Jean Françaix wrote in an accessible, attractive style that often led listeners and commentators to ignore the depth and originality present in much of his music. The light, witty character of Françaix's music has caused some to dismiss it as frivolous. Others have decried the fact that his style remained static throughout his life. In reality, he had found all he needed and achieved his mature voice immediately. His orchestrations are always clear and sparkling, his forms precise and neo-Classical, his emotions reserved. Watch a performance of the first movement of Jean Francaix's Double Concerto for Flute, Clarinet and Orchestra (1991) . . . it's one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

François Bayle, composer, theorist, pioneer in electronic music, coined the term acousmatic to designate music that does not result from a physical source. His works have been performed worldwide, and as director of Groupe de Recherches Musicales from 1975 to 1997, he presided over a major program of research, publications, concert production, and CD, DVD, and book publication. In 1974, he created the Acousmonium, a loudspeaker orchestra. Writing about Bayle's Morceaux de Ciels (1996) Gerard Denizeau muses, "One of the remarkable features of this magnificent piece lies in the fact that it often moves in four-track blocks; and always, initially, in pairs. As a result, the listener, aware of an overall sound over four poles, finds himself with no alternative but to mentally reduce to one source the turbulent sounds he hears on four tracks. François Bayle may be compared to a watercolorist who provides an infinite number of nuances but refuses, in the midst of his experimentation, to set things down in a definitive state." Listen to François Bayle's Morceaux de Ciels . . . it's our FEATURED SOUND ART for the week.

John Psathas, as well as being one of a few New Zealand composers who have made a mark on the international scene, is now also widely considered one of the three most important living composers of the Greek Diaspora. Raised in Taumaranui and Napier, Psathas is the son of Greek immigrant parents who arrived in New Zealand in the early 1960s. His music has been commissioned and performed by many great musicians and orchestras around the world. These include Michael Brecker, Dame Evelyn Glennie, Michael Houstoun, Joshua Redman, The New Zealand String Quartet, Federico Mondelci, The New Zealand Trio, Pedro Carneiro, the Takacs Quartet, The Netherlands Blazers Ensemble, the Halle Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, the Melbourne Symphony, the BBC Scottish Symphony, the NZSO, and many others. Listen to a performance John Psathas' Summary of the Human Presence (2011) . . . it's our BANG, CLANG and BEAT for the week..

Bruce Morley (New Zealand Music Magazine) writes about "View From Olympus" (2001), the double concerto for piano, percussion and orchestra by New Zealand composer John Psathas: "Our composer du jour has really done it this time. Psathas is a composer who seems to have listened to everyone from Ketelbey to Keith Jarrett, and is totally confident of his ability to create a new orchestral music. His compositions . . . are diverse, unclassifiable and fragmented, yet utterly organic. Engaged by the kinetic drive of Psathas' rhythms, classical listeners have taken to the results with enthusiasm". "View from Olympus" won for Psathas the 2002 SOUNZ Contemporary Award, as well as being chosen as one of the orchestral works presented in 2009 for the International Association of Music Information Centres' "IAMIC sounds of the Year". Watch a performance of John Psathas' "View From Olympus", with pianist Michael Houstoun, percussionist Leonard Sakofsky and the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Marc Taddei . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

During most of his years as a composer, Charles Knox has been employed as a performer or teacher. He was an instructor of contemporary, traditional, baroque and renaissance musical styles; director of student ensembles at small and large colleges and universities; and performer in symphonic and  jazz ensembles. This is often reflected in the choice and style of his creative work. Having held the position of Professor of Music at Georgia State University from 1965 to 1995, Knox now lives in academic - but not compositional - retirement in Atlanta, the city where he has spent most of his life. He has been called "the dean of Atlanta composers", and in 2001 he received the Mayor's Fellowship in the Arts (Award in Music) from the City of Atlanta. Listen to a performance of his 1998 chamber work "2002: Semordnilap No. 2" . . . it's one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS for the week.

A native of Washington, D.C., composer Elizabeth Vercoe has been called "one of the most inventive composers working in America today" by her hometown newspaper (The Washington Post). She has worked as a composer in the U.S. and abroad: at the Civitella Ranieri Center in Italy, the St. Petersburg Spring Music Festival in Russia, the Cite International des Arts in Paris, and the MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire. She has written works on commission for Wellesley College, Austin Peay State University, the Pro Arte Orchestra, and the First National Congress on Women in Music. Her awards include grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, the Artists Foundation, and the Massachusetts Arts Council. According to the Vercoe her work "Sonaria" (1980) "is a melodrama for solo cello written in memory of my father, an amateur cellist and violinist. Since the music was written as commentary on an imagined dance/mime either live or filmed, the listener is invited to 'screen' those private visual images sometimes evoked by music instead of hastily suppressing them and trying to 'pay attention.' The mood of the piece is at times tongue-in-cheek, but for the most part is entirely serious". Watch a performance of Vercoe's "Sonaria" played by cellist Jerome Desbordes . . . it's our second FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEO for the week.

According to composer Karl Henning, he "writes and plays music which no one else dare, in and near Boston. His music has been played and sung on three continents (NA, Yurp and Oz), and there is unconfirmed rumor that an Uruguayan zookeeper has papered adobe walls with the Henning organ Toccata. Karl has served at different times as Interim Choir Director and Composer-in-Residence at the Cathedral Church of St Paul in Boston, where he composed a 40-minute unaccompanied choral setting of the St John Passion (2008)". His work for 10 winds, "Out in the Sun" was premiered in 2006 by the New England Conservatory Wind Ensemble. Listen to a performance of Henning's Out in the Sun . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

Composer Judith Lang Zaimont has recently been joining up with her husband, the painter Gary Zaimont, to present videos which highlight both her vibrant and original music and his stunning visuals. The latest of their collaborations is entitled Borealis which features the composer's Sky Curtains: Borealis Australis (1984) scored for the unusual combination of flute, clarinet, bassoon, viola and cello. Check it out at Pytheas . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

John Psathas is one of New Zealand’s most frequently performed composers. With works in the repertoire of such high profile musicians as Evelyn Glennie, Michael Brecker, Pedro Carneiro, the Halle Orchestra and others, he has achieved what was until recently held to be a near impossibility for a composer of contemporary New Zealand music – he is establishing a solid international profile, and receiving regular commission offers from outside New Zealand. Fragments, this week's FEATURED RECORDING, has been described as "an injection of adrenalin direct to the heart of New Zealand classical music". Read more about the recording, John Psathas' music and hear some excerpts from Fragments . . . our FEATURED RECORDING at Pytheas.

This week we bring you an unusual short film by Jamie Ward which feature's both the music of Astor Piazzolla and Richard Grunn's human puppet "Cliff". December (or "Winter") (2009) takes us on a journey through New York City as film maker Ward brings us a visual interpretation of Piazzolla's La muerte del Ángel (1962) and La resurrección del Ángel (1965). Check it all out at this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.

Glenn Klotche writes, "Steve Reich's Clapping Music (1972) is an outgrowth of those works . . . [which] require nothing but the human body - in this case, two performers who hand-clap. Reich states that the piece is 'to have one performer remain fixed, repeating the same basic pattern throughout, while the second moves abruptly, after a number of repeats, from unison to one beat ahead, and so on, until he is back in unison with the first performer.' The piece is intended for performance in an auditorium where the echoes and reverberations of the clapping create, as Reich states, "a surrounding sensation of a series of variations of two different patterns with their downbeats coinciding.' As the piece unfolds, the patterns interact to create a garden of rhythms unlike anything I had previously heard. I was blown away that something so conceptually simple could sound so complicated." Watch a performance recorded in Milna, Croatia . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music