This is a viola concerto commissioned by and composed for Ralph Farris, violist for ETHEL.

Electric Candlelight-Concerto for Viola

electronic dance, techno, pop, groove based music!

Darjeeling

Looking at our media today, I’ve noticed that much of the time, very important news is
not covered. Sometimes, news stories that were on air nearly constantly, simply quit
being on air. The story didn’t go away, the media went away from the story. Much of
the time, when a news event is covered, it is given a particular political slant. Something
I do not remember Walter Cronkite ever doing. For this reason, I decided to call these
pieces “The Age of Miss Information”. I wanted to play on the word misinformation.
Today, news is reported by badly educated broadcasters who mispronounce the names of
the countries they’re reporting on, but they do it with a smile. That makes everything
OK, in an Orwellian kind of way.
Both books of “The Age of Miss Information” were written in 1997 and 1998, when I
was teaching a counterpoint class at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn,
New York. The students thought the class was really cool, and wanted to know if there
was anything like Bach’s Preludes and Fugues by a more modern composer. I brought in
Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes and Fugues. My students considered them great, but still
wanted something more contemporary. I decided to write something they would
understand and appreciate. Instead of 48 preludes and fugues like Bach composed for the
Well-Tempered Clavier, Books I & II, or the 24 preludes and fugues Shostakovich wrote,
I decided to write 10 preludes and fugues divided into two books of 5 each. Since my
music is not tonal like either Bach’s or Shostakovich’s, I couldn’t have a key scheme like
the one they used. Ten, I thought, is a nice round number. Besides, I could finish them
before the end of the term and show them to my students. Of course, my students loved
them; hopefully they weren’t just saying that in order to get a good grade. I hope you
enjoy them as much as they did and as much as I took pleasure in writing them.

Jade Mirror

Partly programmatic, Themes and Variations on "Simple Gifts" tells the indirect story of a young boy is rained in on a summer's day and slips into a fanciful dream, full of chaos and wonder.

Theme
I. Playfully
II. Like Drops of Water
III. Aggressive!
IV. Drifting
V. "Like A Dream"
VI. Menacing; Rubato
VII. In One
VIII. As If Praying
IX. Open
X. In Time!
XI. Hopeful
XII. Heroically 
Theme (reprise)

Theme and Variations on "Simple Gifts" for Solo Piano

Ken Walicki is an American composer who is widely recognized and acknowledged for his dramatic, and engaging music, which reflects the times in which we live. Because of his unusual and interesting background, his sound world has evolved into a unique combination of Art, Pop, Jazz, and World music. Walicki‘s influences include Gyorgy Ligeti, the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Public Enemy, and much more. He was one of the first composers to use turntables in his music and the first composer to have turntables and a D.J. as regular members in a standing ensemble. His music has been performed throughout the world by, among others, the Kronos Quartet, ETHEL, the New Century Saxophone Quartet, the Soldier String Quartet, the Divan Consort, and members of the New York Philharmonic, The Los Angeles Symphony, The Los Angeles Chamber Symphony, The Detroit Symphony, The Pacific Symphony, the Istanbul Borusan Orchestra, and the SWR Kaiserslautern Orchestra. He is the composer-in-residence for the new music ensemble The Divan Consort. Walicki has received grants and commissions from a variety of organizations and performing ensembles including the American Composers Forum, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Jerome Foundation, the Kronos Quartet, the Mary Flagler Cary Trust, and Meet the Composer.
Growing up playing guitar in local Detroit garage bands, Walicki decided, at early age, he wanted to dedicate his life to music. His education included a two-year period in Germany as a Fulbright scholar where he studied with Karlheinz Stockhausen, Helmut Lachenmann, and Rolf Hempel. He was also an active participant in master classes with Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, and William Schumann. After returning from Germany, he studied with Jere Hutcheson at Michigan State University where he received his Ph.D. Walicki enjoys traveling and finds it to be a fantastic source of inspiration. After
spending a large amount of time in the Middle East and the Indian Subcontinent, he has found these cultures to be particularly close to his heart. Together these experiences have made him a composer of diverse, accessible, physically, and spiritually moving, yet intellectually rigorous music. In addition to his music being presented in traditional concert music venues such as Lincoln Center in New York and the Liszt Academy in Budapest, his music has also been performed in new music clubs such as CBGB’s, the Knitting Factory, and countless cafes and storefronts throughout the world. Without compromising his values, he has made a point of writing music that relates to people and their situations. Walicki has collaborated with a variety of artists in the classical, pop, theater, film, and dance worlds, including Lydia Lunch, Dora Ohrenstein, the Doug Elkins Dance Company, Emmy winning producer/director Mark Obenhaus, American Opera Projects, Bermuda Triangle, Bang on a Can All-Stars, the Kronos Quartet, Divan Consort, and Ensemble Green. He was the founder and composer of the Ken Valitsky Ensemble, which included Regina Carter and Thomas Chapin as members. Previously, besides being on the faculty at New York University, Walicki has taught composition in Istanbul, Turkey at the Center for Advanced Music Techniques(MIAM), a department of Istanbul Technical University. Currently, he lives in Southern California with his son, and the family dogs. His music is available on Knitting Factory Works, C.R.I., CRS Artists, Channel Records, Albany Records and Ravello Records.

Jade Mirror

Ken Walicki

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