NEW VIDEOS: Danish String Quartet

Here’s a charming little story, summarized from the Danish String Quartet‘s website, interspersed with the in-studio videos from November 3, 2015:

The Danish String Quartet are three Danes (Rune, Asbjørn, Fredrik) and one Norwegian cellist (Fredrik). They often joke about being modern Vikings – perhaps a touch more harmless than their ancestors, not pillaging cities or razing the English coastline!

 

The three Danes met at a summer music camp and bonded, as the youngest players in the group, and became best friends through football and chamber music and continued their studies together at the Royal Academy of Music. In 2008, Norwegian cellist Fredrik joined the group – they “found him hidden away in a castle outside Stockholm.” While the quartet has varied hobbies ranging from sailing, old cars, cooking, gaming, reading, playing, talking, and drinking – they play string quartets like it’s their job (because it is!) but also because it’s a lot of fun.

If all goes according to plan, around 2060 they will beat the world record for longest running string quartet and will celebrate with a giant feast. We’ll be waiting for our invitations!

Huge thanks to the UW World Series for helping to make this video session possible!

LIVE BROADCAST: ETHEL with Robert Mirabal

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Robert Mirabal - Hi-Res Image - Photo Credit - Kate RussellThis Thursday, October 8, at 8pm PT tune in to Second Inversion for a LIVE broadcast featuring the critically acclaimed (and incredibly fun) string quartet ETHEL with Native American flutist and two-time Grammy winner Robert Mirabal!  They have been collaborating for over six years, using rivers as inspiration for collaboration, and exploring water as the embodiment of spirit and its essential role in life on earth in a cross-cultural concert experience. Through music, narrative and ritual, their performance evokes timeless Native American traditions. Their program on Thursday includes works by Robert Mirabal, Phil Kline, and members of Ethel, themselves (see below for full program)!

 

We hope that if you’re in Seattle, you’ll come hear the concert in person at Meany Hall on the UW World Series (and say “Hi!” to KING FM and Second Inversion at the table in the lobby). For ETHEL and Robert Mirabal lovers worldwide, tune in on Thursday, October 8 at 8pm PT! On the go? Be sure to download our mobile app to listen anywhere.

We will also broadcast a bonus post-performance Q&A with artists immediately after the performance, so stay tuned for that, too!

Program:

Sky River Suite / music by ETHEL, words by Robert Mirabal
An Kha Na / Robert Mirabal
The River / Phil Kline
Kalimba Waterfall, Tsintskaro Memory and Rana Run / Ralph Farris
Gat’te / Dorothy Lawson
Jay-Red, Tsoma, and Clean Dirge, Dirty Dirge / Kip Jones
Tuvan Ride, In the Eyes of E, Wi-wa (traditional) and Peace Calls / ETHEL + Robert Mirabal

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2015-16 SEASON PREVIEW: Fresh music, from Britten to Bowie

by Jill Kimball

With Seattle’s ever-growing and ever-diversifying population, it’s easy to see why our city has become a top destination for up-and-coming composers, young musical talent, and adventurous concert formats. The 2015-16 season is so packed with new music concerts that, on most weekends, you’d need both hands (and maybe a few toes) to count them. From revitalized Britten to badass multimedia concerts to the classiest Bowie you’ve ever heard, there’s a little something for everyone. Read on for our top picks of the season.


The Town Music series at Town Hall Seattle, curated by our own Artistic Advisor Joshua Roman, is a bastion for cutting-edge music. The season kicks off with a young Russian violinist’s interpretations of Bach’s beautiful, complicated Sonatas and Partitas. And the rest of the season is anything but staid: it includes the premiere of a work composed over two continents, a dynamic performance of Britten’s second string quartet, and a new piece by Roman himself, featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry by Tracy K. Smith and the up-and-coming soprano Jessica Rivera.


Another go-to destination for edgy music with global influences is the UW World Series, an arts season at Meany Hall featuring big names and even bigger ideas. This season is packed with exciting concerts that feature mainstays on the Second Inversion stream. In October, the ETHEL quartet teams up with Native American flutist Robert Mirabal for a concert focused on water’s essential role in all our lives. If drums and mallets are your thing, you must check out So Percussion’s set of modern classics by Reich, Cage, and more. For those who prefer concerts that combine edgy work with timeless pieces, go see the young, bearded Danish String Quartet (they take on music by Beethoven, Schnittke, and a composer from their homeland, Per Nørgaard), pianist Jeremy Denk (he’ll work in some Hindemith and Nancarrow between the Bach and Byrd), or the Daedalus String Quartet (a Huck Hodge world premiere is sandwiched between Beethoven chamber works). If you can’t make it to some of these much-anticipated concerts, don’t worry: we’ll have your back with a live broadcasts or a video from each one.


The UW World Series isn’t the only destination for new music on the University of Washington campus. The School of Music itself has an impressive lineup of concerts. On Halloween weekend, we’re excited to hear the Chicago-based Ensemble Dal Niente perform the works of Seattlites Huck Hodge, Joël-François Durand, and Marcin Pączkowski, among others. In late April, the Carnegie Hall resident ensemble Decoda caps off its weeklong UW residency with a Meany Hall concert of new and old music. And finally, some UW students pay homage to Harry Partch, who created new instruments along with new music, with performances of some of his work.

The UW isn’t the only higher education arts game in town, of course. Cornish College of the Arts is a wealth of compositional talent and its concert season, Cornish Presents, attracts world-class acts every year. Cornish teacher Wayne Horvitz starts off the new-music feast with his piece “Some Places are Forever Afternoon/11 Places for Richard Hugo,” performed with chamber groups Sweeter Than The Day and the Gravitas Quartet. A few days later, flutist Camilla Hoitenga teams up with composer and sound designer Jean-Baptiste Barrière for an electronic concert with video. In December, Paul D. Miller, better known as DJ Spooky, uses interviews from survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs to create a moving original composition. And for an ultimate exploration of music from both sides of the Pacific, stop by PONCHO Hall in November, when a famous gamelan ensemble joins four Seattle string players for a performance of new, local music.


Full-time locavores may not be satisfied until everything about the concert, from composer to performer to creator, is Northwest-based. If you want all local, all the time, your concert season destination should be the Universal Language Project. Founded by trumpeter and composer Brian Chin, the project draws on local talent to present a commissioned premiere in every concert. This season, we’ll hear music inspired by local landscapes written by Karen P. Thomas, Brian Cobb, and Tim Carey; music for strings performed by Seattle-based Scrape Ensemble; and an interactive concert with stunning visuals by Scott Kolbo.


And if that’s not enough to whet your new music appetite, the Seattle Modern Orchestra‘s upcoming season has even more new music. Each of its three main concerts features a premiere of some sort, from Orlando Jacinto Garcia’s From Darkness to Luminosity to an as-yet-unnamed work by Ewa Trębacz to the U.S. premiere of Anthony Cheung’s 2011 work Discrete Infinity.


In the last few years, Benaroya Hall has become an internationally recognized center for cutting-edge new music, from the avant garde to the crossover. If you’re into the former, you probably already know about the Seattle Symphony’s famed [untitled] series, which takes place in the Benaroya lobby fashionably late at night. This [untitled] season proves it means business with a season kickoff made up entirely of world premieres, then goes on to focus on New York City’s avant garde scene and an Arctic-themed piece by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Luther Adams. If the latter is more your taste, check out the undefinable Sonic Evolution series, which this season focuses on the way different artists influence each other across genres and the phenomenon of indie music and film.


Finally, if you’re looking to get some culture but indulge in musical guilty pleasures at the same time, your go-to season should be the Seattle Rock Orchestra‘s. The ensemble that famously covers popular music on orchestral instruments has put together a killer 2015-16 series, which includes a David Bowie showcase, a collection of Mowtown music, and an evening devoted to Neil Diamond. A quintet from SRO also closes out Classical KING FM’s inaugural concert series with a very exciting Eastside concert featuring covers of Beck, Bjork, Radiohead, and more.

These are only a few highlights from an expansive, diverse, and exciting upcoming concert season. For a full listing of shows around the Northwest that’ll make you rethink classical, check our full event calendar.

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LIVE BROADCAST: Catalyst Quartet

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Our next live broadcast on Second Inversion’s 24/7 stream is Thursday, March 19 at 7:30pm (PDT), featuring the Catalyst Quartet presented by UW World Series! They’re performing:

Montgomery: Strum
Tower: In Memory
Glass: String Quartet No.3 Mishima
D’Rivera: Wapango
Ives: String Quartet No.1
Barber: String Quartet Op.11

Join the Facebook event and invite your friends!

Catalyst Quartet was in here in November and recorded an awesome in-studio video. Here’s a taste of Glenn Gould’s String Quartet:

Stay tuned for news on more live broadcasts, in-studio recordings, videos, and broadcasts of recorded concerts throughout the year!

LIVE CONCERT SPOTLIGHT: December 18-21

by Maggie Molloy

This week’s concert calendar features marching bands, Mark O’Connor, and many more Northwestern musicians!


 
Seattle Rock Orchestra Performs New Works

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The Pacific Northwest is known for its beautiful mountains, its gorgeous coast, its cool climate, and its commitment to the environment—but it is also known for its rich and unique musical culture, which spans everything from folk to grunge to punk, rock, indie, and even classical.

This Thursday, Seattle Rock Orchestra is honoring the Pacific Northwest’s latest contributions in contemporary music with the third installment in its New Works series. The program features chamber orchestra works by several PNW composers, including Iain Emslie, Willow Goodine, Whitney Lyman, Aaron Otheim, Wes Price, Michaud Savage, and Emily Westman.

The concert will also feature special guest singer Tamara Power-Drutis, a Seattle-based singer-songwriter with a background in indie, folk, classical, and Irish traditional music.

The performance is this Thursday, Dec. 18 at 8 p.m in the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford.


 
MarchFourth Marching Band at the Historic Everett Theater

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A lot of marching bands tend to blend together—the loud, brassy music, the synchronized marching, the ill-fitting uniforms…If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all, right? Wrong.

MarchFourth Marching Band is a multidisciplinary music group which combines the classic marching band aesthetic with elements of funk, rock, and jazz. Known as M4 to its fans, the 15- to 20-piece group features percussion corps, brass, funky electric bass, guitar, and even vocals.

The band is known for its DIY ethic. M4 proudly writes and arranges all of its own musical material, designs its own unique marching band costumes, and even creates its own choreography. (Sorry, did I forget to mention that their performances include dancers, stilt walkers, and acrobatics?)

M4 will be marching through Everett this weekend as part of their nationwide tour. They will be performing at the Historic Everett Theater on Friday, Dec. 19 at 7:30 p.m.


 
Nat Evans’ “The Lowest Arc”


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Winter solstice is typically never as widely celebrated as summer solstice—but this year Seattle composer Nat Evans is brightening up the darkest day of the year with a unique new outdoor site and time specific sound installation.

The piece, titled “The Lowest Arc,” will be installed this upcoming Sunday for an indeterminate exhibition period at ALL RISE. The piece is written for six speakers, each with music inspired by different natural elements. On this Sunday night only, performers will join in the sound sculpture with custom music boxes that produce an aural translation of the constellations visible from Earth during winter. Evans determined the specific music notes by superimposing the constellations on a traditional musical staff.

This aleatoric performance exploring the limits of sound and space will take place this upcoming Sunday, Dec. 21 from 4-5:30 p.m. at the ALL RISE site located at 1250 Denny Way, Seattle.


 
Mark O’Connor’s “An Appalachian Christmas”

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Grammy award-winning violinist Mark O’Connor is coming home for the holidays this year. Though his multifaceted music career has led him all over the world, this week he is returning to Seattle with his band to share an evening of holiday music from his album, “An Appalachian Christmas.”

“Growing up in the O’Connor musical household, Christmas time was a wondrous mixture of Christmas carols, fiddling, bluegrass and other traditional American music,” said O’Connor. “And that is the spirit of ‘An Appalachian Christmas.’”

The concert is this Sunday, Dec. 21 at 7 p.m. at the University of Washington’s Meany Hall for the Performing Arts.