Press
"Christopher Rouse At The International Festival of Arts and Ideas" - Hartford Courant, 06/29 2010The American composer Christopher Rouse has made his name writing orchestral music and has written only three chamber works in over twenty years, so a premiere of a Rouse chamber work is a rare event. On Friday evening, the International Festival of Arts and Ideas presented the intrepid Calder Quartet in the premiere of Rouse's String Quartet No. 3 in New Haven's Sprague Hall.
The all-Rouse concert, called "Transfiguration," also offered the String Quartet No. 2 (1988), the septet "Compline" (1996), and two works for percussion ensemble featuring the Yale Percussion Group.
The presence of the percussion works initially seemed incongruous. After all, no work on the program combined the percussionists and the string quartet. But the heady performances of the established Calder Quartet and the youthful Yale Percussion Group highlighted parallels in the music: a fearless approach to layers of rhythm and sound, a keen ear for tone color, and a delight in sheer complexity. The abandon of the percussion works brought out the elemental fierceness of the chamber music.
The all-Rouse concert, called "Transfiguration," also offered the String Quartet No. 2 (1988), the septet "Compline" (1996), and two works for percussion ensemble featuring the Yale Percussion Group.
The presence of the percussion works initially seemed incongruous. After all, no work on the program combined the percussionists and the string quartet. But the heady performances of the established Calder Quartet and the youthful Yale Percussion Group highlighted parallels in the music: a fearless approach to layers of rhythm and sound, a keen ear for tone color, and a delight in sheer complexity. The abandon of the percussion works brought out the elemental fierceness of the chamber music.
"Calder Quartet's Eric Byers" - Strings Magazine, 05/12 2010Those that call classical music boring or archaic clearly do not follow ensembles like the Calder Quartet. Sure they like to play their fair share of the golden oldies, but they are among a handful of groups redefining what an classical ensemble can be. An added bonus is that one of their members spends a lot of time wood shedding(musican's speak for practicing) in his Downtown L.A. loft.
"Calder Quartet's Eric Byers" - Strings Magazine, 05/12 2010Those that call classical music boring or archaic clearly do not follow ensembles like the Calder Quartet. Sure they like to play their fair share of the golden oldies, but they are among a handful of groups redefining what an classical ensemble can be. An added bonus is that one of their members spends a lot of time wood shedding(musican's speak for practicing) in his Downtown L.A. loft.
"Calder Quartet offer polished performance at the Peace Center" - Greenville News, 05/09 2010Looking like a sort of classical early Beatles, with their dark suits and skinny ties, the youthful Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet offered a concertnotable for technical confidence and a keen musical sensibility shared by all four performers. Their performance truly was a conversation among equals.
In the first half of the program, the engaging quartet provided a graceful, polished and thoroughly persuasive account of Franz Schubert's Quartet No. 15 in G Major, a quartet of epic proportions — longer, in fact, than some Beethoven symphonies.
In the first half of the program, the engaging quartet provided a graceful, polished and thoroughly persuasive account of Franz Schubert's Quartet No. 15 in G Major, a quartet of epic proportions — longer, in fact, than some Beethoven symphonies.
"Calder Quartet plays across genres" - Greenville News, 05/02 2010The Calder Quartet, a classical ensemble with a flair for modern compositions, will be heard May 8 at the Peace Center during Artisphere, Greenville’s weekend-long arts festival.
The four string players – violinists Benjamin Jacobsen and Andrew Bulbrook, cellist Eric Byers and violist Jonathan Moerschel – are the quartet-in-residence at Los Angeles’ Colburn Conservatory and also frequent guest performers at renowned venues and music festivals across the nation.
The four string players – violinists Benjamin Jacobsen and Andrew Bulbrook, cellist Eric Byers and violist Jonathan Moerschel – are the quartet-in-residence at Los Angeles’ Colburn Conservatory and also frequent guest performers at renowned venues and music festivals across the nation.
"Music With and Without Musicians" - NYT, 04/21 2010Tuesday’s concert by the superb Calder Quartet showed that the time-honored string quartet format still provides fertile ground for innovation and surprise in the hands of imaginative, skillful creators.
"Not your typical easy-listening string quartet" - SanDiego.com, 04/16 2010The Southern California-based Calder Quartet can be counted among Adčs’ avid proponents, and Calder’s stimulating program Friday (April 16) at UC San Diego’s Conrad Prebys Hall was centered around Adčs early string quartet “Arcadiana,” Op. 12, a work the young but seasoned ensemble featured on its inaugural CD.
"Tradition and the String Quartet in the 21st century" - ConcertoNet, 03/18 2010Violist Jonathan Moerschel and the Calder Quartet recently played the music of Peter Eotvos in the Green Umbrella series at Disney Hall in Los Angeles, as well as with the indie rock band The Airborne Toxic Event at the LA Philharmonic’s West Coast Left Coast Festival. They tour extensively, collaborating with contemporary composers including Thomas Ades, Terry Riley and Christopher Rouse. Their performances and recordings of Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn and Bartok have also been extensively praised. In this wide-ranging conversation Jonathan talks about these subjects, and also about working with Czech music and film star Iva Bittova and party rocker Andrew W. K. at (Le) Poisson Rouge in New York. He describes the quartet’s training with the renowned chamber music professor Eberhard Feltz in Berlin, and their founding of the Carlsbad Music Festival with composer Matt Mcbane. His views on the string quartet in the 21st century are intriguing.
"Bartok Played Brilliantly" - UCR Highlander, 03/09 2010Many a mediocre quartet has attempted to play Bartok with the results being somewhat less than successful. All too many times, curious music lovers will listen to second-class interpretations of Bartok only to quickly shut off the atonal screeching, the dissonant screaming that comes of such less-than satisfactory performances.
As the Calder Quartet began to play the first measures of the concert program last Tuesday, it was clear that this was not to be one of those performances.
Even the playfulness of Bartok's music was executed by the Quartet. To hear musical phrases literally bounce from player to player, from violin to viola to cello-these things are rarely heard or even brought out of these musical performances. That the Calder four could do so without a second thought clearly showed why this relatively youthful quartet is quickly climbing to the top of the art music world.
As the Calder Quartet began to play the first measures of the concert program last Tuesday, it was clear that this was not to be one of those performances.
Even the playfulness of Bartok's music was executed by the Quartet. To hear musical phrases literally bounce from player to player, from violin to viola to cello-these things are rarely heard or even brought out of these musical performances. That the Calder four could do so without a second thought clearly showed why this relatively youthful quartet is quickly climbing to the top of the art music world.
"Six string works to be performed in two concerts" - Press Enterprise, 02/03 2010A string quartet will play six works in two concerts in February and April at UCR's University Theatre.
The works of Béla Bartók will performed by the Calder Quartet -- Benjamin Jacobson, Andrew Bulbrook (violins), Jonathan Moerschel (viola), and Eric Byers (cello). Tickets are $20 per student for both concerns and $40 per person for both concerts for the general public.
The works of Béla Bartók will performed by the Calder Quartet -- Benjamin Jacobson, Andrew Bulbrook (violins), Jonathan Moerschel (viola), and Eric Byers (cello). Tickets are $20 per student for both concerns and $40 per person for both concerts for the general public.
"2 Composers of Today, Drawing Inspiration From the Past" - juilliardjournal, 02/01 2010The Calder Quartet, Juilliard’s graduate quartet in residence from 2005 to 2007, digs into this gritty score with zest, and although Rouse is his own man, those who wish Bartok had written a seventh quartet won’t be disappointed.
"Transfiguration" - Strings Magazine, 01/21 2010The LA-based Calder Quartet—Benjamin Jacobson, Andrew Bulbrook, violins; Jonathan Moerschel, viola; Eric Byers, cello—is dedicated to championing living composers. It has collaborated with Christopher Rouse since 2002, premiering his two quartets on stage and disc. He is writing his third quartet for the group.
The players show admirable courage in tackling these works because Rouse calls his first quartet, composed in 1981 when he was an angry young man of 32, “17 minutes of rage.” Though written in homage to Bartók, the piece emulates only the harsh aspect of his style, with slashing chords, aggressive attacks, and sound eff ects like glissando and ponticello.
The players show admirable courage in tackling these works because Rouse calls his first quartet, composed in 1981 when he was an angry young man of 32, “17 minutes of rage.” Though written in homage to Bartók, the piece emulates only the harsh aspect of his style, with slashing chords, aggressive attacks, and sound eff ects like glissando and ponticello.
"Rouse's Disquieting Quartets are Given Powerful Performances by the Calder" - Gramophone, 01/01 2010Rouse has the right champions in the Calder Quartet, who maintain the composer's carefully plotted-out moods and variations to a hair's breadth precision while projecting a sense of dimensionality which allows the warmth at the heart of the music's fantastically intricate structure to convincingly signal its existence."
"The Calder Quartet is always ready to stretch boundaries" - LA Times, 12/02 2009Six years ago, soon after the foursome that makes up the Calder Quartet graduated from USC, the group began to get noticed.
Even those who saw these young men as a bit green thought they might be on their way to something big. The critic Alan Rich, not known for dispensing praise lightly, called the Calders a new hope for a resident quartet in L.A. With good looks, mainstream musical flair and earnest ambition, the group was on many observers' most-likely-to list.
Even those who saw these young men as a bit green thought they might be on their way to something big. The critic Alan Rich, not known for dispensing praise lightly, called the Calders a new hope for a resident quartet in L.A. With good looks, mainstream musical flair and earnest ambition, the group was on many observers' most-likely-to list.
"Party hard with the Calder Quartet" - Guardian UK, 11/03 2009Whether they're performing with Thomas Adčs, Andrew WK or
David Letterman's house band, the Calder string quartet are
blazing exciting new ground
David Letterman's house band, the Calder string quartet are
blazing exciting new ground
"Music review: Gloria Cheng and Piano Spheres at Zipper Hall" - LA Times, 10/14 2009For a finale, the ever-impressive Calder Quartet joined Cheng for Schnittke’s Piano Quintet, written —slowly — in memory of his late mother. The piece works its way through passages of tension and layering to the mesmeric finale. Here, strings dispense echoes of previous themes over the pianist’s sweet, repetitive music box-like patterns, playing like a life passing before our ears, wistfully.
"Andrew W.K. & The Calder Quartet" - Punknews, 10/09 2009Having already tackled solo recording, recording and touring with a live band, touring with only a playback device, motivational speaking, Cartoon Network appearances, J-Pop cover albums, producing an album for Lee "Scratch" Perry, starring in children's programming, and most recently releasing an album of improvisational piano songs, it actually isn't THAT shocking that Andrew W.K.'s next move would be to book a short tour playing with a string quartet.
Going into this show, I made a point of not looking into much of what the previous shows on the tour consisted of. Would it be entirely free form piano/string collaborations? Would we be treated to string-augmented versions of classics like "Party 'Till You Puke" like a bizarre mutation of MTV Unplugged? The type and level of involvement were entirely a mystery to me. My curiosity only grew when it was announced that due to the "sexual feeling" Andrew got out of playing these shows, they had been moved out of churches, to more secular venues.
Going into this show, I made a point of not looking into much of what the previous shows on the tour consisted of. Would it be entirely free form piano/string collaborations? Would we be treated to string-augmented versions of classics like "Party 'Till You Puke" like a bizarre mutation of MTV Unplugged? The type and level of involvement were entirely a mystery to me. My curiosity only grew when it was announced that due to the "sexual feeling" Andrew got out of playing these shows, they had been moved out of churches, to more secular venues.
"Live review: Andrew W.K. lets absurdism flow at Largo" - LA Times, 10/09 2009Andrew W.K. had just finished a piano-and-string-quartet version of his pop-metal hit "Party Hard" on Thursday night when a young man from the audience bum-rushed the stage at Largo at the Coronet. There he stood, seemingly waiting for another of W.K.'s jubilant rockers like "Party Til You Puke" or "It's Time to Party."
Instead, W.K. (whose given last name is Wilkes-Krier) and the renowned chamber group the Calder Quartet opted to play two versions of John Cage's entirely silent composition "4:33."
It made for a bit of a transcendently awkward moment for the enthusiastic fan, who rifled in his pockets and looked genuinely confused at this turn of events.
Instead, W.K. (whose given last name is Wilkes-Krier) and the renowned chamber group the Calder Quartet opted to play two versions of John Cage's entirely silent composition "4:33."
It made for a bit of a transcendently awkward moment for the enthusiastic fan, who rifled in his pockets and looked genuinely confused at this turn of events.
"Last Night: Andrew W.K. and Calder Quartet at Swedish American Hall" - SF Weekly, 10/08 2009Better than: Metallica and the San Francisco Symphony.
Hours before he took the stage, Andrew W.K. was amping up his fans. His Twitter feed was bursting with typical AWK excitement:
"PARTY MINDSET OF THE DAY: Remember that even when life feels hard or scary, I am here cheering you on, and you will KEEP GOING!"
Hours before he took the stage, Andrew W.K. was amping up his fans. His Twitter feed was bursting with typical AWK excitement:
"PARTY MINDSET OF THE DAY: Remember that even when life feels hard or scary, I am here cheering you on, and you will KEEP GOING!"
"i never thought i’d yell ‘i get wet’ in the presence of a string quartet" - MixtapeHeartbreaks, 10/08 2009Prior to arriving at San Francisco’s Swedish American Hall on October 7, 2009, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Andrew WK, guru of partying hard, was on tour with the Calder Quartet. Would it be a night of tracks off AWK’s new piano album, 55 Cadillac? A strings-enhanced rendition of “Party ‘Til You Puke?” My guess was closer to the latter, but nothing I’d imagined prepared me for the majesty of the evening ahead.
"Show Review: Andrew W.K. & Calder Quartet at Swedish American Hall, 10/7/09" - Spinning Platters, 10/07 2009The Swedish American Hall was host tonight to an experiment in both performance and audience, as Andrew W.K. brought Calder Quartet with him on a small tour to promote an album of piano improvisations called Cadillac 55. Standing outside the hall waiting on some friends, I watched the crowd go in. First, I saw some former meatheads who made up much of Andrew W.K.’s audience during his major label days. Then I saw a large group of senior citizens go in, having come to see the Calder Quartet, who are a reknowned classical group. And of course, there was a large music nerd contingent. So how would all of this mix?
"Headbanger Andrew W.K. goes classical" - Mercury News, 10/04 2009Not long ago, Andrew W.K., the bloody-faced headbanger whose hits include "Party Hard" and "Party Til You Puke," turned up on National Public Radio to wax poetic about the universal life force of J.S. Bach. His reflections, as it turned out, were merely a buildup to the real shocker: that he was about to hit the road with a string quartet.
"Andrew W.K., strings attached" - Boston Herald, 10/01 2009Can you imagine OzzyOsbourne leading the MilesDavis Quintet through a set of Hoagy Carmichael standards? Or Elvis, Jim Morrison and James Brown tackling “O Sole Mio?”
Neither fantasy approaches the bizarre reality of Andrew W.K. and the Calder Quartet’s show at Coolidge Corner Theatre on Tuesday.
A classical chamber group known for adventurousness, the Calder Quartet doesn’t shy away from odd collaborations; the foursome recently worked with Airborne Toxic Event. But linking with W.K. - a headbanger known for partying hard and songs about it (“It’s Time to Party,” “Party ’til You Puke”) - seems a stretch.
Neither fantasy approaches the bizarre reality of Andrew W.K. and the Calder Quartet’s show at Coolidge Corner Theatre on Tuesday.
A classical chamber group known for adventurousness, the Calder Quartet doesn’t shy away from odd collaborations; the foursome recently worked with Airborne Toxic Event. But linking with W.K. - a headbanger known for partying hard and songs about it (“It’s Time to Party,” “Party ’til You Puke”) - seems a stretch.
"Andrew W.K. in Concert. Contemporary Classical Concert." - GrindingTapes, 10/01 2009Unfortunately, I didn’t know about this earlier, or believe me I would have made haste to share the information with all of you. But me and my girlfriend, in search of a movie, stumbled across this treasure of a concert going experience the other night. If you live in one of the cities yet to be hit on this tour, I implore you to go and see it. Andrew provided a positive environment as always, and his passion for music was showcased in a way I had never seen before.
"Five Things to Do Today" - Time Out Chicago, 09/30 2009MUSIC - Andrew W.K. & Calder Quartet
A head-scratching bill brings together seasoned party animal Andrew W.K. (sporting a newfound piano penchant) and ambitious chamber ensemble the Calder Quartet.
A head-scratching bill brings together seasoned party animal Andrew W.K. (sporting a newfound piano penchant) and ambitious chamber ensemble the Calder Quartet.
"Andrew W.K. Will Not Take You to Church" - idolator, 09/30 2009Motivational partier / nascent meteorologist Andrew WK just embarked on a short tour with the contemporary classicists the Calder Quartet,
"On the Road Again: Andrew W.K. and the Calder Quartet in Boston" - RiverFrontTimes, 09/30 2009Throughout his concert with the Calder Quartet, Andrew W.K. kept stressing that this tour was an "experiment." That his merging of classical piano, a string quartet and party-hearty anthems was something untested and unproved. But while a work-in-progress feel did permeate the first night of his tour at a movie-theater in Boston, the beauty of the music performed trumped any bumps.
"ANDREW W.K. & THE CALDER QUARTET" - WeekendPartyUpdate, 09/30 2009I saw him perform last night at the Coolidge Theatre with the Calder Quartet, which was really beautiful. Andrew W.K. is a great performer, beloved for such memorable anthems as "Party Hard," "Get Wet"and he's touring with a really high-brow (and sexy!) classical string quartet playing new modern chamber music (see above).
"Live:: Andrew W.K. & Calder Quartet at the Coolidge Corner Theatre" - Strings Magazine, 09/30 2009I don't know what there really is to be said. The bizarre show which started around 30-minutes late due to an equally late crowd consisted of a 90-minute performance, complete with
intermission and free pizza. The eclectic repertoire of works performed spanned from Philip Glass to John Cage and even J.S. Bach. Also noteworthy was the locally composed piece
"Interface" with its GameBoy-inspired 1-bit accompaniment which was performed with its mastermind Tristan Perich in-house. The show also featured two spontaneous solo piano improvisations by Andrew W.K. from which the man drew equal parts from his own talent and entertaining personality. Seeing the Calder Quartet's reactions, or their overt difficulty in containing them, was just as entertaining as Andrew W.K.'s his raw panging.
intermission and free pizza. The eclectic repertoire of works performed spanned from Philip Glass to John Cage and even J.S. Bach. Also noteworthy was the locally composed piece
"Interface" with its GameBoy-inspired 1-bit accompaniment which was performed with its mastermind Tristan Perich in-house. The show also featured two spontaneous solo piano improvisations by Andrew W.K. from which the man drew equal parts from his own talent and entertaining personality. Seeing the Calder Quartet's reactions, or their overt difficulty in containing them, was just as entertaining as Andrew W.K.'s his raw panging.
"Live:: Andrew W.K. & Calder Quartet at the Coolidge Corner Theatre" - OnaFriday, 09/30 2009I don't know what there really is to be said. The bizarre show which started around 30-minutes late due to an equally late crowd consisted of a 90-minute performance, complete with
intermission and free pizza. The eclectic repertoire of works performed spanned from Philip Glass to John Cage and even J.S. Bach. Also noteworthy was the locally composed piece
"Interface" with its GameBoy-inspired 1-bit accompaniment which was performed with its mastermind Tristan Perich in-house. The show also featured two spontaneous solo piano improvisations by Andrew W.K. from which the man drew equal parts from his own talent and entertaining personality. Seeing the Calder Quartet's reactions, or their overt difficulty in containing them, was just as entertaining as Andrew W.K.'s his raw panging.
intermission and free pizza. The eclectic repertoire of works performed spanned from Philip Glass to John Cage and even J.S. Bach. Also noteworthy was the locally composed piece
"Interface" with its GameBoy-inspired 1-bit accompaniment which was performed with its mastermind Tristan Perich in-house. The show also featured two spontaneous solo piano improvisations by Andrew W.K. from which the man drew equal parts from his own talent and entertaining personality. Seeing the Calder Quartet's reactions, or their overt difficulty in containing them, was just as entertaining as Andrew W.K.'s his raw panging.
"Calder Quartet & Andrew W.K." - Flavorpill, 09/29 2009Stimulating all parts of your brain, A.W.K. and Calder Quartet have teamed up to perform a collaborative show, mixing reverence with irreverence, and offering their audience a chance for both rapt listening and raucous dancing.
"The Week Ahead: Sept. 27 — Oct. 3" - NYT, 09/27 2009Adventurous, boundary crossing, irreverent, eclectic, avant-garde: these are some of the terms usually used to describe when rock and contemporary classical musicians work together. And their collaborations are sometimes adventurous and boundary crossing and so on. One boundary that has rarely been crossed, however, has to do with violins and bloody noses.
Presumably there will be no physical injury when ANDREW W. K. meets the CALDER QUARTET on Friday at Joe’s Pub. In promoting their joint tour they have played up a sense of mischief and danger — Andrew W. K. is pictured with blood running down his face, as on the cover of his first album, “I Get Wet” — but the musical sparks between the musicians should be violence enough.
Presumably there will be no physical injury when ANDREW W. K. meets the CALDER QUARTET on Friday at Joe’s Pub. In promoting their joint tour they have played up a sense of mischief and danger — Andrew W. K. is pictured with blood running down his face, as on the cover of his first album, “I Get Wet” — but the musical sparks between the musicians should be violence enough.
"Andrew W.K., Calder Quartet shows coming up" - Brooklyn Vegan, 09/26 2009Andrew W.K. goes on tour with the Calder Quartet starting September 29th - they play Joe's Pub together on October 2nd.
After that, Calder Quartet plays music of Janácek and Fred Frith with Iva Bittová at (Le) Poisson Rouge on November 17th. Tickets are on sale.
After that, Calder Quartet plays music of Janácek and Fred Frith with Iva Bittová at (Le) Poisson Rouge on November 17th. Tickets are on sale.
"Show Preview: Andrew W.K. & Calder Quartet ~ Piano and Strings ~ Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline ~ Tuesday, September 29" - Boston Survival Guide, 09/24 2009If you’re wondering what to do on Tuesday night, and looking for something that promises to be unusual, look no further. I can tell you that the Calder Quartet are wonderful, having seen them perform with The Airborne Toxic Event, though I’ve never seen one of their own shows. They’re based in Los Angeles, and the quartet features: Ben Jacobson, first violin; Andrew Bulbrook, second violin; Eric Byers, cello; and Jonathan Moerschel, viola. They specialize in classical and contemporary repertoire, and are focused on discovering new, emerging composers and, as they say on their MySpace page “pursuing unique collaborations”. Um, yes indeed, as joining them for this evening at the Coolidge Corner Theater will be Andrew W.K., and I’m not even sure how to go about describing him. He’s a musician (a classical pianist and metal aficionado), performance artist, lecturer, visual artist, writer… and is known for his spontaneous performances.
"Unearned Intimacy: Calder Quartet at the University of Maryland" - DMV, 09/23 2009Score one for providing audiences with a chance to talk to artists after the concert is over: After the Calder Quartet played works by Stravinsky, Janacek, and Schubert at the University of Maryland’s Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, the quartet told a fair-sized group of curious stragglers in the ensuing “Talk Back” session not only that had they never played this particular program before, but that Sunday afternoon was their first time playing the Stravinsky and the Schubert in public.
"New directions: Carlsbad Music Festival returns with largest-ever slate of world premieres" - North County Times, 09/23 2009Anchoring the festival, as it has every year since its creation, is the L.A.-based Calder Quartet, a nationally acclaimed ensemble that includes Benjamin Jacobson (his brother Peter, a cellist, has also played at the festival in the past). Its program on Saturday will feature several world premiere compositions.
"Calder Quartet at UC San Diego's Mandeville Auditorium" - Sandiego.com, 04/26 2009Southern California's own Calder Quartet has fostered strong connections with contemporary composers Christopher Rouse, Thomas Ades and Terry Riley, as well as a number of younger composers featured with Calder at the annual Carlsbad Music Festival. But Calder is not into specialization -- they claim the whole landscape of chamber music from Haydn to the commission arriving in tomorrow's FedEx box. And I do not know another string quartet that commands this territory with the authority and finesse of the Calder Quartet.
"Devastation" - So I've Heard, 03/22 2009By Alan Rich
The slow movement of Mozart’s G-minor Quintet is as heartbreaking as any music I know. I have written about this music before – a couple of pages in the foreword to my book of this same name repeat an article from New York Magazine in the 1970s, which in turn regurgitates wisdom verbatim from the classrooms of David Boyden and Joe Kerman at UC-Berkeley in the 1950s. Hearing it again last Friday, wonderfully played by the Calder Quartet plus Paul Coletti’s second viola at Zipper Hall, I found myself reacting more strongly than ever before to the G-minor outcry that begins the next movement, the ensuing Arioso – Mozart’s refusal to let go of the agonies he has shared with us over the eight minutes of the previous movement – and I ended the evening aware that my years of adoration of this one Mozart revelation so far have been in no way adequate.
The slow movement of Mozart’s G-minor Quintet is as heartbreaking as any music I know. I have written about this music before – a couple of pages in the foreword to my book of this same name repeat an article from New York Magazine in the 1970s, which in turn regurgitates wisdom verbatim from the classrooms of David Boyden and Joe Kerman at UC-Berkeley in the 1950s. Hearing it again last Friday, wonderfully played by the Calder Quartet plus Paul Coletti’s second viola at Zipper Hall, I found myself reacting more strongly than ever before to the G-minor outcry that begins the next movement, the ensuing Arioso – Mozart’s refusal to let go of the agonies he has shared with us over the eight minutes of the previous movement – and I ended the evening aware that my years of adoration of this one Mozart revelation so far have been in no way adequate.
"Stylish and Satisfying Debut From This Promising Young LA-based Ensemble" - Gramophone, 03/01 2009There is always something special about a classical artist or group's first recording. While thankfully not as career-defining as a pop debut, a first classical disc usually shows off the artists by programming "their" best pieces. That is certainly the case with the Calder Quartet. The Los Angeles-based group's initial entrance into the market puts its best foot forward with Ravel's String Quartet in F, Thomas Ades's Arcadiana and Mozart's Quartet in F, K590.
"Frith's 'Lelekovice' inspires on Strong Calder Quartet Concert" - Palm Beach ArtsPaper, 01/29 2009LAKE WORTH -- There are many ways to describe music, from the
fanciful to the mundane, but Wednesday afternoon a young string
quartet from Los Angeles compellingly brought an audience's ears back to the art's most fundamental identity: Sound.
The Calder Quartet, a four-man group that likes to mix provocative
new works with fresh interpretations of the old, opened the Duncan Theatre's chamber music series with two canonical works by Mozart and Beethoven, and one quartet from 1990 by the English guitarist Fred Frith.
fanciful to the mundane, but Wednesday afternoon a young string
quartet from Los Angeles compellingly brought an audience's ears back to the art's most fundamental identity: Sound.
The Calder Quartet, a four-man group that likes to mix provocative
new works with fresh interpretations of the old, opened the Duncan Theatre's chamber music series with two canonical works by Mozart and Beethoven, and one quartet from 1990 by the English guitarist Fred Frith.
"Calder Quartet Performance Named "Best of 2008" on WNYC" - WNYC, 01/16 2009New York's WNYC named the Calder Quartet's in-studio performance in November one of the Best Live Performances of 2008. You can listen to the show on the link below!
"Awesome Review in the LA Times!" - LA Times, 12/08 2008We were blown away by the great review we got in the LA Times for our concert with Gloria Cheng at Zipper Hall on December 5th.
Mark Swed from the LA Times says:
"I've written before that every time I hear the Calder, the ensemble seems to have reached a new level. That remains true, and now only the stars are the limit, as the Calder takes its place as one of America's most satisfying -- and most enterprising -- quartets."
Mark Swed from the LA Times says:
"I've written before that every time I hear the Calder, the ensemble seems to have reached a new level. That remains true, and now only the stars are the limit, as the Calder takes its place as one of America's most satisfying -- and most enterprising -- quartets."
"Calder Quartet gives cool, intense performance in Shaker Heights" - Cleveland Plain Dealer, 11/21 2008Dressed in tight black suits with straight black ties, the four gentlemen of the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet look like hit men as much as musicians. Yet their hip style mirrors their artistry. Like an undercover agent, their music-making, as evidenced at the group's Cleveland debut Wednesday night at Plymouth Church of Shaker Heights, is stealthy, cool and potent by turns.
"Cma Leads This Week's Arts Picks" - Cleveland Scene, 11/19 2008CMA series brings quartet to Plymouth Church of Shaker Heights WednesdayAlexander Calder's mobiles balance color and form so that the organic shapes move with relation to each other and make for constant visual intrigue. Musical programs assembled by the Calder Quartet are a sound analog to that idea, balancing one piece of music against another so that each reveals something new. The group is known for juxtaposing new works with old ones in a way that helps audiences make sense of where the composers are coming from. "We're a classical quartet, based in Beethoven and Mozart, but we have a strong interest in modern music," says second violinist Andrew Bulbrook in a phone interview. "We found that when we put older and newer pieces together, one changes the way you hear the other.
You can make newer music more accessible. For example, Thomas AdŹs' 'Arcadiana' is rife with quotes and references to older composers. One movement quotes [Mozart's] The Magic Flute." The group paired that piece with a quartet of Mozart's, his "Dissonant" Quartet, K. 465. The work also has allusions to French rococo painter Antoine Watteau's "The Embarkation for Cythera." "It's this boating party onshore, very merry and ready to go, but you can see a storm boiling," says Bulbrook. "The music mimics that with a light, airy opening, and then a second movement that is much more dark and dramatic." 'Arcadiana' is on the program at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, November 19 at Plymouth Church UCC, 2860 Coventry Rd. in Shaker Heights, as part of the Cleveland Museum of Art's Viva and Gala Around Town series. Also on the program is Terry Riley's "Cadenza on the Night Plain." $29, CMA members $27. Call 888.CMA.0033 or go to clevemusart.org.
You can make newer music more accessible. For example, Thomas AdŹs' 'Arcadiana' is rife with quotes and references to older composers. One movement quotes [Mozart's] The Magic Flute." The group paired that piece with a quartet of Mozart's, his "Dissonant" Quartet, K. 465. The work also has allusions to French rococo painter Antoine Watteau's "The Embarkation for Cythera." "It's this boating party onshore, very merry and ready to go, but you can see a storm boiling," says Bulbrook. "The music mimics that with a light, airy opening, and then a second movement that is much more dark and dramatic." 'Arcadiana' is on the program at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, November 19 at Plymouth Church UCC, 2860 Coventry Rd. in Shaker Heights, as part of the Cleveland Museum of Art's Viva and Gala Around Town series. Also on the program is Terry Riley's "Cadenza on the Night Plain." $29, CMA members $27. Call 888.CMA.0033 or go to clevemusart.org.
"Tiny Mix Tapes Reviews our NYC Concert!" - Tiny Mix Tapes, 11/15 2008The Calder Quartet featuring Andrew W.K.
Andrew W.K has spent his 2008 opening a new venue in New York (Santos Party House), producing a Lee Perry record, and giving readings of children’s books. He’s made some time for performing as well, but his recent gigs have not exactly been full-bore, “I Get Wet,” bloody-faced raunch fests. Solo piano shows, improvisational experiments in art museums, and impromptu Tom Petty covers have been more the norm, and, to that eclectic list, Mr. W.K. can now add a collaboration with the Calder Quartet.
The product of this collaboration went down at (Le) Poisson Rouge and consisted of a blend of new classical works, improvisations, Phillip Glass, and favorites from I Get Wet and The Wolf, performed with the help of a varied assortment of pre-recorded material, makeshift percussion and, most intriguingly, Ensemble Robot’s Bot(i)cello (a robotic, MIDI-controlled, single-stringed, quasi percussion-y thing). The program was almost as strange as it looks on paper. The tone of the performance ran the gamut from W.K.’s goofy "Brandenburg Hey Hey Hey" (which started as a Bach piano solo and ended as a disco jam), to Christine Southworth’s austere Honey Flyers for quartet and Bot(i)cello, to a frenzied and climactic dance fest on W.K.’s show-closing "Long Live the Party." Miraculously, this all managed to form some kind of a cohesive experience.
It’s difficult to say why a well-respected string quartet would want to play "Party Hard," if you approach the question from a purely musical level, but this collaboration went further than that. Fun is the main element of both Andrew W.K.’s persona and musical style, though the more difficult to pin-down "energy" is probably second, and the energy and sense of enjoyment that the Calder Quartet instilled was definitely a sign that they were influenced by more than W.K.’s sense for apocalyptically simple melodies.
Of course, a collaboration needs to go two ways, and there were moments where the gravity of a classical concert seemed to get through to W.K. At the end of an improvisation, he performed with piano, voice, and the Bot(i)cello; the rumble lapsed into something in between George Crumb and black metal that seemed oddly fitting.
But the overwhelming feeling, which seems common to all Andrew W.K. projects, was one of possibility and growth. The Calder Quartet has a long way to go before they can inspire ecstatic embraces and dancing, and W.K. is still years away from being able to produce anything close to the breathless serenity the Calder showed in their performance of Tristan Perich’s "Interface." But everyone’s trying, and everyone’s inspired, and that’s really the best anyone can hope for.
Andrew W.K has spent his 2008 opening a new venue in New York (Santos Party House), producing a Lee Perry record, and giving readings of children’s books. He’s made some time for performing as well, but his recent gigs have not exactly been full-bore, “I Get Wet,” bloody-faced raunch fests. Solo piano shows, improvisational experiments in art museums, and impromptu Tom Petty covers have been more the norm, and, to that eclectic list, Mr. W.K. can now add a collaboration with the Calder Quartet.
The product of this collaboration went down at (Le) Poisson Rouge and consisted of a blend of new classical works, improvisations, Phillip Glass, and favorites from I Get Wet and The Wolf, performed with the help of a varied assortment of pre-recorded material, makeshift percussion and, most intriguingly, Ensemble Robot’s Bot(i)cello (a robotic, MIDI-controlled, single-stringed, quasi percussion-y thing). The program was almost as strange as it looks on paper. The tone of the performance ran the gamut from W.K.’s goofy "Brandenburg Hey Hey Hey" (which started as a Bach piano solo and ended as a disco jam), to Christine Southworth’s austere Honey Flyers for quartet and Bot(i)cello, to a frenzied and climactic dance fest on W.K.’s show-closing "Long Live the Party." Miraculously, this all managed to form some kind of a cohesive experience.
It’s difficult to say why a well-respected string quartet would want to play "Party Hard," if you approach the question from a purely musical level, but this collaboration went further than that. Fun is the main element of both Andrew W.K.’s persona and musical style, though the more difficult to pin-down "energy" is probably second, and the energy and sense of enjoyment that the Calder Quartet instilled was definitely a sign that they were influenced by more than W.K.’s sense for apocalyptically simple melodies.
Of course, a collaboration needs to go two ways, and there were moments where the gravity of a classical concert seemed to get through to W.K. At the end of an improvisation, he performed with piano, voice, and the Bot(i)cello; the rumble lapsed into something in between George Crumb and black metal that seemed oddly fitting.
But the overwhelming feeling, which seems common to all Andrew W.K. projects, was one of possibility and growth. The Calder Quartet has a long way to go before they can inspire ecstatic embraces and dancing, and W.K. is still years away from being able to produce anything close to the breathless serenity the Calder showed in their performance of Tristan Perich’s "Interface." But everyone’s trying, and everyone’s inspired, and that’s really the best anyone can hope for.
"The STRAD Selection" - Strad Magazine, 09/30 2008"I have very much enjoyed getting to know the Calder Quartet, which since the 2007-8 season has been in residence at the Colburn School of music in Los Angeles...Their Ravel, which begins this introductory disc, is ravishingly played..."
"In downtown L.A., a fresh mix of new music sounds, via San Diego" - LA Times, 09/22 2008The Carlsbad Music Festival previewed five new events at Zipper Hall, and at REDCAT, CalArts began its Creative Music Festival featuring UC San Diego's Anthony Davis and his group Episteme.
By Mark Swed
Times Music Critic
September 22, 2008
That downtown Los Angeles has become new music central is one thing, but that downtown's new music scene could be so taken over by San Diego-area beach towns, as happened Friday night, really is something that would have been unimaginable a few years ago.
In the Colburn School's Zipper Hall, the Carlsbad Music Festival held a marathon concert to preview the five new music events that this week will fill the city just north of San Diego. At the same time, across the street at REDCAT, CalArts began its Creative Music Festival with a marathon that featured the UC San Diego composer and pianist Anthony Davis and his adventuresome group Episteme.
I checked out the new kids on the Carlsbad block. Founded four years ago by Matt McBane, a young composer and violinist from Carlsbad who studied at USC, the festival became a showcase for a new generation of composers, many under 30.
McBane, now approaching 30, and his festival have prospered. He's relocated to Brooklyn, where he has formed a new music indie band, Build, to play his malleable music, which doesn't distinguish between classical and rock.
Build's catchy first CD, recently released, has caught on with tastemakers at NPR and Amoeba Music and boasts a slate of warm reviews. The Zipper program began with a Build set that closely resembled the CD.
McBane's music has sweet, simple melodies that flow over an ingratiating beat. I look forward to a time when McBane adds more meat to his music, but he is a natural composer, a fresh voice and, from the evidence of his festival, a first-rate organizer with a broad range of musical interests.
Next came an appearance by Red Fish Blue Fish, a percussion ensemble at UC San Diego. The program closed with the Calder Quartet, which has been associated with the festival from the beginning and in an astonishingly short time has become the American string quartet to watch.
And it offered maybe the newest of the evening's works -- a short piece, "Interface," by Tristan Perich, who will be one of the composers featured in Carlsbad.
I first encountered Perich, who specializes in primitive electronics, at a new music festival in Massachusetts two years ago where he couldn't be missed because he walked around with a big, white 1970s push-button telephone that he had converted into the world's coolest mobile phone.
Using elegant if basic electronics, Perich hooked up each of the Calder's instruments to a dinky speaker. One of the hallmarks of the Calder is the wonderful richness of its sound, here turned into beeps. But they were voluptuous beeps full of texture.
As with most young composers these days, Perich's style is hard to pinpoint. He demonstrates an accomplished sense of counterpoint, and "Interface" has a harmonic identity all its own. From one angle, this sounded like old music; from another, it felt utterly new, and the angles kept changing.
There was much else of interest on the program. The Calder played a movement by Anton Batagov, a Russian, Tchaikovsky Competition-winning pianist with a flair for Bach, Philip Glass, John Cage and rock, who gave up performing to put all that in his own mystically tinged music.
The movement was a warm, rocking, off-center lullaby from Batagov's new "Quartet.ru" with the character of a Russian Terry Riley.
Other recent music included a pleasingly post-minimalist movement from Christine Southworth's "Honey Flyers," which the Calder premiered at last year's festival.
In between modern percussion classics by Steve Reich and Cage, Red Fish Blue Fish offered an experimental piece by a collective, Synchronism Project, and another by Marianthi Papalexandri-Alexandri; neither work was self-explanatory.
The percussion standout was David Lang's "Unchained Melody," a bopping single line played by Steven Schlick on the glockenspiel, each note doubled by an electronically operated mallet hitting a noise-maker.
This was made possible by Williem Brent, who goes by the title of robot designer. Operated by a laptop, the robot crew proved a flawless ensemble.
By Mark Swed
Times Music Critic
September 22, 2008
That downtown Los Angeles has become new music central is one thing, but that downtown's new music scene could be so taken over by San Diego-area beach towns, as happened Friday night, really is something that would have been unimaginable a few years ago.
In the Colburn School's Zipper Hall, the Carlsbad Music Festival held a marathon concert to preview the five new music events that this week will fill the city just north of San Diego. At the same time, across the street at REDCAT, CalArts began its Creative Music Festival with a marathon that featured the UC San Diego composer and pianist Anthony Davis and his adventuresome group Episteme.
I checked out the new kids on the Carlsbad block. Founded four years ago by Matt McBane, a young composer and violinist from Carlsbad who studied at USC, the festival became a showcase for a new generation of composers, many under 30.
McBane, now approaching 30, and his festival have prospered. He's relocated to Brooklyn, where he has formed a new music indie band, Build, to play his malleable music, which doesn't distinguish between classical and rock.
Build's catchy first CD, recently released, has caught on with tastemakers at NPR and Amoeba Music and boasts a slate of warm reviews. The Zipper program began with a Build set that closely resembled the CD.
McBane's music has sweet, simple melodies that flow over an ingratiating beat. I look forward to a time when McBane adds more meat to his music, but he is a natural composer, a fresh voice and, from the evidence of his festival, a first-rate organizer with a broad range of musical interests.
Next came an appearance by Red Fish Blue Fish, a percussion ensemble at UC San Diego. The program closed with the Calder Quartet, which has been associated with the festival from the beginning and in an astonishingly short time has become the American string quartet to watch.
And it offered maybe the newest of the evening's works -- a short piece, "Interface," by Tristan Perich, who will be one of the composers featured in Carlsbad.
I first encountered Perich, who specializes in primitive electronics, at a new music festival in Massachusetts two years ago where he couldn't be missed because he walked around with a big, white 1970s push-button telephone that he had converted into the world's coolest mobile phone.
Using elegant if basic electronics, Perich hooked up each of the Calder's instruments to a dinky speaker. One of the hallmarks of the Calder is the wonderful richness of its sound, here turned into beeps. But they were voluptuous beeps full of texture.
As with most young composers these days, Perich's style is hard to pinpoint. He demonstrates an accomplished sense of counterpoint, and "Interface" has a harmonic identity all its own. From one angle, this sounded like old music; from another, it felt utterly new, and the angles kept changing.
There was much else of interest on the program. The Calder played a movement by Anton Batagov, a Russian, Tchaikovsky Competition-winning pianist with a flair for Bach, Philip Glass, John Cage and rock, who gave up performing to put all that in his own mystically tinged music.
The movement was a warm, rocking, off-center lullaby from Batagov's new "Quartet.ru" with the character of a Russian Terry Riley.
Other recent music included a pleasingly post-minimalist movement from Christine Southworth's "Honey Flyers," which the Calder premiered at last year's festival.
In between modern percussion classics by Steve Reich and Cage, Red Fish Blue Fish offered an experimental piece by a collective, Synchronism Project, and another by Marianthi Papalexandri-Alexandri; neither work was self-explanatory.
The percussion standout was David Lang's "Unchained Melody," a bopping single line played by Steven Schlick on the glockenspiel, each note doubled by an electronically operated mallet hitting a noise-maker.
This was made possible by Williem Brent, who goes by the title of robot designer. Operated by a laptop, the robot crew proved a flawless ensemble.
"Carlsbad Music Festival offers a taste of the eclectic" - Press Enterprise, 09/19 2008By MARK BENOIT
The Press-Enterprise
A concert today at the Zipper Hall in Los Angeles will provide an introduction to the eclectic offerings of the 5-year-old Carlsbad Music Festival.
"This year we actually have four groups that are performing in the festival in general. At that concert we have three of the groups performing. ... And it's like a longer concert, like a 2 ˝ -hour concert with those three groups playing," said Matt McBane, the festival's founder and director.
"It's kind of like a showcase of what we're doing down in Carlsbad. In Carlsbad we have five concerts. So it's kind of condensing all of those five concerts into one," he said in a telephone interview.
The festival consists mainly of classical chamber music.
"There have been some pieces with video that are like multimedia media kind of pieces that we've done in the past and we're doing one this year as well. But the format that it's presented in is a chamber-music format, but it's all adventurous chamber music," McBane said.
McBane, a violinist and composer, is also the leader of the Brooklyn-based band Build, which will be performing at the festival for the first time this year, including the Los Angeles concert.
He described Build, which recently released a self-titled album, as an indie-classical band. He said it is a mix of a lot of things, mainly chamber music and art rock. As examples of art rock, he cited the British band Radiohead, the Icelandic band Sigurros and the American singer/songwriter Beck.
The other performers featured in the festival are the Calder Quartet, which has been the festival's ensemble in residence since its inception; Red Fish Blue Fish, the resident percussion ensemble of UC San Diego; and Partch, which specializes in the music of Harry Partch, a 20th-century American composer.
The Calder Quartet is rooted in the classics such as Beethoven and Bartok, McBane said. "But then they also have an adventurous side to their programming. Their usual programs will be a juxtaposition of modern works with the classics of the string-quartet repertoire."
Diversity is the audience's main feature, he said.
"The audience that we get is all ages. And there are some people that are real aficionados and there are some people that are just along for the ride and checking out something different."
McBane, who lives in New York, grew up in Carlsbad and his parents still live there.
This is the second year the festival has started in Los Angeles. Last year, several of the people who went to the Los Angeles concert went to Carlsbad for all the concerts, McBane said.
"That's not a bad way to spend a weekend down here in Carlsbad by the beach," he said. "It's a nice time of year for that, and then going to a whole bunch of concerts in a weekend."
The Press-Enterprise
A concert today at the Zipper Hall in Los Angeles will provide an introduction to the eclectic offerings of the 5-year-old Carlsbad Music Festival.
"This year we actually have four groups that are performing in the festival in general. At that concert we have three of the groups performing. ... And it's like a longer concert, like a 2 ˝ -hour concert with those three groups playing," said Matt McBane, the festival's founder and director.
"It's kind of like a showcase of what we're doing down in Carlsbad. In Carlsbad we have five concerts. So it's kind of condensing all of those five concerts into one," he said in a telephone interview.
The festival consists mainly of classical chamber music.
"There have been some pieces with video that are like multimedia media kind of pieces that we've done in the past and we're doing one this year as well. But the format that it's presented in is a chamber-music format, but it's all adventurous chamber music," McBane said.
McBane, a violinist and composer, is also the leader of the Brooklyn-based band Build, which will be performing at the festival for the first time this year, including the Los Angeles concert.
He described Build, which recently released a self-titled album, as an indie-classical band. He said it is a mix of a lot of things, mainly chamber music and art rock. As examples of art rock, he cited the British band Radiohead, the Icelandic band Sigurros and the American singer/songwriter Beck.
The other performers featured in the festival are the Calder Quartet, which has been the festival's ensemble in residence since its inception; Red Fish Blue Fish, the resident percussion ensemble of UC San Diego; and Partch, which specializes in the music of Harry Partch, a 20th-century American composer.
The Calder Quartet is rooted in the classics such as Beethoven and Bartok, McBane said. "But then they also have an adventurous side to their programming. Their usual programs will be a juxtaposition of modern works with the classics of the string-quartet repertoire."
Diversity is the audience's main feature, he said.
"The audience that we get is all ages. And there are some people that are real aficionados and there are some people that are just along for the ride and checking out something different."
McBane, who lives in New York, grew up in Carlsbad and his parents still live there.
This is the second year the festival has started in Los Angeles. Last year, several of the people who went to the Los Angeles concert went to Carlsbad for all the concerts, McBane said.
"That's not a bad way to spend a weekend down here in Carlsbad by the beach," he said. "It's a nice time of year for that, and then going to a whole bunch of concerts in a weekend."
"Old, New California in Tune at Carlsbad" - Voice of San Diego, 09/18 2008By Cathy Robbins
Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008 | Matt McBane doesn’t look like he’s celebrating an important milestone. At the Coffee Cup in La Jolla recently, he limited himself to some green tea and talked about the fifth anniversary of the Carlsbad Music Festival. This year the festival he founded and now directs kicks off in Los Angeles on Sept. 19 and moves to Carlsbad and San Diego for performances from Sept. 25 through 28.
McBane is an unassuming, almost retiring young musician, even though he’s presenting cutting edge music from a gaggle of genres from electronic to punk. The composer and violinist grew up in Carlsbad, and after school at USC and eight years in Los Angeles, he now lives in Brooklyn, the base for his band Build.
The Carlsbad festival has always featured young composers and ensembles.
"They’re underrepresented in California in contemporary music. Few venues present things in a high-profile way," McBane said.
Joining the festival this year are 26-year-old Tristan Perich, an artist-composer-geek-NYU graduate student, and Sweden’s 28-year-old Fabian Svensson. McBane, members of Build, and the Calder Quartet are in their late 20s. Many combine conservatory training and jazz and pop sensibilities.
With national and even international creds, the festival’s ensembles are youthful and originated or are based in southern California. The Calder has developed a world-wide reputation with performances of both traditional and cutting edge new music and helped establish the festival; its violinist, Ben Jacobson is one of McBane’s life-long friends from Carlsbad. red fish blue fish of UCSD brought down the house during August’s SummerFest, and Los Angeles’ Partch has assumed a unique mission.
This year’s festival, however, also introduces some historic energy with attention to California’s post-World War II experimental tradition. John Adams, one of the best known of the Californians, described in a New Yorker article last month how he experienced that tradition. Rooted in New England, he headed west in 1974, when young composers were going to Paris and Vienna. Among other day jobs, he unloaded ship containers and taught at the fledgling San Francisco Conservatory. At night, he and other Bay Area composers experimented with new and explosive forms like electronic, minimalism, and making music out of audio junk. Today, Adams is an "establishment" but idiosyncratic composer, known for operas like "Nixon in China."
For listeners in any genre -- fine art, punk, indie rock, jazz, etc. -- the festival is rich with works from California experimenters, who provide liberating inspiration for today’s composers: Terry Riley (Colfax) and Fred Firth (a Brit who teaches at Mills College); and the late Lou Harrison (San Francisco), Angeleno John Cage, Harry Partch, who lived in Leucadia, taught at SDSU and died in San Diego, and James Tenney, who performed with Partch and Cage and taught at Cal Arts and U.C. Santa Cruz.
Paralleling the California experiments were those in New York, specifically among the "downtown" group that differentiated itself from the "uptown" composers associated with Juilliard, Lincoln Center and Columbia University.
McBane said that the differences between the two coasts were real. Composers from the west tended to take their cue from nature, with open music in which changes occur gradually and lines of sound are longer. In contrast, New Yorker Elliot Carter writes works that are meticulous in detail. "It’s music written by someone living in a small space," he said.
The Californians also heard much music from the Pacific Rim, and they borrowed Asia’s musical structures and instruments. Harrison and Cage were among the first to incorporate Asian influences.
While San Francisco and UCSD were important centers, modernists Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg taught Harrison and Cage in Los Angeles. "European modernists moved to Los Angeles, so Americans had a relationship to modernism, the intellectual rigor of modernism, even though they eventually rebelled against it," McBane said.
Harrison, whose later music seems a return to romanticism, was an innovator and experimenter to the core, and the festival will perform one of his last pieces, "Nekchad." Harrison wrote it for a resonator guitar and rearranged the frets for microtonal tuning.
One of the more intriguing appearances will be Partch, named for Harry Partch, who invented his own instruments, such as a diamond shaped marimba tuned to his own 44-note scale and another fashioned with containers from particle accelerators. The composer’s original instruments were in storage at SDSU, until the collection moved to Montclair State University in New Jersey, where it is housed in the Harry Partch Instrumentarium.
Partch’s leader John Schneider has been building replicas and is working toward a complete set. The group will give a free performance and demonstration at the Museum of Making Music and a full concert on Schulman Auditorium. The performances are a rare treat; even McBane has never heard Partch’s music live.
Today’s young composers stand on the shoulders of the past, even as they draw heavily on pop influences and new technologies. On his blog Perich describes his works as simple forms where randomness, order and composition intersect. He isn’t content to make music and art; he invents "instruments" that are in a straight line from Harry Partch’s, although they are creations of the digital age.
In his One-Bit Music project, Perich turns jewel cases into personal lo-fi devices. The listener plugs into a head phone jack on the side of a jewel case that contains an electronic circuit and hears 40 minutes of 1-bit electronic music, the lowest possible digital representation of audio. "Interface" is a full-throated work for string quartet and 4-channel 1-bit electronics. Perich, who can switch from Bjork-like compositions to punk, has been recognized by no less than New York’s Whitney Museum, which in February, showcased him in its Whitney Live series of cutting edge performers.
Sevensson is Perich’s polar opposite. Loaded with Scandinavian bite and humor, his works use unusual instrument combinations and sometimes large ensembles. In his hour-long work "Tillvaratagna effekter," he reinvents the violin concerto, scoring it for a violin soloist, two sopranino recorders, two melodicas, six electric guitars, two bass guitars and timpani.
Svensson’s "Singing and Dancing" won the festival’s international competition which drew 100 entries. The Calder Quartet will perform Svensson’s piece, which was co-commissioned by ArtPower! at UCSD, and Perich’s "Interface."
Build, which performs in clubs and lofts in New York, will make its California debut at the festival with McBane’s compositions. The band’s musical identity sings from the cover of its recently-released premiere CD, "build." A hulking, rusting piece of construction equipment is parked on a beach washed by a gentle surf. McBane wrote the music, took the photo and produced the disc for New Amsterdam Records. The band -- violin, cello, piano, bass and drums -- is clearly in control of music that is alternately swaying and gentle ("in the backyard") and rough and driving ("magnet"). The final track ("driving") clocks in at nearly 14 minutes and progresses in a steady and energetic minimalist intensity. The recording has already picked up good reviews.
Today, new music is a free trade zone, and differences between the coasts are not as stark as they were in the middle of the twentieth century. Bi-coastal energies rule. In 2005, the San Francisco opera premiered John Adams’ "Doctor Atomic," about Robert Oppenheimer, the developer of the A-bomb. This season, after productions in the Netherlands and Chicago, it’s on the Metropolitan Opera’s schedule.
Terry Riley’s work will reach across the continent too. In November, Bang On a Can All-Stars of New York will premiere Terry Riley’s "Autodreamographical Tales" at Le Poisson Rouge in Greenwich Village. And then in the spring, Carnegie Hall will host a California modernist masterpiece. The Kronos Quartet, which is based in San Francisco, will supervise a star-filled 45th anniversary performance of Riley’s movable musical feast "In C." (SoundOn, the Athenaeum’s new music festival, has presented it twice in the past two years.)
Rooted in California, McBane also operates in the active New York music world that he described: "Composers in their 30s and early 20s are fusing genres, including indie rock. They’ve gone to conservatories and they’re musicians from different groups. It’s an indie classical scene."
For complete festival information go to www.carlsbadmusicfestival.org.
Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008 | Matt McBane doesn’t look like he’s celebrating an important milestone. At the Coffee Cup in La Jolla recently, he limited himself to some green tea and talked about the fifth anniversary of the Carlsbad Music Festival. This year the festival he founded and now directs kicks off in Los Angeles on Sept. 19 and moves to Carlsbad and San Diego for performances from Sept. 25 through 28.
McBane is an unassuming, almost retiring young musician, even though he’s presenting cutting edge music from a gaggle of genres from electronic to punk. The composer and violinist grew up in Carlsbad, and after school at USC and eight years in Los Angeles, he now lives in Brooklyn, the base for his band Build.
The Carlsbad festival has always featured young composers and ensembles.
"They’re underrepresented in California in contemporary music. Few venues present things in a high-profile way," McBane said.
Joining the festival this year are 26-year-old Tristan Perich, an artist-composer-geek-NYU graduate student, and Sweden’s 28-year-old Fabian Svensson. McBane, members of Build, and the Calder Quartet are in their late 20s. Many combine conservatory training and jazz and pop sensibilities.
With national and even international creds, the festival’s ensembles are youthful and originated or are based in southern California. The Calder has developed a world-wide reputation with performances of both traditional and cutting edge new music and helped establish the festival; its violinist, Ben Jacobson is one of McBane’s life-long friends from Carlsbad. red fish blue fish of UCSD brought down the house during August’s SummerFest, and Los Angeles’ Partch has assumed a unique mission.
This year’s festival, however, also introduces some historic energy with attention to California’s post-World War II experimental tradition. John Adams, one of the best known of the Californians, described in a New Yorker article last month how he experienced that tradition. Rooted in New England, he headed west in 1974, when young composers were going to Paris and Vienna. Among other day jobs, he unloaded ship containers and taught at the fledgling San Francisco Conservatory. At night, he and other Bay Area composers experimented with new and explosive forms like electronic, minimalism, and making music out of audio junk. Today, Adams is an "establishment" but idiosyncratic composer, known for operas like "Nixon in China."
For listeners in any genre -- fine art, punk, indie rock, jazz, etc. -- the festival is rich with works from California experimenters, who provide liberating inspiration for today’s composers: Terry Riley (Colfax) and Fred Firth (a Brit who teaches at Mills College); and the late Lou Harrison (San Francisco), Angeleno John Cage, Harry Partch, who lived in Leucadia, taught at SDSU and died in San Diego, and James Tenney, who performed with Partch and Cage and taught at Cal Arts and U.C. Santa Cruz.
Paralleling the California experiments were those in New York, specifically among the "downtown" group that differentiated itself from the "uptown" composers associated with Juilliard, Lincoln Center and Columbia University.
McBane said that the differences between the two coasts were real. Composers from the west tended to take their cue from nature, with open music in which changes occur gradually and lines of sound are longer. In contrast, New Yorker Elliot Carter writes works that are meticulous in detail. "It’s music written by someone living in a small space," he said.
The Californians also heard much music from the Pacific Rim, and they borrowed Asia’s musical structures and instruments. Harrison and Cage were among the first to incorporate Asian influences.
While San Francisco and UCSD were important centers, modernists Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg taught Harrison and Cage in Los Angeles. "European modernists moved to Los Angeles, so Americans had a relationship to modernism, the intellectual rigor of modernism, even though they eventually rebelled against it," McBane said.
Harrison, whose later music seems a return to romanticism, was an innovator and experimenter to the core, and the festival will perform one of his last pieces, "Nekchad." Harrison wrote it for a resonator guitar and rearranged the frets for microtonal tuning.
One of the more intriguing appearances will be Partch, named for Harry Partch, who invented his own instruments, such as a diamond shaped marimba tuned to his own 44-note scale and another fashioned with containers from particle accelerators. The composer’s original instruments were in storage at SDSU, until the collection moved to Montclair State University in New Jersey, where it is housed in the Harry Partch Instrumentarium.
Partch’s leader John Schneider has been building replicas and is working toward a complete set. The group will give a free performance and demonstration at the Museum of Making Music and a full concert on Schulman Auditorium. The performances are a rare treat; even McBane has never heard Partch’s music live.
Today’s young composers stand on the shoulders of the past, even as they draw heavily on pop influences and new technologies. On his blog Perich describes his works as simple forms where randomness, order and composition intersect. He isn’t content to make music and art; he invents "instruments" that are in a straight line from Harry Partch’s, although they are creations of the digital age.
In his One-Bit Music project, Perich turns jewel cases into personal lo-fi devices. The listener plugs into a head phone jack on the side of a jewel case that contains an electronic circuit and hears 40 minutes of 1-bit electronic music, the lowest possible digital representation of audio. "Interface" is a full-throated work for string quartet and 4-channel 1-bit electronics. Perich, who can switch from Bjork-like compositions to punk, has been recognized by no less than New York’s Whitney Museum, which in February, showcased him in its Whitney Live series of cutting edge performers.
Sevensson is Perich’s polar opposite. Loaded with Scandinavian bite and humor, his works use unusual instrument combinations and sometimes large ensembles. In his hour-long work "Tillvaratagna effekter," he reinvents the violin concerto, scoring it for a violin soloist, two sopranino recorders, two melodicas, six electric guitars, two bass guitars and timpani.
Svensson’s "Singing and Dancing" won the festival’s international competition which drew 100 entries. The Calder Quartet will perform Svensson’s piece, which was co-commissioned by ArtPower! at UCSD, and Perich’s "Interface."
Build, which performs in clubs and lofts in New York, will make its California debut at the festival with McBane’s compositions. The band’s musical identity sings from the cover of its recently-released premiere CD, "build." A hulking, rusting piece of construction equipment is parked on a beach washed by a gentle surf. McBane wrote the music, took the photo and produced the disc for New Amsterdam Records. The band -- violin, cello, piano, bass and drums -- is clearly in control of music that is alternately swaying and gentle ("in the backyard") and rough and driving ("magnet"). The final track ("driving") clocks in at nearly 14 minutes and progresses in a steady and energetic minimalist intensity. The recording has already picked up good reviews.
Today, new music is a free trade zone, and differences between the coasts are not as stark as they were in the middle of the twentieth century. Bi-coastal energies rule. In 2005, the San Francisco opera premiered John Adams’ "Doctor Atomic," about Robert Oppenheimer, the developer of the A-bomb. This season, after productions in the Netherlands and Chicago, it’s on the Metropolitan Opera’s schedule.
Terry Riley’s work will reach across the continent too. In November, Bang On a Can All-Stars of New York will premiere Terry Riley’s "Autodreamographical Tales" at Le Poisson Rouge in Greenwich Village. And then in the spring, Carnegie Hall will host a California modernist masterpiece. The Kronos Quartet, which is based in San Francisco, will supervise a star-filled 45th anniversary performance of Riley’s movable musical feast "In C." (SoundOn, the Athenaeum’s new music festival, has presented it twice in the past two years.)
Rooted in California, McBane also operates in the active New York music world that he described: "Composers in their 30s and early 20s are fusing genres, including indie rock. They’ve gone to conservatories and they’re musicians from different groups. It’s an indie classical scene."
For complete festival information go to www.carlsbadmusicfestival.org.
"Audiophile Audition Gives Album a Positive Review" - Audiophile Audition, 07/09 2008The Calder Quartet is an ensemble in residence at The Colburn School, and they made these recordings at Zipper Hall there in June 2007. This disc itself looks like vanity-press production, with neither timings nor a record “label” as such. While the names of the Calder Quartet are listed, there are no biographies provided.
I must say I find the Ravel Quartet a compelling realization, expansive, lingering over hazy harmonies and the interior colorations that make the piece unique. The group articulates Ravel’s curious demands--like sur tanto, from the bridge--with care, molding the melodies that recur throughout the composition with a delicacy likely borrowed from Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun.
The curio is the 1994 Arcadiana of Thomas Ades, a seven-movement set of miniatures, in what some would politely call an “eclectic” style. Behind the ethos of the work are musical allusions from Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Watteau’s The Embarkation from the Island of Cythera, or what Debussy called The Isle of Joy. The odd-numbered sections are intended as watercolors, the third titled after Schubert’s song about singing waters. Whether the various pluckings, cluckings, whizzings, and bangings at certain moments makes for aquatic listening is up to you.
Mozart’s last quartet, his K. 590, dedicated to the King of Prussia, basks in its cello part, presumably written to accommodate the King’s own talents. The cello leads immediately in the first movement, a real choice exercise for Eric Byers, cello. The operatic, expressive writing finds good balances in the Calder distribution of voice parts. Engineer Matt Snyder focuses on those audacious bass harmonies that make the late Mozart style a world unto itself. Violin Benjamin Jacobson relishes his concertante part, and the second movement vibrates with bucolic energy. One can only speculate what a violin concerto from this period of Mozart’s development might have been. The Menuet, one of the more Haydnesque moments in Mozart, quite jars us with passing dissonances and urgent sforzati. Nice viola work from Jonathan Moerschel in the last movement, a sarcastic rondo with virtuosic writing in each part, as each “soloist” competes for the principal leading voice.
I must say I find the Ravel Quartet a compelling realization, expansive, lingering over hazy harmonies and the interior colorations that make the piece unique. The group articulates Ravel’s curious demands--like sur tanto, from the bridge--with care, molding the melodies that recur throughout the composition with a delicacy likely borrowed from Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun.
The curio is the 1994 Arcadiana of Thomas Ades, a seven-movement set of miniatures, in what some would politely call an “eclectic” style. Behind the ethos of the work are musical allusions from Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Watteau’s The Embarkation from the Island of Cythera, or what Debussy called The Isle of Joy. The odd-numbered sections are intended as watercolors, the third titled after Schubert’s song about singing waters. Whether the various pluckings, cluckings, whizzings, and bangings at certain moments makes for aquatic listening is up to you.
Mozart’s last quartet, his K. 590, dedicated to the King of Prussia, basks in its cello part, presumably written to accommodate the King’s own talents. The cello leads immediately in the first movement, a real choice exercise for Eric Byers, cello. The operatic, expressive writing finds good balances in the Calder distribution of voice parts. Engineer Matt Snyder focuses on those audacious bass harmonies that make the late Mozart style a world unto itself. Violin Benjamin Jacobson relishes his concertante part, and the second movement vibrates with bucolic energy. One can only speculate what a violin concerto from this period of Mozart’s development might have been. The Menuet, one of the more Haydnesque moments in Mozart, quite jars us with passing dissonances and urgent sforzati. Nice viola work from Jonathan Moerschel in the last movement, a sarcastic rondo with virtuosic writing in each part, as each “soloist” competes for the principal leading voice.
"The Art of Brilliant Chamber Music" - Star Telegram, 06/26 2008There’s nothing dissonant about Mozart’s quartet except a short, brooding introduction. After that, it’s sunny and vivacious. The quartet — Andrew Bulbrook and Benjamin Jacobson, violins; Jonathan Moerschel, viola; and Eric Byers, cello — captured the frivolity often conjured by Mozart’s music. Melodies were tossed back and forth between players in the elegant give and take so crucial to good chamber music. The quartet played with a broad, dark tone. Phrases were weighted with color, tapering from one instrument to another.
"String Quartets by Ravel, Ades and Mozart" - Cleveland Plain Dealer, 06/26 2008The Calder Quartet will appear in the Cleveland Museum of Art's Viva! & Gala Around Town series Wednesday, Nov. 19, at Plymouth Church of Shaker Heights. But why wait to hear this galvanic ensemble, which is in residence at the Colburn School in Los Angeles? Ravel's String Quartet is a burst of seductive and ravishing ideas in their hands, and they treat the seven movements of Thomas Ades' enchanting "Arcadiana" with utmost clarity, color and cohesion. In Mozart's Quartet in F major, K. 590, the Calder catapult the score's invigorating material as vividly as they probe its dramatic corners. Grade: A
"Spin of the Week" - Strings Magazine, 06/19 2008Greg Cahill says, "There is an almost delirious display of rich coloration and complex textures that unify these three works, spanning 220 years of string literature. Yet the Calder Quartet—Benjamin Jacobson and Andrew Bulbrook, violins; Jonathan Moerschel, viola; and Eric Byers, cello—bring a sense of purpose to this adventurous program that underscores the group's stature as quartet-in-residence at the Colburn School in Los Angeles...."
Click below to read the entire article!
Click below to read the entire article!
"The Calder Quartet excelled in its challenging, esoteric repertoire at the Barns at Wolf Trap on Friday night." - Washington Post, 04/14 2008There's little that's typical in a typical performance by the Calder Quartet. This ensemble pushes the audience's boundaries, and sometimes its buttons. Friday night at the Barns at Wolf Trap, the players -- violinists Benjamin Jacobson and Andrew Bulbrook, violist Jonathan Moerschel and cellist Eric Byers -- probably included Mendelssohn's Capriccio, Op. 81, No. 3, just to show they could handle standard repertoire. Although the piece is actually a bit unusual -- featuring a fugue, that most uncapricious of forms -- the quartet gave it a straightforward, rather dry interpretation.
"Calder Quartet Shows Strength for Artist Series" - Tallahassee Democrat, 01/21 2008The Calders (Benjamin Jacobson and Andrew Bulbrook, violin, Jonathan Moerschel, viola, and Eric Byers, cello) opened their program with Felix Mendolssohn's "Capriccio," Op. 81, No. 3. This short work neatly showed where the quartet's strengths lie. They lyrical introduction showed their warm, cohesive sound, while the fast fugal section revealed their balanced approach to ensemble playing.
"Calder Crosses the Ages with Ease" - LA Times, 12/20 2007The Calder Quartet-- suave in appearance and elegantly unified in its playing-- is the model of the sleek young string quartet. The ensemble's technical accomplishment is very high. The four men dress alike: fitted suits, black shirts, skinny striped ties. They have a reverence for the formal Classical style and for formal Modernism as well.
"A Taste of the Carlsbad Music Festival-- in forward and reverse" - LA Times, 09/26 2007The Calders-- now an even more self-confident, powerhouse of a group than ever-- produced a warm, beautiful amplified string tone in the second movement of festival founder-director Matt McBane's "Ghost in the Machine" that the composer manipulated electronically with delicacy and restraint. The foursome then found considerable subtly shaded expressive depth in Philip Glass' "Company"...
"" - Strings Magazine, 00/00 0000
News 
New Calder Quartet Album! Never Before Recorded or Released Works by Terry Riley
Today, June 24, 2010, on Terry Riley's 75th birthday, we are releasing a recording of two of his very earliest works that have never been recorded or released prior to this.
Beginning today, "Terry Riley - Two Early Works," will be available for 75 days as a "pay-what-you-want" digital download at: calderquartet.bandcamp.com.
Additionally, we collaborated with artist Dave Muller to create 75 one-of-a-kind, limited-edition vinyl records. These will be available to order for $75 starting Thursday, June 24, 2010 at the above website.
Check out our New York Times Review
Go to our press section and check out the New York Times review that ran yesterday for our concert as part of the MATA festival.
The NYT said: "Tuesday’s concert by the superb Calder Quartet showed that the time-honored string quartet format still provides fertile ground for innovation and surprise in the hands of imaginative, skillful creators."
2009 Calder Quartet