Joel Hoffman's works draw from such diverse sources as Eastern European folk musics and bebop, and are pervaded by a sense of lyricism and rhythmic vitality. Born in Canada, Hoffman received degrees from the University of Wales and the Juilliard School. He is a member of a distinguished musical family that includes brothers Gary (cellist), and Toby (conductor), sister Deborah (harpist). Honors include a major prize from the American Academy-Institute of Arts and Letters, two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bearns Prize of Columbia University, a BMI Award, ASCAP awards since 1977, and three American Music Center grants. His works have been performed by many ensembles such as the Chicago Symphony Brass, the BBC Orchestra of Wales, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, eighth blackbird, the Cleveland Quartet, the Shanghai Quartet, and acclaimed soloists such as Cho-Liang Lin, David Krakauer and Brian Ganz. Hoffman served as composer-in-residence with the National Chamber Orchestra of Washington, DC (1993-94) and held the position of New Music Advisor for the Buffalo Philharmonic (1991-92). He has been a resident composer at the Rockefeller, Camargo and Hindemith Foundations, the MacDowell Colony and Yaddo. Currently, he is Professor of Composition at the University of Cincinnati's College-Conservatory of Music. Watch a performance of  Joel Hoffman's Music in Yellow and Green (2012) played by members of the Hoff Barthelson Contemporary Music Festival . . . it's one of our NEW MUSIC VIDEOS for the week.

Vincent Ho is widely recognized as one of the most exciting composers of his generation. His works have been hailed for their profound expressiveness and textural beauty that has audiences talking about with great enthusiasm. Born in Ottawa, Ontario in 1975, Vincent Ho began his musical training through the Royal Conservatory of Music. He received his Associate Diploma in Piano Performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music (Toronto) in 1993, his Bachelor of Music from the University of Calgary in 1998, his Master of Music degree from the University of Toronto in 2000, and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Southern California (2005). His mentors have included Allan Bell, David Eagle, Christos Hatzis, Walter Buczynski, and Stephen Hartke. His many awards have included Harvard University’s Fromm Music Commission, The Canada Council for the Arts’ “Robert Fleming Prize,” ASCAP’s “Morton Gould Young Composer Award,” four SOCAN Young Composers Awards, and CBC Radio’s Audience Choice Award (2009 Young Composers’ Competition). Listen to an interview with Vincent Ho -  Évolution (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) . . . it's our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.

When World War II ended, William Schuman was positioned, at age thirty-five, as one of America’s most important composers and arts leaders. Not only had he won the very first Pulitzer Prize for music in 1943, for A Free Song: Secular Cantata No. 2, but he took on his new responsibilities as president of the Juilliard School of Music at the beginning of the 1945-46 academic year. His music had been performed by prominent American orchestras, especially the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) under Serge Koussevitzky, and he had already composed five symphonies (the first two of which were withdrawn), including the expertly crafted Third Symphony and the animated Fifth Symphony for strings alone. Thus, at this time Schuman was in the prime of his compositional life. A new concerto for violin and orchestra would most likely embody the energy, musical creativity, and expert orchestration that were becoming the hallmarks of a Schuman composition. Schuman was approached by the well-known violinist Samuel Dushkin in 1946 to compose a violin concerto that Dushkin hoped he would be able to premiere with Koussevitzky and the BSO. Dushkin had a very distinguished record of first performances of violin works, including Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto, the Duo concertant, and Suite italienne . . . [read more in this article: "The William Schuman Violin Concerto: Genesis of a 20th Century Masterpiece" by Joseph Polisi]. And listen to a performance of Schuman Violin Concerto (1959) played by Philippe Quint (violin) and the Bournemouth Sinfonietta, José Serebrier conducting . . . one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS for the week.

Composer Annie Gosfield is an active performer and improviser. She is inspired by the sound and use of machines, destroyed pianos, warped records and detuned radios. She explores the use of non-musical sound. She also incorporates the use of out of tune violins that are not played right. Her notation consists of traditional notation, improvisation and other techniques that break the boundaries between what is known as music and noise. Her pieces range from large scale, chamber music, electronic music, video projects and music for dance. She has played with many different muscians such as Joan Jeanrenaud, John Zorn, David Moss, and Sim Cain. Her music has been used for choreography by several dance companies across the world. Gosfield created a six minute film about an imaginary orchestra (of machines playing instruments) called Shoot The Player Piano (1999)  . . . it's this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

Igor Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments (1920) strikes the listener as singular for several reasons. The use of the word "symphonies" for a 10-minute piece single movement seems odd until we think back to the ancient word of "sounding together in harmony" (although as musicologist William Austin has pointed out, "nowhere before the final chord is there an unquestionable tonic or a complete and unclouded major scale"). Stravinsky clarified the use of the word, somewhat, by calling his piece "an austere ritual which is unfolded in terms of short litanies between different groups of homogeneous instruments." The lack of strings was also odd for a piece called "symphonies." Some have pointed to Stravinsky's shunning of the lush, romantic qualities of string instruments, others to post-war economic woes that made works written for smaller forces more likely to earn a performance. But the sonority of the Symphonies is so strikingly perfect to its content that one can't imagine it in any other setting. It is, again in
the words of Austin, "one of Stravinsky's most poignantly beautiful masterpieces, with a form as original and convincing as that of the Rite of Spring, and as hard to define." Watch a performance of Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments performed by Netherlands Wind Ensemble with Reinbert De Leeuw conducting . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

William Schuman's 60-year career as a composer and an educator left an indelible mark on several generations of American musicians. He began exploring jazz and popular music while attending public school. After abandoning a career in commerce, Schuman enrolled in the Juilliard Summer School, and, in 1933, entered Columbia University's Teacher's College, eventually taking his bachelor's and master's degrees. He not only studied with American composer Roy Harris, he found an ally in conductor Serge Koussevitsky. Between 1938 and 1945 Schuman served as director of publications for G. Schirmer, Inc. as well as on the faculty of Sarah Lawrence College, leaving this post to take over as president of the Juilliard School. Other administrative positions throughout his long career include serving as president of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (1962-1969), director of the Koussevitsky Music Foundation, director of the Chamber Music Society at Lincoln Center, and director of the Walter W. Naumberg Foundation. Already an established composer in the early 1940s, Schuman was thrust into the national and international limelight when the very first Pulitzer Prize in music was bestowed upon him in 1943 for his cantata A Free Song. His Third Symphony (1941), is considered by many to be one of the pinnacles of American symphonic achievement. Hear Schuman talk about his life and music . . . our current COMPOSER PORTRAIT.

According to composer AND choreographer Miro Magloire, "a choreographer setting an existing piece of music faces a dilemma: music written for the concert hall is often too dense to be successfully juxtaposed to dance. Many interesting results could be won from just such a misalignment, but it is rarely consciously exploited. Instead, choreographers tend to either choose music that is so simple as to approach banality, providing them with peace of mind and a rhythmic flow, or humbly distort their choreography, stretching and pulling it until it fits the dimensions of a musical masterwork - but almost loses its own identity in the process. I have been guilty of both offenses. Writing my own music for Reflections allowed me a way out of this conundrum: the dance starts with no music at all, giving the steps a chance to establish their own rhythm. Later, the dancer slows to near stillness as the music gets a chance to be heard. In the end, both what is heard and what is seen is spare enough to need the other for completion. Watch a performance of Magloire's Reflections I (2007) performed by members of the New Chamber Ballet . . . our DANSES PYTHEUSES this week.

Jonathan Elliott, a native of Philadelphia, is a composer, pianist and sound designer. His music has been heard internationally in concert and broadcasts. He has received numerous awards and honors for his music, including fellowships from the MacDowell Colony,Yaddo, the Ragdale Foundation, the New State Council on the Arts, the International Festival of New Music at Darmstadt, Centre Acanthes, the Aspen Music Festival, and the W.K. Rose Trust. In addition he he has won prizes from BMI, ASCAP, the Chicago Symphony, the American Composers Forum, Forum 91/UNESCO, and has been a nominee for the American Academy of Arts and Letters music awards. Hear a performance of Elliott's Odd Preludes (2000) for alto sax and piano . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

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

In his review of the Opera Theater of St. Louis' performance of Scott Joplin's Treemonisha (1916) Anthony Tommasini (The New York Times) writes, "But what ultimately ennobles the opera is Joplin's music. The score is often awkward, yet disarming. Though Joplin was the king of ragtime there are actually few real rags in the opera. The lilt and lyricism of ragtime music run through the score, as does the melancholia that is always part of Joplin's voice, even in such seemingly jolly works as The Maple Leaf Rag. A gentle sadness pervades every bit of Treemonisha: the recitatives; the moments of tension, thick with seventh chords; the confessional arias, like Monisha's moving account of her adopted daughter's origins; even the dances and choruses. And when the time comes for jubilation at the happy ending, what does Joplin provide? A Real Slow Drag, a wistful dance of subdued joy and hope." Watch a performance of this "happy ending" with soprano Carmen Balthrop and the Houston Grand Opera . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

Krzysztof Penderecki has been an exceptional phenomenon in the history of music, not only in that of Polish music, but in the history music in general. And in twentieth-century music, no one has had a career quite like his. He enjoyed success from the very start. When the results of the Second Competition of Young Composers were decided in 1959, it turned out that Penderecki's compositions (submitted under different pseudonyms) had taken the first, second and third prizes - Krzysztof Penderecki, an unknown 28-year-old assistant professor at the Composition Department of the State Musical Academy in Krakow. In 1960, he wrote a work titled 8'37" (which is how long the composition lasts), for which he received a prize the next year from the UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers in Paris. The work is now known as Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima, and it has been played all over the world. During that period Penderecki became a leading representative of avant-garde music. Then in 1966 came the premiere performance of his Passion According to St. Luke. With this work, Penderecki parted with the radicalism of the avant-garde. He began composing works that were accessible to the average music lover - with a content, construction and emotions that were instantly understandable. Penderecki has said, "It is not important to me how the St. Luke Passion is described, whether as traditional or an avant-garde. For me it is simply one that is genuine. And that is enough." He is himself in each of his works, and he has not allowed the critics to discourage him. He stands his own and has continued to write music his own way. Hear Penderecki talk about his life and his music . . . our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.

The Silencers (1966) is a quintessential 1960's spy spoof movie, directed by Phil Karlson. It is the first (and best) of four colorful Matt Helm fims, with debonair 'Rat Pack' member Dean Martin cleverly cast as a womanizing smoothie, the Man from ICE (Intelligence Counter Espionage). The attitudes may have dated — this is very much of its time — but the women continue to delight, especially Stella Stevens as a divine klutz. According to Mark Hasan (Film Score Monthly), "The film score of The Silencers fused big-band arrangements with a level of playful yet aggressive writing, imbued with a vigor reminiscent of composer Elmer Bernstein's classic 1950s output. That isn't to say his 1960s scores to that time were weak, but The Silencers exudes such vitality and goofiness that the final result is utterly addictive." Watch a montage from this over the top film backed by the infection music of the great Elmer Bernstein . . . our current PYTHEAS SIGHTING.

Conductor Andre Kostelanetz expressed nervousness at premiering William Schuman's New England Triptych with the New York Philharmonic, so he instead first performed it with the University of Miami Symphony Orchestra on October 26, 1956. It was played in New York the following week. Critics gave glowing reactions - and the New England Triptych became an instant classic. The music is based on three hymn tunes by 18th century American composer William Billings: "Be Glad Then, America," " When Jesus Wept," and "Chester." With the exception of his arrangement of Charles Ives’ organ piece "Variations on America," New England Triptych is recorded and performed more often than any work by William Schuman. Hear a classic performance of the New England Triptych with Max Rudolph conducting the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

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

According to Steve Schwartz/ClassicalNet.com, "In the last decade of his life Ralph Vaughan Williams took to experimenting with what could well be considered "unusual" instruments; in the 7th, 8th and 9th Symphonies he included a wind machine, tuned gongs and a flugelhorn respectively. During the same period Vaughan Williams also wrote two works for soloist and orchestra, the Romance for Harmonica (1951) and the Tuba Concerto (1954), and both works emphasize the fact that Vaughan Williams was still full of musical ideas well into his eighties. Vaughan Williams seemed to have quite liked the tuba as an instrument, and often included parts for it in his orchestral works. However, in the Tuba Concerto it gets center stage, is given two cadenzas – in the first and last movements - and proves that it can hold its own as a concerto instrument". See a performance of the first movement of Tuba Concerto by the youthful Leswi Pantoja and the Teresa Carreño Youth Orchestra ... one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.

The conceptual and multifaceted composer Tan Dun has made an indelible mark on the world's music scene with a creative repertoire that spans the boundaries of classical, multimedia, Eastern and Western musical systems. Central to his body of work, Tan Dun has composed distinct series of works which reflect his individual compositional concepts and personal ideas - among them a series which brings his childhood memories of shamanistic ritual into symphonic performances; works which incorporate elements from the natural world; and multimedia concerti. Opera has a significant role in his creative output and of his many works for film, the score for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, received an Oscar for best original score. Hear Tan Dun talk about his life and music - Pytheas' current COMPOSER PORTRAIT.

William Schuman's Symphony for Strings (his Symphony No. 5) was completed on July 31, 1943, at New Rochelle, New York. The work was a Koussevitzky Foundation memorial for Natalie Koussevitzky and was premiered on November 12, 1943 by the strings of the Boston Symphony Orchestra with the dedicatee's husband, Sergei Koussevitzky conducting. The work, which clearly espresses its angst-ridden World War II era, enjoyed immediate success and has since received many performances, recordings and broadcasts. Have a listen to its first movement ... this week's PYTHEAS EARFUL.

Lousadzak (The Coming of Light) (1944) was composed during the years 1944–54, the period during which Alan Hovhaness created his greatest music. Subtitled Concerto for Piano and Strings, the work is unlike any other piano concerto in the repertoire. There is not a single chord, not a single passage of octaves in this one-movement work. The piano is employed to emulate various Armenian and Middle-Eastern instruments of the dulcimer and zither families, and the music is composed very much along the lines of what those instruments typically play, which includes striking the same key repeatedly to simulate sustained notes, and playing a melody against a drone-note, often in rapid, irregular rhythmic patterns. The strings provide a largely accompanimental backdrop like a small folk orchestra, in simple, almost improvisatory modal polyphony. The effect is truly unforgettable. The result is a highly exotic work suggesting an ancient pagan rite of unearthly, primitivistic fire and passion, as well as, at times, tender tranquility. (Walter Simmons, Fanfare) Hear and see an excerpt of this beautiful work ... this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.

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