Scott Pender is a Washington DC-based composer and occasional contributor to this site.  His chamber piece “In the Time Before” was just released on Navona Records. “Post-minimalist” is an entirely accurate description for the piece.  As Scott explains in his program note, he was inspired to sit down and write it after hearing Steve Reich’s Double Sextet in a performance by the Bang on a Can...

It sounds like a late-night parlor game:  pick two artistic geniuses of the 20th century that you’d like to hear share a conversation in the great beyond. Michael Century had no trouble coming up with a dynamic combination:  experimental composer John Cage and classical pianist Glenn Gould.  He’s paired them up in an unusual concert happening Saturday night at EMPAC and presented by the iEar series. Actually “happening”...

A central city is males up. A central city’s a cluster of corporate cocks and capital’s pride.* Video is the ejaculate of the gleaming corporate cocks; by video they assert  & cum inside your home to breed their money-fodder   *right now Chicago’s Mr. Sears has the biggest one. from Joys & Perplexities (1992, The Jargon Society) 

Saturday afternoon the Met’s Live in HD broadcasts features Thomas Ades’ “The Tempest.”  The composer conducts.  Here’s a sampling of reviews of the production starring Simon Keenlyside and directed by Robert Lepage, who seems to have redeemed himself among critics who scorned his staging of The Ring.  Also, some video excerpts and a discussion with Lepage. The work got the royal treatment...

“The connecting thread between this vast array of works in so many disparate genres was politics, a commitment to which never left him, although varying in degree over time. Henze adhered throughout his life to leftwing ideologies, a reaction to his youth in Nazi Germany, which left an indelible mark on his creative psyche. He was not afraid of courting controversy, even as recently as last month: ‘So long as...

A teenager in Maine spins around, casually establishing her coordinates in the world, when she suddenly becomes contaminated by Infinity. Manic episodes transform into saint-like empathy as she is taken on a journey through self, other, death, re-birth and spiritual awareness.  All in iambic tetrameter no less! This is “Renascence,” the long poem that won a teenage Edna St. Vincent Millay worldwide critical attention...

David Conte‘s most recently completed opera is titled “Stonewall” and it will be developed at the University of North Colorado.  It’s his 11th collaboration and third opera with librettist John Stirling Walker, who died this past May.  Among their previous efforts was “Famous,” based on Ultra Violet’s book “Famous for 15 Minutes,” based on her years with Andy Warhol. Conte...

Director Jessica Robinson is working a new film, “The Man on the Fifth Floor,” about the life and work of Gerald Busby, a 76-year old composer and one of the few remaining tenants of the famed Chelsea Hotel. (He’s on the fifth floor.)  Playwright Craig Lucas and choreographer/dancer Richard Daniels are executive producers. The project needs backing and is raising funds through Kickstarter. Previously on...

Composer Mohammed Fairouz, 26, refuses to name a favorite poem but admits to being obsessed with texts.  He’s written 13 song cycles and his first opera, Sumeida’s Song, is due out on Bridge Records soon.  He’s also collaborated with poets Mahmoud Darwish, Wayne Koestenbaum, and Nobel Prize-winner Seamus Heaney.   October will be a landmark month for Fairouz. Besides the CD release, he’ll have...

Because of his centennial on September 5, there’s been way too much Cage happening all year for me to be comprehensive or even give many highlights.  In the Times on Saturday, Steve Smith acknowledges the once-unthinkable:  ”Who would ever have imagined a year in which Cage oversaturation might threaten to set in?” Letters Inspire an Intertwining of Boulez and Cage: John Cage and Pierre Boulez Juxtaposed...