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Press Releases
The S.E.M. Ensemble Opens Its 40th Season, December 15
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Isabelle Deconinck
212-727-7662
The S.E.M Ensemble opens its 40th season with its annual Christmas concert at Paula Cooper Gallery (NYC)
Music by Christian Wolff, Petr Kotik, Lejaren Hiller, and J. S. Bach
Special guests Christian Wolff and TimeTable Percussion
December 15, 2009
New York, NY–The S.E.M. Ensemble – founded and directed by Petr Kotik – will open its 40th season at Paula Cooper Gallery’s main space in Chelsea on Tuesday, December 15 (8 pm). Highlights include two compositions by Christian Wolff – Flutist “with Percussion” (2003) and For John / Material (2007); the first public performance of Petr Kotik’s 3, 6 & 10 for John Cage (2009); and Lejaren Hiller’s rarely performed String Quartet No. 5 (In Quarter-tones) (1962). Since SEM performed its first concert at Paula Cooper Gallery on Christmas Eve 1984, it has become a tradition to include an early music piece, and the December 15 program will also feature J. S. Bach’s Sonata No. 1 in B-Minor (circa 1720). Guest soloists for the evening are Christian Wolff (performing on various percussion and wind instruments) and the innovative new music group, TimeTable Percussion.
Written for flutist Petr Kotik and percussionist Chris Nappi and premiered at Ostrava Days 2003 Festival, Christian Wolff’s Flutist “with Percussion” will be performed by Kotik and two SEM percussionists. In this piece, musicians go through their material independently and are given free space to listen to each other and make intuitive decisions as to playing or be silent. A tribute to John Cage, For John – Material is similar to Flutist. It features sections that can be played in any sequence chosen by the performer, resulting in a kind of anarchic canon. The two pieces will be performed continuously, with Wolff and additional SEM players joining in.
TimeTable Percussion will give the first public reading of Petr Kotik’s 3, 6, & 10 for John Cage. The title refers to 3 percussionists performing with 6 hands on 10 instruments. Kotik was inspired to write the piece after hearing TimeTable’s recent NYC appearance. It is dedicated to John Cage as a tribute to his deeply moving performance of Cheap Imitation, which Kotik heard at the Merce Cunningham Memorial at the Park Avenue Armory.
An eclectic and versatile composer renowned for his pioneering work with computer music, but also for a wide range of other compositions, Lejaren Hiller composed his String Quartet No. 5 in 1962. The work is written in an even-tempered, quarter-tone scale, demanding of the performers a new playing technique, as well as new ways of listening to each other. It makes extensive use of serial procedures applied to 24-note (quarter-tone) rows. Originally premiered by the Concord String Quartet, String Quartet No. 5 will be performed by members of the S.E.M. Ensemble.
The 15 December program will also include Bach’s Sonata in B-Minor for flute and continuo, performed by Petr Kotik on flute with SEM members Bradley Brookshire on harpsichord and Gregory Hesselink on cello.
S.E.M. ENSEMBLE
40th Season’s opening concert
Petr Kotik, Director/Flutist; Christian Wolff, special guest; TimeTable Percussion
Christian Wolff: Flutist “with Percussion” (2003), For John / Material (2007), Christian Wolff, special guest
Petr Kotik: 3, 6 & 10 for John Cage (2009) (First public performance) Performed by TimeTable Percussion
Lejaren Hiller: String Quartet No. 5 (1962)
J. S. Bach: Sonata No. 1 in B-Minor for flute and continuo (circa 1720)
When: Tuesday, December 15, 2009, 8pm
Where: Paula Cooper Gallery, 534 West 21st Street, New York Tickets: $15, Students and Seniors $10
Info & Reservations: (718) 488-7659 or pksem@semensemble.org
The S.E. M. Ensemble:
In 1969, Petr Kotik landed at JFK on his way from Prague to Buffalo, NY, to complete a fellowship at the Center for the Creative and Performing at SUNY/Buffalo, upon the invitation of directors Lejaren Hiller and Lucas Foss. Kotik’s decision to relocate permanently in the U.S. was brought about by the 1968 invasion and occupation of his native Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union, making it impossible for him to continue working there. Shortly after his arrival, Kotik organized a group of musicians from within the circle of fellows at the Center under the name S.E.M. Ensemble. The first S.E.M. Ensemble concert was presented in Buffalo on April 15, 1970, with a program featuring works by Cornelius Cardew (2-hour version of Treatise), John Cage, Petr Kotik and Rudolf Komorous. Since then, the S.E.M. Ensemble has made a considerable mark on today’s music, devoting itself to the performance and advancement of new music, from chamber to orchestral compositions. Over the past 30 years, the repertoire of SEM has included compositions by Brown, Wolff, Lucier, Cage, Feldman, Kotik, Niblock, Somei Satoh, Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Threadgill, and Muhal Richard Abrams. SEM can be heard on Wergo, Asphodel, and Dog w/a Bone labels.
Known for its riveting performances of new and experimental music, TimeTable Percussion invites audiences to experience percussion up close. The group specializes in music that crosses boundaries of style and discipline, with an emphasis on works that challenge the language and materials of percussion music. TimeTable collaborates closely with emerging and established composers to investigate and expand the possibilities for percussion-based music, and commissions, premieres, and records an ever-growing body of new works. TimeTable maintains an active performance schedule including concerts in New York City and beyond, and collaborations with other ensembles and composer collectives.
A prolific and versatile composer, Lejaren Hiller (1924-1994) played piano, oboe, clarinet and saxophone as a child, although his early obsession with piano remained with him throughout his life. At Princeton University, in addition to compositional studies with Milton Babbitt and Roger Sessions, Hiller earned a degree in chemistry and became a respected expert in the field. Hiller’s experimental, scientific spirit made him among the first musicians to work with computers and a pioneer in the realm of algorithmic composition. He is best known for the Illiac Suite (String Quartet No. 4) which he “composed” by computer in collaboration with Leonard Isaacs in 1955 and as a collaborator of John Cage for the large multimedia project HPSCHD. In 1958, Hiller founded the Experimental Music Studio at the University of Illinois. His works are by no means limited to computer music and include various other styles and genres, combining the most contradictory influences (from indeterminism and stochastic composition to Brahmsian romanticism, performance art and jazz). He was definitely among the first to begin using “field recordings” in his compositions. From 1968 through 1989, Hiller taught at the University of Buffalo, where he was one of the directors of the famed Center for the Creative and Performing Arts. He was a very inspirational teacher, and among his pupils were James Tenney and Peter Gena.
Petr Kotik (b.1942) entered the Prague Conservatory to study flute at age 14 and four years later began private lessons in compositions. He left for the U.S. in 1969, and in 1970 founded the S.E.M. Ensemble, which later expanded into The Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble (1992). Among Kotik's best-known compositions are Many Many Women (1976-78) on a text by Gertrude Stein and Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking (1978-81) on texts by R. Buckminster Fuller, as well as recent orchestral works Quiescent Form (1996) and Music in Two Movements (1998-2002) and Variations for 3 Orchestras (2005). Kotik’s compositional system can be compared to a game in which the use of controlled chance is balanced by intuitively led decision-making. Kotik has been the recipient of composition grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the prestigious composition award from the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts. Kotik is the founder and artistic director of the biennial summer institute and festival Ostrava Days in Ostrava, Czech Republic, which was realized in 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2009.
Christian Wolff (b.1934, Nice, France) studied piano at an early age with Grete Sultan, who, witnessing her student’s precocious creative endeavours, sent him to study composition with her friend, John Cage. Wolff went on earning a doctorate in classics from Harvard University. He remained to teach classics there until 1970, and then at Dartmouth College until 1999. Yet, Wolff continued to follow an independent approach to music, directed at effacing the differences between the artist, the interpreter, and the listener. Among many distinguished awards and honors, he was appointed a “Ford Composer” at Mills College and was also a composer/lecturer at the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany. Wolff’s work alludes much more to the authenticity of expression in folk and workers’ songs than it does to typical concert music and it contains strong non-musical influences: political conviction, personality features and in particular poetry. Wolff’s is, however, essentially a joyful and transparently sounding music, which rejects any form of pretence. In his famous lecture ‘45´for a Speaker,’ John Cage said: ‘Something occurred to me about the music of Christian Wolff: the only way to approach it is to suddenly listen, in the same way that you have to suddenly sneeze when you have a cold...’
This concert is made possible thanks to support from the Paula Cooper Gallery, New York State Council on the Arts, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, Phaedrus Foundation and individual contributions.
The S.E.M Ensemble opens its 40th season with its annual Christmas concert at Paula Cooper Gallery (NYC)
Music by Christian Wolff, Petr Kotik, Lejaren Hiller, and J. S. Bach
Special guests Christian Wolff and TimeTable Percussion
December 15, 2009
New York, NY–The S.E.M. Ensemble – founded and directed by Petr Kotik – will open its 40th season at Paula Cooper Gallery’s main space in Chelsea on Tuesday, December 15 (8 pm). Highlights include two compositions by Christian Wolff – Flutist “with Percussion” (2003) and For John / Material (2007); the first public performance of Petr Kotik’s 3, 6 & 10 for John Cage (2009); and Lejaren Hiller’s rarely performed String Quartet No. 5 (In Quarter-tones) (1962). Since SEM performed its first concert at Paula Cooper Gallery on Christmas Eve 1984, it has become a tradition to include an early music piece, and the December 15 program will also feature J. S. Bach’s Sonata No. 1 in B-Minor (circa 1720). Guest soloists for the evening are Christian Wolff (performing on various percussion and wind instruments) and the innovative new music group, TimeTable Percussion.
Written for flutist Petr Kotik and percussionist Chris Nappi and premiered at Ostrava Days 2003 Festival, Christian Wolff’s Flutist “with Percussion” will be performed by Kotik and two SEM percussionists. In this piece, musicians go through their material independently and are given free space to listen to each other and make intuitive decisions as to playing or be silent. A tribute to John Cage, For John – Material is similar to Flutist. It features sections that can be played in any sequence chosen by the performer, resulting in a kind of anarchic canon. The two pieces will be performed continuously, with Wolff and additional SEM players joining in.
TimeTable Percussion will give the first public reading of Petr Kotik’s 3, 6, & 10 for John Cage. The title refers to 3 percussionists performing with 6 hands on 10 instruments. Kotik was inspired to write the piece after hearing TimeTable’s recent NYC appearance. It is dedicated to John Cage as a tribute to his deeply moving performance of Cheap Imitation, which Kotik heard at the Merce Cunningham Memorial at the Park Avenue Armory.
An eclectic and versatile composer renowned for his pioneering work with computer music, but also for a wide range of other compositions, Lejaren Hiller composed his String Quartet No. 5 in 1962. The work is written in an even-tempered, quarter-tone scale, demanding of the performers a new playing technique, as well as new ways of listening to each other. It makes extensive use of serial procedures applied to 24-note (quarter-tone) rows. Originally premiered by the Concord String Quartet, String Quartet No. 5 will be performed by members of the S.E.M. Ensemble.
The 15 December program will also include Bach’s Sonata in B-Minor for flute and continuo, performed by Petr Kotik on flute with SEM members Bradley Brookshire on harpsichord and Gregory Hesselink on cello.
S.E.M. ENSEMBLE
40th Season’s opening concert
Petr Kotik, Director/Flutist; Christian Wolff, special guest; TimeTable Percussion
Christian Wolff: Flutist “with Percussion” (2003), For John / Material (2007), Christian Wolff, special guest
Petr Kotik: 3, 6 & 10 for John Cage (2009) (First public performance) Performed by TimeTable Percussion
Lejaren Hiller: String Quartet No. 5 (1962)
J. S. Bach: Sonata No. 1 in B-Minor for flute and continuo (circa 1720)
When: Tuesday, December 15, 2009, 8pm
Where: Paula Cooper Gallery, 534 West 21st Street, New York Tickets: $15, Students and Seniors $10
Info & Reservations: (718) 488-7659 or pksem@semensemble.org
The S.E. M. Ensemble:
In 1969, Petr Kotik landed at JFK on his way from Prague to Buffalo, NY, to complete a fellowship at the Center for the Creative and Performing at SUNY/Buffalo, upon the invitation of directors Lejaren Hiller and Lucas Foss. Kotik’s decision to relocate permanently in the U.S. was brought about by the 1968 invasion and occupation of his native Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union, making it impossible for him to continue working there. Shortly after his arrival, Kotik organized a group of musicians from within the circle of fellows at the Center under the name S.E.M. Ensemble. The first S.E.M. Ensemble concert was presented in Buffalo on April 15, 1970, with a program featuring works by Cornelius Cardew (2-hour version of Treatise), John Cage, Petr Kotik and Rudolf Komorous. Since then, the S.E.M. Ensemble has made a considerable mark on today’s music, devoting itself to the performance and advancement of new music, from chamber to orchestral compositions. Over the past 30 years, the repertoire of SEM has included compositions by Brown, Wolff, Lucier, Cage, Feldman, Kotik, Niblock, Somei Satoh, Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Threadgill, and Muhal Richard Abrams. SEM can be heard on Wergo, Asphodel, and Dog w/a Bone labels.
Known for its riveting performances of new and experimental music, TimeTable Percussion invites audiences to experience percussion up close. The group specializes in music that crosses boundaries of style and discipline, with an emphasis on works that challenge the language and materials of percussion music. TimeTable collaborates closely with emerging and established composers to investigate and expand the possibilities for percussion-based music, and commissions, premieres, and records an ever-growing body of new works. TimeTable maintains an active performance schedule including concerts in New York City and beyond, and collaborations with other ensembles and composer collectives.
A prolific and versatile composer, Lejaren Hiller (1924-1994) played piano, oboe, clarinet and saxophone as a child, although his early obsession with piano remained with him throughout his life. At Princeton University, in addition to compositional studies with Milton Babbitt and Roger Sessions, Hiller earned a degree in chemistry and became a respected expert in the field. Hiller’s experimental, scientific spirit made him among the first musicians to work with computers and a pioneer in the realm of algorithmic composition. He is best known for the Illiac Suite (String Quartet No. 4) which he “composed” by computer in collaboration with Leonard Isaacs in 1955 and as a collaborator of John Cage for the large multimedia project HPSCHD. In 1958, Hiller founded the Experimental Music Studio at the University of Illinois. His works are by no means limited to computer music and include various other styles and genres, combining the most contradictory influences (from indeterminism and stochastic composition to Brahmsian romanticism, performance art and jazz). He was definitely among the first to begin using “field recordings” in his compositions. From 1968 through 1989, Hiller taught at the University of Buffalo, where he was one of the directors of the famed Center for the Creative and Performing Arts. He was a very inspirational teacher, and among his pupils were James Tenney and Peter Gena.
Petr Kotik (b.1942) entered the Prague Conservatory to study flute at age 14 and four years later began private lessons in compositions. He left for the U.S. in 1969, and in 1970 founded the S.E.M. Ensemble, which later expanded into The Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble (1992). Among Kotik's best-known compositions are Many Many Women (1976-78) on a text by Gertrude Stein and Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking (1978-81) on texts by R. Buckminster Fuller, as well as recent orchestral works Quiescent Form (1996) and Music in Two Movements (1998-2002) and Variations for 3 Orchestras (2005). Kotik’s compositional system can be compared to a game in which the use of controlled chance is balanced by intuitively led decision-making. Kotik has been the recipient of composition grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the prestigious composition award from the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts. Kotik is the founder and artistic director of the biennial summer institute and festival Ostrava Days in Ostrava, Czech Republic, which was realized in 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2009.
Christian Wolff (b.1934, Nice, France) studied piano at an early age with Grete Sultan, who, witnessing her student’s precocious creative endeavours, sent him to study composition with her friend, John Cage. Wolff went on earning a doctorate in classics from Harvard University. He remained to teach classics there until 1970, and then at Dartmouth College until 1999. Yet, Wolff continued to follow an independent approach to music, directed at effacing the differences between the artist, the interpreter, and the listener. Among many distinguished awards and honors, he was appointed a “Ford Composer” at Mills College and was also a composer/lecturer at the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany. Wolff’s work alludes much more to the authenticity of expression in folk and workers’ songs than it does to typical concert music and it contains strong non-musical influences: political conviction, personality features and in particular poetry. Wolff’s is, however, essentially a joyful and transparently sounding music, which rejects any form of pretence. In his famous lecture ‘45´for a Speaker,’ John Cage said: ‘Something occurred to me about the music of Christian Wolff: the only way to approach it is to suddenly listen, in the same way that you have to suddenly sneeze when you have a cold...’
This concert is made possible thanks to support from the Paula Cooper Gallery, New York State Council on the Arts, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, Phaedrus Foundation and individual contributions.
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