 20:43:01 +0200 Subject: AFMM MicroMay '97 - May 21, NYC From: DMB5561719@aol.com American Festival of Microtonal Music MicroMay '97 Day #2: "Jewel" Columbia University's St. Paul's Chapel New York, N.Y. May 21, 1997 Day 2 of AFMM's MicroMay began with a transcription of Andrea Gabrieli's Vezzosa Filli, a piece for double quartet of singers. The resonant St. Paul's Chapel (at least a couple of seconds of reverb) was an additional instrument, reinforcing the music with a glow. Vezzosa Filli was perfect for this space. sopranos - Meredith Borden,Piera F. Paine altos - Adria Quinones, Elizabeth Lee tenors - Brendan Glynn, Orlando Colon, basses - Gabriel Mendlow, Andrew Clateman Three pieces by John Dowland: Lachrimae, The Frog Galliard, and Forlorn Hope Fancy were performed by Wim Hoogewerf. Dowland's "personal tuning" uses perfect ji thirds and fifths yet still contains some intervals that enrich and color (IMHO) the tuning. Like the Gabrieli, the ambient St. Paul's contributed to the performance. just intonation guitar - Wim Hoogewerf Johnny Reinhard's Eye of Newt is another of his works in polymicrotonality - where more then one tuning is used. His technique of using more then one tuning creates frequent unexpected changes in mood. Multiphonics and singing through his alto recorder adds harmony to this potion. alto recorder - Johnny Reinhard Ei, Wie der Kaffee ist Suisse by J. S. Bach for soprano, flute and harpsichord in Werkmeister III. A wonderful piece that gives the soprano a chance to sing about how wonderful coffee is. Unfortunately the chapel drank this one up, obscuring the details. soprano - Meredith Borden baroque flute - Andrew Bolotowsky harpsichord - Rebecca Pechefsky One of the most anticipated events of the festival was the NY premiere of the solo version of Harry Partch's Barstow by John Schneider. The result of historical research, Schneider had a custom guitar built based on Partch's notes. Schneider released a version of Barstow on Just West Coast - microtonal music for guitar and harp (Bridge) a few years ago and he's refined his approach since then. Now his Partchian sprechgesang is a bit more approprate to the piece. After the concert I asked Schneider about his future plans for microtonal guitar recordings and was told that he's planning to record or has unreleased recordings of works by Partch (US Highball for guitar and voice), La Monte Young (a newer composer supervised slower version of Sarabande), more works by Lou Harrison and others including his own compositions. Partch monophonic-model guitar - John Schneider Shruti is the 22 interval scale of India and also the title of Ganesh Anandan's contribution to the festival. He played his homemade percussion, metal bars resting on foam and resonators and then sang in a gruff overtone style. NY premiere. extended voice, original instruments - Ganesh Anandan Andrew Culver's Architectonic Space placed the musicians spatially around the chapel. The trumpet in the balcony, the violin in the pulpit, the viola to the side near the pews and so on. Culver's purely minimalistic held tones disregard the obsessive rhythmic cells favored by most minimalists, the primary influences seem to be John Cage and La Monte Young. A Tuning Digest buddy said that listening to Architectonic Space was like watching paint dry. I happen to like this kind of zen minimalism, but think that the composer missed a great opportunity to explore the rich resources of higher limit just intonation systems. NY premiere. alto flute - Andrew Bolotowsky bass clarinet - Ron Kozak bassoon - Johnny Reinhard violin - Dan Auerbach viola - Anastasia Solberg cello - Jodi Beder trumpet - John Charles Thomas The Quarter tone Preludio a Colon by Julian Carrillo also used occasional eighth tones. It's pieces like this that spark up a festival like this, the tuning is so far out that there's no doubt that it's not in the much too common 12 tone equal temperament. Icing on the cake! soprano - Meredith Borden flute - Andrew Bolotowsky violins - Dan Auerbach, Tina Cho viola - Anastasia Solberg cello - Jodi Beder 24 tone equal temperament guitar - Wim Hoogewerf 96 tone equal temperament harp - Skip LaPlante conductor - Johnny Reinhard My picks: Barstow, Preludio A Colon and Eye of Newt. Not that there was anything wrong with the other works. Just my personal highlights. Stay tuned for more... db 5/26/97 Part one of this series of reviews is at url: www.virtulink.com/immp/jux/j_index.htm Information about the American Festival of Microtonal Music: http://www.echonyc.com/~jhhl/AFMM/ D a v i d B e a r d s l e y .. dmb5561719@aol.com * .. * ... .* .... *...... . ..* I M M P & B i i n k! m u s i c . .. * .. .. * .. J u x t a p o s i t i o n Ezine * . .. * . .*.. . .. . . .*. . . . . .. .. http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm . .. .*.. . .. . ..*. . .. . *. Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Tue, 27 May 1997 01:07 +0200 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA00734; Tue, 27 May 1997 01:07:50 +0200 Date: Tue, 27 May 1997 01:07:50 +0200 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA00732 Received: (qmail 13101 invoked from network); 26 May 1997 23:07:47 -0000 Received: from localhost (HELO ella.mills.edu) (127.0.0.1) by localhost with SMTP; 26 May 1997 23:07:47 -0000 Message-Id: Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu