21st century classical music

[Sean]

Hello and yes I was being a bit inflammatory, if while only speaking the truth. Our situation is that art music is in terminal trouble, all major areas of expression having been explored.

I've had a look at the Grawemeyer list, which didn't come through at first on the link. It's another dusty academic award similar to the Pulitzer prize and I've explored works by most of the names on it. In the last few years there are only a couple I don't know but with works of uninspiring titles such that I don't think I'll bother to track them down. I can get you my list of listening experience if you like.

I'm also familiar with much music by all the names mentioned in the last few posts, and I take a pretty dim view of it. I've explored them over many years and the artistic quality is not there, largely because the harmonic resources for it are bankrupted.

Moreover most of those names are better defined as late-20th century composers. Obviously there is no groundbreaking masterpieces for the century like The Rite of spring by a man in his late 20s, or the great wealth of achievements by similar generations in the same period a hundred years ago.

[SimonNZ]

Hello and yes I was being a bit inflammatory, if while only speaking the truth. Our situation is that art music is in terminal trouble, all major areas of expression having been explored.

Well I won't try to convince you any further, it sounds like your mind is made up.

For me, though, there's no other time in the history of classical music I'd rather be living through. I struggle to keep up with just a representitive fraction of all the exciting works that are being written by extremely talented composers just in this century.

[Mirror Image]

Well I won't try to convince you any further, it sounds like your mind is made up.

For me, though, there's no other time in the history of classical music I'd rather be living through. I struggle to keep up with just a representitive fraction of all the exciting works that are being written by extremely talented composers just in this century.

Agreed. With each unfolding year, a whole generation of composers are discovered that have yet to even been explored in any depth. Kind of like how we're all still discovering composers from the last century. It all boils down to time.

[Sean]

That's okay, I'm happy to agree to disagree.

By the way this goes to Karl with first class honours-

[San Antone]

Klaus Lang : Austrian composer



His music is no language used to communicate non-musical content. Music is seen as a free and selfstanding acoustical object. In his work he is not using sound, sound is explored and given the opportunity to unfold its inherent rich beauties. Only when sound is just sound it is percievable as that what it really is: a temporal phenomenon – audible time.

[Mirror Image]

Another 21st Century composer to keep an eye on:

Dobrinka Tabakova



Dobrinka Tabakova is a composer of 'thoughtful and approachable' music (Gramophone), with 'glowing tonal harmonies and grand, sweeping gestures [which] convey a huge emotional depth' (The Strad). Her music has been commissioned and performed by leading musicians and ensembles and her debut profile album 'String Paths', on ECM Records, was nominated for a Grammy in 2014.

Between 2014-2016 Dobrinka will be working on two large-scale projects with the Stratford-upon-Avon based Orchestra of the Swan as composer-in-residence, supported by the Sorel Organization, New York. May 2015 will see a major focus on her work as part of the Vale of Glamorgan Festival, UK.

Born in the historic town of Plovdiv, Bulgaria to a music-loving family of doctors and scientists, Dobrinka Tabakova moved to London in 1991, where she has lived since, holding both Bulgarian and British citizenship. Here she studied at Alleyn's School and the Royal Academy of Music Junior Department, specialising in composition, piano and conducting. Early on, the composer John Adams praised her music as being "extremely original and rare". She attended summer courses at the renowned Centre Acanthes in France, as well as the Prague and Milan Conservatoire summer compositions courses, alongside her composition degree studies at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama (GSMD) in London. On graduating with distinction BMus and MMus at the GSMD, Dobrinka was appointed Composition Fellow there, where she continued her activities as President of the Contemporary Music Society. In 2007 she was awarded a doctorate in composition from King's College London (KCL). Her composition teachers have included Simon Bainbridge, Diana Burrell, Robert Keeley and Andrew Schultz as well as masterclasses with John Adams, Louis Andriessen, Alexander Goehr, Marek Kopelent, Philippe Manoury, Alessandro Solbiati, Olav Anton Thommessen and Iannis Xenakis.

Among Dobrinka Tabakova's prizes are the Jean-Frédéric Perrenoud prize and medal at the 4th Vienna International Music Competition; the prize for an anthem for the Queen's Golden Jubilee, performed at St Paul's Cathedral, the GSMD Lutoslawski Composition Prize 1999 and the 2007 Adam Prize of King's College London. She was a finalist for the 2010 Gaudeamus prize in Amsterdam and in 2011 was awarded first prize and the Sorel Medallion in Choral Composition, New York.

Her works have been recorded for the Hyperion and Avie record labels, among others, and in May 2013 ECM Records released the first full CD Album devoted to her music. The album String Paths reached No. 2 in the UK's Specialist Classical charts and attracted praise from the international press. String Paths was nominated in the Classical Compendium category of the 56th Grammy Awards and was one of four albums supporting the Grammy Nomination of ECM Records founder Manfred Eicher for Classical Producer of the Year. Music from the album was used in Jean-Luc Godard's award winning 2014 film 'Adieu au langage'.

The music of Dobrinka Tabakova has captured the imagination and support of worldwide audiences and leading musicians. She has been invited composer-in-residence at the Oxford Chamber Music Festival, Leicester International Chamber Music Festival and Utrecht International Chamber Music Festival, Kremerata Baltica Festival in Sigulda, Latvia and guest composer at the Lockenhaus Festival, Austria and Julian Rachlin & Friends festival, Dubrovnik. Dobrinka has also been invited as featured composer at the Spectrum Concerts, Berlin 20th anniversary concert and the 2010 Musicarama Festival in Hong Kong. In 2015 she is featured composer at the Vale of Glamorgan Festival and the Arbanassi Summer Music Festival.

Notable commissions include three suites and a concerto for violist Maxim Rysanov, Concerto for Cello & Strings for Kristina Blaumane and Amsterdam Sinfonietta, Of the Sun Born for Riga Youth Choir Kamer's large project of World Sun Songs, as well as projects with Janine Jansen, Gidon Kremer, Natalie Clein, Milos Karadaglic, Orchestra of the Swan, Choir of Merton College (Oxford), Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra and Voices of Ascension (New York). 2014 saw the premiere of a Royal Philharmonic Society commission, a joint film and music collaboration with Scottish director Ruth Paxton. The film Pulse was part of the UK's first New Music Biennial and was screened through the UK and across Europe.

[Article taken from composer's own website]

[Brian]

Another 21st Century composer to keep an eye on:

You must have checked the listening thread and seen that today I listened to a Tabakova piano piece and her orchestration of the Schubert "Arpeggione" Sonata. The "String Paths" CD is high up my wishlist.

[Mirror Image]

You must have checked the listening thread and seen that today I listened to a Tabakova piano piece and her orchestration of the Schubert "Arpeggione" Sonata. The "String Paths" CD is high up my wishlist.

Actually, I did not see your post, but she's been on mind a bit lately as I await the next ECM recording of her music (if there's even going to be one at this juncture).

[bhodges]

Hello and yes I was being a bit inflammatory, if while only speaking the truth. Our situation is that art music is in terminal trouble, all major areas of expression having been explored.

We have been down this road many times before, and I will only repeat that you hardly speak "the truth," but rather, offer a single jaded opinion which thankfully is not shared by the thousands of composers and musicians who are spending untold hours of time writing and performing music of our time. You are perfectly free to your own opinions, but your hyperbole and arid conclusions ("terminal trouble," "all major areas of expression having been explored") carry little weight, and are at considerable odds with the experiences of many people here - and elsewhere - who are discovering, and enjoying, fascinating new pieces every week.

Whether any composers living today will be remembered as vividly as Stravinsky and "The Rite" one hundred years from now, well, who can say - it's far too soon to make those assessments. But if you're bored by what you're listening to, then move on to another universe - film, literature, visual art, haute cuisine, travel, architecture. Life is too short to spend time butting one's head against dead ends, and you seem to have reached one.

(Enough, my apologies, and I do not intend to debate this silly issue further: sometimes I'm as susceptible to bait as anyone else.)

--Bruce

[bhodges]

Back on topic:

Tonight was the first of four nights by the Momenta Quartet, a young group offering its first festival this year, at a pleasant gallery space in downtown New York. Each night is curated by one of the quartet's members.

www.momentaquartet.com

I'm only able to go to the first two, but tonight bodes well for the others. In addition to rarely heard items from Feldman, Glass, Christian Wolff and Ives, they played interesting works by D.J. Sparr and Dan Visconti, both of whom are in their mid-30s (I think). A fascinating evening - this one curated by Adda Kridler, one of the group's violinists - and they did very smart work with the Glass (Music in Similar Motion, its first all-strings outing) and a sensational job with Ives Second String Quartet.

--Bruce

[Sean]

Okay Brewski, I guess I needed reminding, and indeed I shouldn't be sauntering with repetitive negativity across here.

I'm still a keen listener and still explore new territory, but focus on the core repertory and great interpretations- of real music...

Till next time, maybe I need to find that cookery class.

[Rinaldo]

You must have checked the listening thread and seen that today I listened to a Tabakova piano piece and her orchestration of the Schubert "Arpeggione" Sonata. The "String Paths" CD is high up my wishlist.

It's worth getting for the cello concerto itself.

[Wieland]

Actually, I did not see your post, but she's been on mind a bit lately as I await the next ECM recording of her music (if there's even going to be one at this juncture).

As do I, since String Path was one of my favourite CDs in 2014. The cello concerto is such an amazing piece of music. I gave this to a friend who doesn't care at all about contemporary music and she was thrilled as well. Dobrinka in my ears is the real thing.

[Wieland]

Back on topic:

Tonight was the first of four nights by the Momenta Quartet, a young group offering its first festival this year, at a pleasant gallery space in downtown New York. Each night is curated by one of the quartet's members.

www.momentaquartet.com

I'm only able to go to the first two, but tonight bodes well for the others. In addition to rarely heard items from Feldman, Glass, Christian Wolff and Ives, they played interesting works by D.J. Sparr and Dan Visconti, both of whom are in their mid-30s (I think). A fascinating evening - this one curated by Adda Kridler, one of the group's violinists - and they did very smart work with the Glass (Music in Similar Motion, its first all-strings outing) and a sensational job with Ives Second String Quartet.

--Bruce

That seems to be a very interesting group. Thanks for mentioning them, I will definitely look for that first  CD.

[Karl Henning]

Whether any composers living today will be remembered as vividly as Stravinsky and "The Rite" one hundred years from now, well, who can say - it's far too soon to make those assessments. But if you're bored by what you're listening to, then move on to another universe [...]

Similarly, as Sean's opinion alleging the exhaustion of music has become terminally boring, I've moved on . . . .

[Brian]

film, literature, visual art, haute cuisine, travel, architecture.

But Bruce, all those areas are in terminal trouble too, because all major areas of expression of everything have already been explored! 

[San Antone]

Kate Soper : vocal experimentation

Kate Soper (born 1981) is a composer, performer, and writer whose work explores the integration of drama and rhetoric into musical structure, the slippery continuums of expressivity, intelligibility and sense, and the wonderfully treacherous landscape of the human voice.

She was a recent Guggenheim Fellow as well as a 2012-13 fellow of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.

More information including audio clips are found here.

[bhodges]

Kate Soper : vocal experimentation

Kate Soper (born 1981) is a composer, performer, and writer whose work explores the integration of drama and rhetoric into musical structure, the slippery continuums of expressivity, intelligibility and sense, and the wonderfully treacherous landscape of the human voice.

She was a recent Guggenheim Fellow as well as a 2012-13 fellow of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.

More information including audio clips are found here.

Are you hacking my computer? (Totally kidding...  )

I was just about to thank you for mentioning Klaus Lang - a most interesting talent, whom I had the great pleasure of interviewing at a concert of his music a few years ago. He returned here over the summer to play some of his organ music - which apparently was so stressful on the aging instrument that he blew some of its fuses. 

And I'm writing about Kate Soper as we speak! She closed the recent Resonant Bodies Festival with a hugely entertaining 45 minutes of her own work, with help from the Wet Ink Ensemble.

--Bruce

[bhodges]

But Bruce, all those areas are in terminal trouble too, because all major areas of expression of everything have already been explored! 

--Bruce

[San Antone]

Are you hacking my computer? (Totally kidding...  )

I was just about to thank you for mentioning Klaus Lang - a most interesting talent, whom I had the great pleasure of interviewing at a concert of his music a few years ago. He returned here over the summer to play some of his organ music - which apparently was so stressful on the aging instrument that he blew some of its fuses. 

And I'm writing about Kate Soper as we speak! She closed the recent Resonant Bodies Festival with a hugely entertaining 45 minutes of her own work, with help from the Wet Ink Ensemble.

--Bruce

Hah!      


It is my understanding that Sober was a founding member of the Wet Ink Ensemble.  Look forward to your article.  Both composers are doing very interesting work.