ECCE Ensemble | Mark ANDRE: Asche (2004/2014)

Catherine Gregory, flute
Vasko Dukovski, clarinet
Ashleigh Gordon, viola
Serafim Smigelskiy, violoncello
Wei-Chieh Lin, piano
Jean-Philippe Wurtz, conductor

Dimenna Center for Classical Music. New York. 
February 6, 2015

www.eccensemble.com


Mark ANDRE Asche | ECCE Ensemble

"A Liturgy of the Hours" is essentially a singular, personal musical impression of the liturgical hours -  a period of time defined by the individual hours of prayer and worship over the course of a day.  Typically, during the course of a day’s liturgy, the prayers begin at midnight, with Matins -- dawn begins with Lauds, moving through the morning and afternoon with Prime, Terce, Sext, None, and moving into the evening with Vespers and finally, Compline.  Each prayer is about three hours apart from each other, and depending on which church’s tradition you follow, will have a set of readings, hymns, psalms, and prayers which are read, sung, or prayed.  This sonata is loosely based on some of those readings. psalms, and prayers, with a verse or fragment of those hours listed below.  The individual movements contain some shared musical material between movements, but is unlike a typical violin sonata in that the violin is not always the principal instrumentalist – indeed, most of the time, the foregrounded music is an amalgamation of both instruments.  The musical language, while accessible, is contemporary to the late 20th and early 21st centuries, and takes advantage of scordatura violin writing, modes of limited transposition, and inside the piano work popularized by Olivier Messiaen, George Crumb, Henry Cowell, Charles Ives and others.  This piece is not a straight programmatical work – rather, the work reflects the impressions made upon me while working on it, and when reading/praying the liturgical hours, I made similar connections between the texts below (taken from a single day’s breviary texts) and the music as it was being written.

It is here performed by the violin-piano duo "Ascending," by whom the piece was commissioned

A Liturgy of the Hours (Violin Sonata No. 1)

2015

Composed for the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival

Jordan Koransky, Natsuki Kumagai, violins
Mary Ferrillo, viola
Francesca McNeeley, violoncello

The Palace of the Windowed Rocks (Tanguy Responses I)

for 11 saxophones
Premiere by Megalopolis Saxophone Orchestra 3/3/2018
First Church in Boston

Directed by Andrew Steinberg
Raymond Kelly and Sean Mix - soprano saxophones
Thomas Giles, Cole Belt, Scott Chamberlin, and Andy Wilds - alto saxophones
Michael Brinzer and Jacob Swanson - tenor saxophones
Josh Lang and Bryan McNamara - baritone saxophones
Ryan Mantell - bass saxophone

Impedance (2017-18)

Marcos Balter | À vis 
Hajnal Pivnick, Violin
Eric Umble, Clarinet

April, 2018 | SoundCat Productions | Brooklyn, NY 
marcosbalter.com
hajnalpivnick.com
ericumble.com
soundcatproductions.com

À vis, Marcos Balter

Courtship Dance of the Jungftak

Drawing (2012 version) for flute, violin, cello, piano, and percussion

June in Buffalo Concert; June 7, 2012
Performed by Ensemble Interface
(Cond. Scott Voyles)

The title of my piece, Drawing, came from my desire to create an image in sounds. In summer of 2011, I had an opportunity to visit a few art galleries in London and Paris. The paintings of the earlier twentieth century, particularly the geometric abstract paintings of Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) and the surrealist paintings of Joan Miró (1893–1983), inspired me to create a “drawing” of my own with instrumental sounds and highly gestural characteristics. Certain pitch material and their variations are used throughout the piece. I tried to avoid fulfilling the expectation of a “climax” in Drawing.

Drawing for 5 Players

Machine learning (2018)
for amplified baritone saxophone and diffused electronics

IRCAM
Concert Cursus 2018
Centquatre, Salle 400 
June 16th, 2018

Interpreter : Elvis Sousa
Pedagogical supervision : 
• Mikhail Malt (Ircam)
• Claude Delangle (The Conservatory of Paris) 
Dedication: to Fred Lerdahl

In my piece Machine learning, I want to highlight the sound qualities of the key mechanism of the saxophone. It is amplified by several microphones on the outside, but also inside the main body of the instrument. This enabled me to access the hidden acoustic nuances of the instrument and investigate a new sonic territory, that of a sonic pallet full of various percussive sounds resonating in different ways. The goal of this project is to capture this hidden acoustic world of the instrument’s mechanism while understanding its potential for music making. Therefore, the performer is put in a place where he/she is reinvestigating the acoustic results of the traditional, common performance practices of the saxophone. The electronics are sonically intertwined with the acoustic properties of the resonant body of the instrument while expanding its acoustic and spatial possibilities. The final result is a projection of an augmented saxophone where acoustic and electronic sounds intermingle in a halo of mechanical sounds, metallic and versatile.

Machine learning (2018), for amplified baritone saxophone and diffused electronics

Pedr’s Aria, from Scene 3 of the opera Pedr Solis
Performed by Brian Church and Guerilla Opera

Fifteen years ago Pedr Solis, the Norwegian modernist author, had his son Ignus locked away in a dungeon-like structure after a prophecy that the boy would kill his father. Pedr is haunted by his decision, and is increasingly unable to write. At the time of the action there is a rebellion brewing in Pedr’s (imagnined?) kingdom, and the rebels have adopted Ignus as their leader-in-exile. 

Music by Per Bloland 
Libretto by Paul Schick 
Directed by Laine Rettmer

Performed by: 
Brian Church, baritone
Rane Moore, clarinets
Gabriela Diaz, violin
Philipp Stäudlin, saxophones
Mike Williams, percussion

"Black sky crimson and luminous"

Many thanks to everyone that gave me input and lent an ear on this one. 

Lift the Sun on Hype Machine! Give it some love please ❤️❤️❤️ 
https://hypem.com/track/2veg8/Bels+Lontano+-+Lift+The+Sun

The cover art is by the incredible Jei Kobu

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Instagram: www.instagram.com/belslontano/
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Lift The Sun

Kubah's forests are pulsing with life, and the soundscapes that can be heard in this national Park are among the most incredible I have ever experienced. This recording features the incredibly powerful sounds of Empress cicadas, along with the melodic song of the White-rumped Shama, and the rhythmic ' te-hoop 'calls of Golden-whiskered Barbets.

This sample is an excerpt of the track "Dusk Rhythms" from the album Rhythm of Kubah - https://wildambience.com/albums/rhythm-of-kubah/

Dusk - Empress Cicadas & White-rumped Shama

Dusk - Empress Cicadas & White-rumped Shama - Recorded in Borneo's rainforest

For more information about me and my music, please visit 
http://jongheekang.wordpress.com/




Drawing for 5 Players

Jonghee Kang

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