Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition Announces 2019-20 Season with Over 40 World Premieres

19-20 Season Highlights

• Over 40 world premiere works by established and emerging composers
• Seven commissioned guest composers: Tania León, Zosha Di Castri, David Serkin Ludwig, Paula Matthusen, Stephen A. Taylor, Jay Alan Yim, Du Yun
• Three guest conductors: Oliver Hagen, Jerry Hou, Michael Lewanski
• Three guest ensembles: Third Coast Percussion, HEAR in NOW, Plena Libre
• Access to the artists: Open rehearsals and after-parties
• Five free concerts

CHICAGO - The University of Chicago’s Center for Contemporary Composition (CCCC) is pleased to announce the 2019-20 concert season featuring nine concerts with seven CCCC commissioned works and over 40 world premieres. Tania León will serve as this season’s Distinguished Guest Composer, joining 6 other commissioned guest composers and a number of other local established and emerging composers. 

"The CCCC nurtures enterprising experiences for music-making and fun!” said Founder and Director Augusta Read Thomas. “In our second full season, we are thrilled to welcome our first-ever Distinguished Guest Composer, the dynamic Tania León, who will expand the impact of our program beyond the classroom and concert hall. Her residency exemplifies the interconnected nature of our work and capacity for social good in the field of contemporary composition. I invite audiences to join us this season and become part of our creative community."

The CCCC’s resident Grossman Ensemble performs 12 world premiere works, seven commissioned by the CCCC, in three concerts this season. This recently formed ensemble of contemporary music specialists has a unique workshopping and rehearsal process that was highly praised by both musicians and composers during the first season. The conductors lead five rehearsals, spread over a three-month time, prior to the debut of the works. Each composer introduces their work from the stage in the approximately hour-long concerts, and they join the musicians and audience for an after-party.

This season the CCCC features Tania León as the Distinguished Guest Composer. León is a internationally lauded Cuban-born composer and conductor recognized for her accomplishments as an educator and advisor to arts organizations. She has received Honorary Doctorate Degrees from Colgate University, Oberlin and SUNY Purchase Colleges, and as Professor at Brooklyn College, where she has taught since 1985, she was named Distinguished Professor of the City University of New York in 2006. In addition to a Grossman Ensemble world premiere, León extends her time on the UChicago campus with mini residencies. She will teach private lessons, present in classes and seminars, participate in a lunch and moderated discussion with Plena Libre, and engage in several outreach activities benefitting the city of Chicago and the Southside community.  

Six other guest composers have been commissioned by the CCCC to create new works for the Grossman Ensemble, which will be led by three guest conductors this season.

Guest composers:

• Zosha Di Castri is a Canadian composer whose work extends beyond pure concert music, to include sound arts and interdisciplinary collaborations. She serves as the Francis Goelet Assistant Professor of Music at Columbia University.
• David Serkin Ludwig’s diverse career has led to working with today’s leading soloists, ensembles, filmmakers, choreographers, and writers. Ludwig is chair of the composition faculty of the Curtis Institute where he also serves as the Gie and Lisa Liem Artistic Advisor.
• Paula Matthusen’s music and sound installations consider discrepancies in musical space—real, imagined, and remembered. Matthusen is currently Associate Professor of Music at Wesleyan University. 
• Stephen A. Taylor composes music that explores boundaries between art and science. Taylor is Professor of Music at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
• Jay Alan Yim’s collaborative intermedia projects explore the use of the senses to trigger reassessment of existing situations. He is co-founder of the “localStyle” collaborative and coordinator of the composition and music technology program at Northwestern University.
• Pulitzer Prize-winner Du Yun’s work exists at an artistic crossroads of music, theatre, opera, cabaret, storytelling, visual arts, and noise. She is the Artistic Director of MATA Festival, a pioneering organization dedicated to commissioning and presenting young composers from around the world.

Guest conductors:

• Oliver Hagen is a conductor and GRAMMY-winning pianist who has guest-led with ensembles and orchestras around the world. Hagen is on faculty in the Juilliard Pre-College Division.
• Jerry Hou has gained recognition as a versatile and exciting young conductor. He is the Associate Conductor for The Shepherd School of Music.
• Michael Lewanski is an educator, writer, and conductor of Ensemble Dal Niente and Associate Professor of instrumental ensembles at the DePaul University School of Music.

The 19-20 Postdoctoral Researcher, Iranian-Canadian composer Ashkan Behzadi, will also premiere three new works this season. Behzadi’s music has won numerous competitions including the Graham Sommer Second Prize, the Prix de Composition at Fontainebleau, and a number of SOCAN Foundation awards. Behzadi will also teach an undergraduate course, provide music lessons, and participate in CCCC workshops, seminars, and events.

Composers Anthony Cheung, Alison Yun-Fei Jiang, David “Clay” Mettens, and Will Myers also receive world premieres by the Grossman Ensemble, and UChicago composer Rodrigo Bussad and Austrian composer G.F. Haas (commissioned by Third Coast Percussion) receive world premieres on Third Coast Percussion’s season-opening performance.

Third Coast Percussion is one of three guest ensembles performing on the CCCC’s 19-20 season. The GRAMMY-award winning quartet will open the concert season with a program of engaging works and world premieres. HEAR in NOW, a collaborative trio performing original jazz-tinged avant-classical compositions, presents a concert of experimental music and the University of Chicago’s Don Michael Randel Ensemble in Residence, Plena Libre, will perform a concert of world premiere compositions by UChicago graduate students as part of a yearlong collaborative project.

In addition to the mainstage performances, CHIMEfest 2020 will occur in February this season, bringing keynote speaker Cathy van Eck to campus for two days of workshops, talks and performances related to the theme of “Circulations” in electronic music. Rounding out the series are two concerts produced by UChicago graduate composers. The first project, SITE/less, features six world premiere works for saxophonist Allison Balcetis paired with handcrafted cocktails. The second project, New Chamber Concerti, offers new perspectives on the concerto in miniature form. In addition to the premieres of their works, the graduate students will gain indispensable entrepreneurial, organizational, and budgeting skills through the production of these concerts.

For more information, visit cccc.uchicago.edu.