Tuesday, September 25, 2018

Other Minds Announces 2018–2019 Season

This season Other Minds (OM) will be busier than in the past. Activities will include a collaboration with the David Brower Center in Berkeley; but this article will focus (as most of the articles on this site do) on the events that will take place in San Francisco. These will include the three-concert OM Festival 24, which will take place in March and June of next year. This season, however, the Festival will be preceded by two piano recitals, each involving two pianists, and the launch of a concert series at the Center for New Music (C4NM) curated by OM Associate Director Blaine Todd. Specifics, given in chronological order, are as follows:

Wednesday, October 10, 7 p.m., C4NM: As has already been reported, Todd will launch his Latitudes series with an evening of sets taken by guitarist Tetuzi Akiyama and violinist John Krausbauer, details of which have been provided in the article about October performances at C4NM.

Gloria Cheng and Terry Riley (courtesy of Other Minds)

Wednesday, December 5, 7:30 p.m., Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA): The “official” season will begin with an evening consisting entirely of the piano works of Terry Riley. Riley himself will play “Simply M” and “Requiem for Wally,” the latter written in memory of his close friend and teacher Wally Rose, a pianist who specialized in ragtime. The second pianist on the program will be Gloria Cheng. She will play selections from The Heaven Ladder, Book 7, which she commissioned Riley to compose.

This program will be presented at the YBCA Forum, which is on the west side of Third Street between Howard Street and Mission Street (directly across from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art). All tickets are being sold for $45. Tickets may be purchased in advance through an event page on the YBCA Web site.

Ticket information has not yet been announced for the remaining events on the schedule as follows:

Sunday, February 10, 4 p.m., Taube Atrium Theater: Having appeared together to honor Lou Harrison at the OM Festival 22 last year, Dennis Russell Davies and his wife Maki Namekawa will return to OM to perform arrangements of orchestral music for two pianos. The first of these will be Dmitri Shostakovich’s own arrangement of his Opus 43 (fourth) symphony in C minor, an arrangement being given its West Coast premiere. This will be followed by Igor Stravinsky’s two-piano arrangement of his “Symphony of Psalms.” The Diane and Tad Taube Atrium Theater is located on the fourth floor of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street.

Saturday, March 23, 8 p.m., Taube Atrium Theater: OM Festival 24 will feature the rarely heard piano and string chamber music of Franco-Russian microtonal composer Ivan Wyschnegradsky. For the first program the Arditti Quartet will visit from London to play Wyschnegradsky’s three string quartets, a work called simply “Composition for String Quartet,” and a trio for violin, viola, and cello. The program will also include the second string quartet by George Haas, an admirer of Wyschnegradsky.

Friday, June 15, 8 p.m., YBCA: The second OM Festival 24 concert will consist entirely of the world premiere of an evening-length work by American composer Brian Baumbusch. Like Harrison, Baumbusch has constructed his own new gamelan instruments, many of which will be employed in this performance, which will require 25 players (but has not yet been given a title). Performers will include Baumbusch’s percussion ensemble Lightbulb, our own Friction Quartet, a keyboardist, and four singers, yet to be named. This concert will be presented in the YBCA Theater, which is on the northwest concert of Third Street and Howard Street.

Saturday, June 16, 8 p.m., YBCA: OM Festival 24 will conclude by returning to the music of Wyschnegradsky, this time presenting his piano music. Most of the selections on the program will require four pianos, two of which will be tuned down a quarter-tone. Performances will be by a vast array of special guest pianists visiting from Los Angeles. This concert will also take place in the YBCA Theater.

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