Women in (New) Music: What Better Than Call An Interview?

by Lauren Freman

Quick! Imagine a genius. Don’t think about it, just, whatever comes to mind first. What do they look like? Do they wear glasses? How old are they? What color is their hair?

What color is their skin?

What’s their gender?

I’d wager a guess that most of us have a very specific image of the kind of person who counts as a genius. But there are glimmers of hope that the narrow parameters for the moniker are beginning to loosen: Shuri, the teenage tech-whiz character in the box-office record breaking film Black Panther, for example, or, more recently, Kendrick Lamar’s historic Pulitzer Prize win.

The fact is, we carry around our assumptions until they’re confronted. I was lucky enough to experience such a confrontation, when I sat down with new music chamber ensemble Kin of the Moon (comprised of Heather Bentley, Dr. Kaley Lane Eaton, and Leanna Keith), and dancer-choreographer Karin Stevens (of Karin Stevens Dance) to ask a few questions about their collaborative performance this Friday, What Better Than Call a Dance?

From left: Kaley Lane Eaton, Leanna Keith, Heather Bentley, Karin Stevens, Beth Fleenor.

The performance will feature original pieces by Bentley and Eaton, each inspired by dance forms running the gamut from waltz, tango, the Scottish cèilidh—and even EDM. Kin of the Moon’s more-or-less-through-composed music will be interwoven with improvised movement and music by Karin Stevens and clarinetist Beth Fleenor.

I admit I initially felt a certain skepticism around the name Kin of the Moon. This is a highly educated ensemble that plays intellectually complex, heady musicwhy choose a name that evokes a certain nag-champa-laden mysticism? Was that title truly serious enough to describe serious music that is to be taken seriously? I was surprised to find that the line came straight out of a poem from one of the most established figures in the English literary canon, W.B. Yeats. Strike one, assumptions.

What Better Than Call An Interview? with Kin of the Moon and Karin Stevens

We got exclusive access into the brilliant minds behind Kin of the Moon and Karin Stevens Dance. Join us as we discuss everything from W.B. Yeats, the #metoo movement, and of course, their April 20th performance What Better Than Call a Dance?

Posted by Second Inversion on Tuesday, March 27, 2018

 

Kaley Lane Eaton (KLE): I didn’t start composing until my last year of college, and I had never even thought about it until then. It had not even crossed my mind. I had been a concert pianist, I was winning concerto competitions, I was surrounded by classical music composers my entire life, studying opera, and all that. But I went to Whitman College and I took a course by the incredible Dr. Susan Pickett. She teaches a course called Women As Composers…I really had to reckon with the fact that I had never considered women as composerswhich was odd, given that I’m a woman musician, raised by a raging bra-burning feminist, who made sure that everything I consumed as a young child was feminist. And that says something, that even having a mother like that, who puts everything on the line to make sure that her daughter is aware that she can be anything, STILL I didn’t even know.

Karin Stevens (KS): It’s been essential to me to advocate for local new music, and to build this work that I do together with these amazing composers and artists in music in Seattle. Beth [Fleenor] and I go way back, we’ve done a lot of work together through various groups: the Seattle jazz composers ensemble, the Sam Boshnack quintet, she was a player in a work I did… playing music by Wayne Horvitz, Mike Owcharuk, Nate Omdal (just to give all those lovely people a shoutoutthat’s the advocate in me! We’ve gotta be building audiences for each other). For me, I hope that it’s another layer of the people that have come to support my work, to see music from another direction.

Leanna Keith (LK): I think part of it is that we try to focus on certain types of voices that you may not hear anywhere else. We tend to focus on a lot more female composers if we can. This particular show, it is genreless, going from all these different types of dance from the waltz to EDM, so it’s one of those things where, even if you’ve never heard anything like this before, that’s kind of the point.

Heather Bentley (HB): That EDM piece is really quite unique. This is one that Kaley put together.

KLE: Yeah, this is gonna be the final thing that concludes our pieces, but then [Karin and Beth] will come in on the bass drop. I write electroacoustic music, and I love EDM, I love dance, I love trap musicall of this stuff is really movement-based…We’re going to sing this Hildegard chant into this microphone that picks up our signal and takes little granules…and then turns them into a beat. So you’ll hear this kind of driving, four-on-the-floor beat that’s actually made out of our voices, from the Hildegard chant. So our singing will kind of dissolve into this beat that will emerge, and then [Karin and Beth] will join us

KS: —for the Finale.

KLE: It’s Hildegard and EDM, it’s like

LK: —Trap Hildegard!

Strike two, assumptionsthis time about the limits of what Serious Artists™ are allowed to draw inspiration from. To review: The finale of What Better Than Call A Dance? will be a club-music inspired dance piece, using electronics to manipulatein real-timea chant by an 11th century abbess into an EDM mix.

Incidentally, St. Hildegard von Bingen, said 11th century abbess, was a genius. She was a writer, scientist, composer, philosopher, playwright, medical healer, Doctor of the Church—and currently the only woman listed in the Wikipedia entry for “polymath.”

HB: When I was a kid, I always did many, many, many things…So, this is this idea that I’ve been trying on since #metoo. I should get a t-shirt, I want it to say “I’m a Genius Polymath.” As a woman, my first inclination is to be like “Oh, well isn’t that presumptuous?” I don’t know if I am a genius polymath or not, but why not say it anyway? …So that’s something to try on. I was asked to write a piece for the Thalia Symphony, and it’s going to be about the shape of the universe, which means I need to learn some astrophysics. So I said to myself “I can learn that, because I’m a genius polymath.” What if women—and especially younger girls—just had the sense that it was allowed to them, to say that about themselves, or just to have that self-knowledge? That takes a lot of ceilings away from one’s attitude.

KS: I’m fabulously excited about this side of Kin of the Moon, to be surrounded by all these women…The movements and sounds we make together matter—they have power, and have effect. So I’d like to imagine…that there is something beyond the traditional transaction of art consumption or aesthetic gesture—that we’re doing something that is important. We haven’t had a lot of support for our voices, especially in music…I’m just really excited to be a part of this energy that they’re building with their own music. I kinda don’t care if people like it or not.

LK: To be honest, this is very integral to what we do. The whole gender spectrum, and feminine identity, and these kinds of ideas, across age differences. Kaley, and myself and Heather, we span a rather different amount of time, and so have very different perspectives between the three of us…When we sit down and talk and start to make music together, we’re like, “What do we want to talk about in our music, what do we want to get across?” so a lot of this is what you’ll hear.

KLE: I have to add a little addendum to that article I wrote [“Things I Wish I Had Known When I Thought I Couldn’t Be A Composer”], that you have to just do it. You have to just commit, you have to just be like “I’m not gonna care if anyone tells me I can, I’m not gonna wait for funding, I’m not gonna wait. I’m just gonna do it, and I’m gonna advocate for myself, and I’m not gonna sit around being like ‘nobody wants to hear my music.” Who cares? Just, f***ing do it. So that is my number one advice for people, especially young women, who feel like “I don’t know if I can do this,” well, you can. Just do it.

Which is to say: strike three, assumptions.


What Better Than Call A Dance? is Friday, April 20 at 8pm at the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center. Tickets can be purchased at the door, on a sliding scale of $5-$15 (cash only). Click here for more information.

For a full transcript of the interview, please click here.


 

Lauren Freman is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and composer, hell-bent on blurring the boundaries between high and low art. Follow her at www.freman.band, on Facebook, or on Instagram.

 

New Music for April: Music of Earth, Moon, and More

by Maggie Molloy

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Second Inversion and the Live Music Project create a monthly calendar featuring contemporary classical, cross-genre, and experimental performances in Seattle, the Eastside, Tacoma, and places in between! 

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Keep an eye out for our this flyer in concert programs and coffee shops around town. Feel free to download, print, and distribute it yourself! If you’d like to be included on this list, submit your event to the Live Music Project at least 6 weeks prior to the event and tag it with “new music.”

New Music Flyer - April 2018

 

Wayward Music Series
Concerts of contemporary composition, free improvisation, electroacoustic music, and sonic experiments. This month: drone cinema, phonetic etudes, murder ballades, and the muted colors of Morton Feldman.
Various days, 7:30/8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $5-$15

Things That Break
New music merges with stop-motion animation, visual art, and theatre in this multidisciplinary concert centered around the theme of “breaking.” Four Seattle-based female artists come together for a unique presentation of world premieres.
Fri, 4/6, 8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $5-$15

The Sound Ensemble: You Didn’t Know They Composed
Did you know some of today’s top rock stars and pop stars have tried their hands at classical composition too? The Sound Ensemble presents an evening of chamber music by the likes of Björk, Beck, Bryce Dessner, and more, plus a new commission by James McAlister.
Sat, 4/7, 7pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $10-$15

The Esoterics: CŌNFIDŌ
The ancient rite of the Christian liturgy, the Mass, is reimagined for modern times in this program of works by Gregory Brown, Giles Swayne, and Kirke Mechem. The Esoterics sing four settings of Mass texts that express crises of faith, criticize organized religion, and prioritize the health of our planet over any individual belief.
Fri, 4/13, 8pm, St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church, Seattle | $15-$22
Sat, 4/14, 8pm, Holy Rosary Catholic Church, West Seattle | $15-$22
Sun, 4/15, 7pm, Christ Episcopal Church, Tacoma | $15-$22

Seattle Modern Orchestra: The Clouds Receding
Immerse yourself in the dense sonic clouds of composers like György Ligeti and Beat Furrer, plus a new world premiere by Orlando Jacinto Garcia featuring violist Melia Watras as the soloist.
Sat, 4/14, 8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $10-$25

Sound of Late: 48-Hour Composition Competition
A group of composers each gets 48 hours to compose a new piece for their assigned instrumentation, and a group of performers gets six days to prepare before they perform the works live in concert.
Sat, 4/14, 8pm, Gallery 1412 | FREE

SMCO: Songs and Dances of Peace
The Seattle Metropolitan Chamber Orchestra performs a powerful program exploring Leonard Bernstein’s now-ubiquitous quote, “This shall be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before.” Featured composers include Bernstein, Barber, Golijov, and Tchaikovsky.
Sat, 4/14, 8pm, First Free Methodist Church | $15-$25
Sun, 4/15, 2pm, Rainier Arts Center | $15-$25

What Better Than Call a Dance?
Experimental chamber troupe Kin of the Moon joins forces with dancer/choreographer Karin Stevens and clarinetist/improvisor Beth Fleenor for a program that wildly reimagines dance music from Renaissance to waltz to tango and even EDM.
Fri, 4/20, 8pm, Good Shepherd Chapel | $5-$15

On Stage with KING FM: Earth Day Celebration
The Ecco Chamber Ensemble celebrates Earth Day with a program of music exploring the vital role of water in both our basic survival as well as our art.
Sat, 4/21, 7:30pm, Resonance at SOMA Towers | $20-$25

Symphony Tacoma: Earth Songs from the Harp
Grammy-nominated electric harpist Deborah Henson-Conant joins Symphony Tacoma for a boundary-bursting program ranging from blues and jazz to flamenco, folk, and beyond.
Sun, 4/22, 2:30pm, Pantages Theater | $19-$82

Seattle Art Song Society: Elemental
In honor of Earth Day, the Seattle Art Song Society performs songs inspired by the elements of fire, earth, water, and air. The program features music by Ruth Crawford Seeger, Aaron Copland, Juliana Hall, Ernst Bacon, Björk, and more, plus brand new works by Steven Luksan and Brian Armbrust.
Sun, 4/22, 3:30pm, Queen Anne Christian Church | $20-$40

Seattle Symphony: Stravinsky Persephone
A stunning cast of star soloists, dancers, and puppeteers (plus three choirs and four grand pianos!) join the symphony for an entire evening of Stravinsky rarities, including his Persephone, Les noces, “Song of the Volga Boatmen,” and Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments.
Thurs, 4/26, 7:30pm, Benaroya Hall | $42-$79
Sat, 4/28, 8pm, Benaroya Hall | $42-$79

Seattle Symphony: [untitled] 2
Symphony musicians dive into the mind of Stravinsky with a performance of his elegant Octet, a piece which first came to him in a dream. Plus, the Dmitry Pokrovsky Ensemble brings a scintillating blend of folk traditions and extended techniques to two wild works by Russian composers Vladimir Nikolaev and Alexander Raskatov.
Fri, 4/27, 10pm, Benaroya Hall | $16

NOCCO: Lost Sisterhood; Found Landscapes
The North Corner Chamber Orchestra presents a newly commissioned Cello Concerto by Philip Lasser alongside Louise Farrenc’s stunning Symphony No. 3 and Aaron Copland’s unforgettable Appalachian Spring.
Sat, 4/28, 2pm, University Christian Church | $15-$25
Sun, 4/29, 7:30pm, The Royal Room | $15-$25

TICKET GIVEAWAY & CONCERT PREVIEW: City Arts Presents Genre Bender

by Maggie Stapleton

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Each year, City Arts pairs artists who work in different media, commissioning them to leap out of their comfort zones to create a unique experience. Genre Bender is a refreshing look at what interdisciplinary art can and should be in the 21st century – diverse, expressive, free, rich, thoughtful, and collaborative. Any one of these ten artists could hold their own for a solo set this Friday and Saturday evening, but the combined powers in these five duos is sure to spark emotion, inspiration, and optimism for the future of art.

Second Inversion is a Genre Bender sponsor this year and we want to give away two tickets (to either night) to a lucky winner! Simply leave a comment at the bottom of this post and let us know which of the 5 duos sounds the most intriguing to you! You can visit us on Facebook or Twitter to enter, too. The winner will be chosen and notified on Thursday, March 3 at 1pm. (Ticket giveaway has now closed – congratulations to our lucky winner, Cam!)

Genre Bender runs this Friday, March 4 and Saturday, March 5 at 8pm (doors open at 7pm) at the Cornish Playhouse at Seattle Center. Tickets are $20 in advance $30 at the door. The show is the same both nights, but a party in the lobby will follow the Saturday night performance.

Hear’s a taste of each of the duos by City Arts’ Jonathan Zwickel and Gemma Wilson – follow the links for more details!

Musician/producer Erik Blood + dancer/choreographer Markeith Wiley

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Photo by Megumi Shauna Arai.

Both Wiley and Blood are chameleon-like in their ability to adapt and evolve their output. Both are natural collaborators. Both have honed their own expressive personal style and are adept at drawing out the most expressive efforts in others. To paraphrase Blood, Wiley works with dancers the way Blood works with musicians. – by City Arts’ Jonathan Zwickel

 

Performance artist Alice Gosti + ritualist Timothy White Eagle

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Photo by Megumi Shauna Arai.

The two are preparing a symbolic setting within which they’ll present a new, modern myth about departure and nonattachment that personally involves the audience. – by City Arts’ Jonathan Zwickel

 

Actor/playwright/cellist Justin Huertas + composer/clarinetist/vocalist Beth Fleenor

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Photo by Bruce Clayton Tom.

“At Cornish Playhouse, Fleenor and Huertas will keep themselves as close to the audience as possible, and make the theatre as inviting and comfortable as they can. “We want to share light and space with the audience, and we want them to participate in our music,” Huertas says. Music will feature Fleenor on clarinet, Huertas on cello and the audience on…no one knows yet.” – by City Arts’ Gemma Wilson 

 

Writer/artist Tessa Hulls + performance/visual artist Kyle Loven

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Photo by Megumi Shauna Arai.

“Both Hulls and Loven bring an introspective lyricism and an earnest interest in humanity to their work, liberally sprinkled with a wry sense of humor. When they first met to discuss their collaboration for this year’s Genre Bender, they started with a Venn diagram that just kept overlapping. Last night at the Cloud Room, Hulls and Loven were decked out in matching houndstooth jackets as they talked about bonding over what Hulls called a “curmudgeonly distrust of/despair over technology and what it does to relationships.” At Genre Bender, they’ll jump from that theme into a piece blending ’50s camp with an apocalyptic flavor.” – by City Arts’ Gemma Wilson 

 

Dancer/choreographer Jody Kuehner + actor/solo performer Keira McDonald

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Photo by Megumi Shauna Arai.

“‘Someone falling down the stairs is really funny—unless they die,’ McDonald says. When Kuehner and McDonald first met and began working together, they found a common interest in exploring that intersection of laughter and death, humor and pain: the absurdity that comes from catastrophe. To get things rolling, they told a lot of stories about people dying in tragic ways, of which McDonald says she has many and Kuehner really has just one, about her cat.

“‘We’re all going to die, but we have no idea how or when. It’s the greatest mystery of being alive,” says McDonald.'” – by City Arts’ Gemma Wilson

LIVE CONCERT SPOTLIGHT: January 22-27

by Maggie Molloy

This week’s music calendar features everything from blindfolded musicians to Babylonian goddesses!


Pink Martini with the Seattle Symphony

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Portland is known for its unique and diverse music scene—Courtney Love, Elliott Smith, and the Decemberists are just a few Portland natives who come to mind—but nothing is quite like Portland’s Pink Martini.

Pink Martini is a 12-piece band that draws musical inspiration from around the world. With a unique fusion of classical, jazz, and old-fashioned pop influences, the group strives to create beautiful and inclusive music which transcends the boundaries of language, geography, politics, and religion.

This week Pink Martini is coming to our neck of the woods to perform two concerts with the Seattle Symphony. They will be joined by the Von Trapps, a family who is famous for their spot-on sibling harmonies, rich musical arrangements, and multilingual repertoire. Did we mention they’re descendants of the Trapp Family Singers, whose lives were the inspiration for “The Sound of Music”?

The performance is Thursday, Jan. 22 at 7:30 p.m. at Benaroya Hall.


Heather Bentley’s “The Ballad of Ishtar”

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Opera is among the oldest vocal musical forms still prevalent today in Western classical music. However, this weekend Seattle musicians are putting a contemporary spin on this classic art form with composer Heather Bentley’s “The Ballad of Ishtar,” an original electroacoustic, semi-improvised opera which experiments with new sounds, new instruments, and a new story.

The opera responds to our worldwide rape culture crisis through a new musical language. It tells the story Ishtar, the Babylonian goddess of love, war, and sex, who is so disgusted by rape culture that she travels to the underworld and back to discover why humanity deserves any intimate connection at all.

Bringing this story to life is a fabulous cast of Seattle musicians, including singer and clarinetist Beth Fleenor as Ishtar, performance artist okanomodé as Asu Shu-Namir, and singer Jimmie Herrod as the Queen of the Underworld. The instrumental ensemble features saxophonist Ivan Arteaga, violist Heather Bentley, trumpeter Ahamefule J. Oluo, guitarist Trey Gunn, bassist Evan Flory-Barnes, and guitarist Michaud Savage. Electronics, amplification, and live processing will be done by composer and sound artist William Hayes.

For a preview of some of the artists, please listen to Heather and Beth’s installment of Second Inversion’s “The Takeover”

 

The opera will be performed this Thursday, Jan. 22, Friday, Jan. 23, and Saturday, Jan. 24 at 8 p.m. at the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford.


Music of Remembrance: Commemorating the 70th Anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz

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Some moments in history are too powerful, to sobering, and too significant to be put into words. Art is simply the only way to fully express the emotional gravity of such moments. Next week, Music of Remembrance will present a free concert honoring the 70th anniversary of a very crucial moment in history: the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp.

The musical program will feature works by composers whose lives were cut tragically short by Nazi persecution: Hans Krása, Gideon Klein, Viktor Ullmann, Ilse Weber, Carlo Taube, Robert Dauber, David Beigelman, and Dick Kattenburg. The concert serves as a reminder of their courage and creative spirit even in the face of such violent and catastrophic circumstances.

For a listen back to MOR’s November 2014 concert, take a listen to this Second Inversion broadcast hosted by Mina Miller:

 

The concert is next Tuesday, Jan. 27 at 5 p.m. at the Illsley Ball Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya Hall.


Beth Fleenor’s Workshop Ensemble

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Beth Fleenor’s Workshop Ensemble (WE) is good at listening. In fact, they’re so good at listening that they don’t even need to use their eyes—they choose to perform blindfolded.

WE is a 12-piece project that performs Fleenor’s chamber works, including her “20 Etudes for Blindfolded Musicians,” a series of exercises which help cultivate a deeper sense of ensemble intention and communication by heightening each member’s full body listening and awareness.

Next week, the ensemble will perform “SILT,” a 16-minute sonic meditation which is being released on Bunny Blasto Records. They will also perform a new work for blindfolded musicians.

The performance is next Tuesday, Jan. 27 at 8 p.m. at the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford.