Yarn/Wire 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival at Miller Theatre at Columbia University

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 Yarn/Wire 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival at Miller Theatre at Columbia University

Featuring Works by Craig Taborn, Zeena Parkins, Sam Pluta, Enno Poppe, Tyshawn Sorey, and Mei-Fang Lin 

“...questioning the boundaries of what music might be.” – The Guardian

“spellbinding virtuosity” – Time Out New York

www.yarnwire.org

New York, NY (September 18, 2025) – Described by The New York Times as “key figures from the contemporary music scene… with unmistakable devotion and excitement,” Yarn/Wire, New York-based percussion and piano quartet (Russell Greenberg and Sae Hashimoto, percussion; Laura Barger and Julia Den Boer, pianos), enters its 20th anniversary season with a celebratory 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival at Miller Theatre at Columbia University from October 27, 2025 to October 29, 2025.

"Yarn/Wire is one of my favorite ensembles—each of the musicians is a star and together they are a new music supergroup,” states Melissa Smey, Executive Director of Miller Theatre. “We have collaborated with Yarn/Wire on Miller Theatre's Composer Portraits and Pop-Up Concerts every season since 2013. Together, we have commissioned and premiered new work from composers including Zosha Di Castri, Sarah Hennies, Annea Lockwood, Thomas Meadowcroft, Misato Mochizuki, Lisa Streich, and Øyvind Torvund, among others. They play such an important role in our new music community and I am so excited to celebrate their 20th anniversary milestone with this special series of free Pop-Up Concerts." 

Yarn/Wire’s 20th Anniversary kicks off with a Pop-Up Festival, presented by Miller Theatre at Columbia University in New York, honoring the two decades of the group’s commitment to exceptional performances, vibrant commissions, and dynamic education and outreach efforts. On October 27 at 6:00 PM, Yarn/Wire performs new additions to harpist Zeena Parkins’ Lace Action Cards and electronic artist Sam Pluta’s Seven Systems, a sequence of seven interlocking movements that unfolds over a twenty minute span, with Parkins and Pluta joining the ensemble. Yarn/Wire’s relationship with Parkins began when she was a faculty member for Yarn/Wire’s institute.

Then, on October 28 at 6 PM, the group performs composer Enno Poppe’s Feld and a new work by pianist Craig Taborn, who joins the ensemble on stage. Feld, for two pianos and two percussion, creates its harmonic complexity through shifting combinations of sound. Pure, unaltered piano tones blend with unspecified percussive sounds—metals, woods, skins—to create new timbres and texture at every turn. Each of the two movements takes its inspiration from one half of the ensemble. The first is traditionally pianistic in its flowing, almost cinematic evolution of musical line and melody, while the second transitions into percussive alternations of noise and sound, highlighting the resonance and “space between” sounds.

The 20th anniversary celebration concludes on October 28 at 6 PM with performances of composer and percussionist Tyshawn Sorey’s For Ross Gay, a distillation from the process after working on Be Holding together with Yarn/Wire; Linda Catlin Smith's Morandi, which was composed in 1991 (originally commissioned through the Ontario Arts Council by Kitchener Waterloo’s New Art Quartet) and named after the 20th century Italian painter Giorgio Morandi and his still life paintings; and Mei-Fang Lin’s Yarny/Wiry, the first piece ever written for the ensemble. Sorey will join Yarn/Wire for the performance on percussion.

“The goal of this series was to program important existing ‘repertoire’ for the ensemble with new collaborations that result from a more flexible format with composer/performers—a direction that we have increasingly moved in over time,” says percussionist Russell Greenberg.

Attendees receive a free drink at these hour-long weeknight Pop-Up Concerts, and then can mingle with the musicians and fellow concertgoers after the show. Admission is free, and doors open at 5:30 PM, with music starting at 6:00 PM. 

Program

Monday, October 27, 2025 at 6:00 PM

Yarn/Wire 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival: Concert One

Miller Theatre at Columbia University | New York, NY

Link: www.millertheatre.com/events/celebrating-20-years-of-yarn-wire-concert-one

 

Program:

Zeena Parkins – Lace Action Cards [Expanded Version]

Sam Pluta – Seven Systems

 

Zeena Parkins, harp

Sam Pluta, electronics

Yarn/Wire

 

Tuesday, October 28, 2025 at 6:00 PM

Yarn/Wire 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival: Concert Two

Miller Theatre at Columbia University | New York, NY

Link: www.millertheatre.com/events/celebrating-20-years-of-yarn-wire-concert-two

 

Program:

Enno Poppe – Feld

Craig Taborn – New Work

 

Craig Taborn, piano

Yarn/Wire

 

Wednesday, October 29, 2025 at 6:00 PM

Yarn/Wire 20th Anniversary Pop-Up Festival: Concert Three

Miller Theatre at Columbia University | New York, NY

Link: www.millertheatre.com/events/celebrating-20-years-of-yarn-wire-concert-three

 

Program:

Tyshawn Sorey – For Ross Gay

Mei-Fang Lin – Yarny/Wiry
Linda Catlin Smith – Morandi

 

Tyshawn Sorey, percussion
Yarn/Wire

 

More About Yarn/Wire

Described by The New York Times as “key figures from the contemporary music scene… with unmistakable devotion and excitement” and “wildly virtuosic" by The Wire, Yarn/Wire is a New York-based percussion and piano quartet (Russell Greenberg, percussion and Sae Hashimoto; Laura Barger and Julia Den Boer, pianos) dedicated to the promotion of creative, experimental new music. Since its founding in 2005, the ensemble has garnered widespread acclaim for its steadfast commitment to adventurous compositions and unique collaborative approach to music making. With a worldwide presence, Yarn/Wire strives to connect with audiences, building community to help new compositions realize their full creative potential. New York Classical Review writes, “Yarn/Wire may well be the most important new music ensemble on the classical scene today." 

Yarn/Wire's 20th anniversary season in 2025-2026 exemplifies its expansive reach, musical breadth, and international acclaim, including its New York Philharmonic debut in the world premiere of a concerto for quartet and orchestra by George Lewis and a celebratory Pop-Up Festival at Columbia University’s Miller Theatre, which contains new works by Craig Taborn and Zeena Parkins. Earlier in the 25-26 season, the group performs the premiere of a collaborative new work by Raven Chacon and John Dieterich called Endlings at the Time:Spans Festival, appears at Swoonfest with TAK Ensemble and ISSUE Project Room in new works by Nate Wooley, presents Annea Lockwood’s Into The Vanishing Point at Harvard University, and is featured in Composer Portraits of Anthony Cheung and Andrew McIntosh at Miller Theatre at Columbia University, as well as holding several “Live from Troutman” performances at their Yarn/Wire Studio in Queens, NY and its annual Yarn/Wire Currents concert in Brooklyn, NY. Yarn/Wire’s international schedule includes Europe’s Transart Festival (Italy), Festival Aperto (Italy), Transit Festival (Belgium), and Aarhus Symphony Orchestra (Denmark). In the 2025-2026 season, Yarn/Wire will release Yarn/Wire Currents 10 and 11, sonic artist Katie Young's Biomes on Chaikin Records, and a portrait CD of Thomas Meadowcroft's music on MODE Records. They will also serve as Artists-in-Residence at the University of Washington.

In recent seasons, Yarn/Wire performed at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Miller Theatre at Columbia University, The McKnight Center for the Performing Arts, and more, as well as returning regularly to Miller Theatre, Time:Spans Festival, Italian Academy at Columbia University, and Pioneer Works (NYC). Yarn/Wire performed Øyvind Torvund’s children’s piece, The Sound of the Forest at the Ultima Festival in Norway. Yarn/Wire also held educational and performance residencies at Harvard, Princeton, IRCAM (Paris), Emory University, Georgia Tech, and UC Berkeley.

A fixture at the world’s preeminent halls and music festivals, Yarn/Wire has performed at Lincoln Center and Brooklyn Academy of Music (New York, USA), Donaueschingen Musiktage and MaerzMusik (Germany), Shanghai Symphony Orchestra Hall (China), Dublin SoundLab (Ireland), and Monday Evening Concerts (Los Angeles, USA); plus numerous European music festivals: the Edinburgh International Festival (Scotland); the Eclat Festival (Stuttgart, Germany); Rainy Days (Luxembourg), Ultima (Norway), Transit (Belgium), Contemplus (Prague), Manifeste (France), and Wien Modern (Austria).

Through hundreds of commissions over 19 years, Yarn/Wire has championed composers including Annea Lockwood, Enno Poppe, Michael Gordon, George Lewis, Ingrid Laubrock, Ann Cleare, Catherine Lamb, Sarah Hennies, Tyshawn Sorey, Peter Evans, Alex Mincek, Thomas Meadowcroft, Misato Mochizuki, Sam Pluta, Tyondai Braxton, Kate Soper, and Øyvind Torvund. The ensemble enjoys collaborations with genre-bending artists such as Tristan Perich, Ben Vida, Mark Fell, Sufjan Stevens, and Pete Swanson. In previous seasons, Yarn/Wire performed at Bergen International Festival (Norway) with JACK Quartet. In addition, their ongoing commissioning series, Yarn/Wire/Currents, serves as an incubator for new experimental music in partnership with a variety of Brooklyn-based institutions, including Roulette, Blank Forms, and ISSUE Project Room

In Spring 2023, the Ensemble premiered Sorey’s multidisciplinary performance work, Be Holding, as part of their multi-year residency at Girard College in Philadelphia. Using poet Ross Gay’s book-length poem inspired by Philadelphia basketball champion Julius Erving (a.k.a. “Dr. J”) as its libretto, the piece explored themes of Black genius and beauty in the face of racial violence and inequities. Other past highlights include a debut appearance at the Big Ears Festival; Michael Gordon's tour-de-force Material in Leuven, Belgium; and performances at Bowerbird (Philadelphia), The Momentary (Bentonville), and The Stone. 

Yarn/Wire has recorded for the WERGO, Kairos, New Amsterdam, Northern Spy, Distributed Objects, Black Truffle, Shelter Press, Populist, and Carrier record labels, in addition to maintaining their own imprint. Past releases include Tonband, featuring works by Enno Poppe and Wolfgang Heiniger, on the WERGO label; Annea Lockwood’s Becoming Air and Into the Vanishing with trumpeter Nate Wooley on Black Truffle Records; Yarn/Wire Currents 7 featuring works by Victoria Cheah, Zeno Baldi, and Diana Rodriguez; Marcel Zaes’ Parallel Prints; the piano and percussion works of Andrew McIntosh; and many more. Recent releases include Yarn/Wire Currents 8 and 9, plus a portrait album of the works of Thomas Meadowcroft on MODE Records.

A strong advocate for education, Yarn/Wire has presented collaborative workshops, masterclasses, and residencies at Princeton University, Columbia University, Harvard University, Stanford University, Brown University, Duke University, Northwestern University, Cornell University, Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Adelphi University, UC Santa Cruz, Girard College, Brandeis University, and University of Pennsylvania.

Since 2014, the ensemble has hosted the annual Yarn/Wire International Institute and Festival for composers and performers interested in exploring the collaborative side of contemporary music, in which they get the opportunity to study with and interact with the ensemble and faculty. Affordable, accessible, and open to all instruments, the institute has been organized around a mission to challenge and deepen our understanding of performance, scholarship, and practice. The Yarn/Wire Institute Festival provides both participants and the public a week of free performances on Long Island and in NYC. Festival attendees have access to interact with Yarn/Wire members as well as leading mentors such as Tyshawn Sorey, Vicky Chow, Ann Cleare, Wang Lu, Klaus Lang, Catherine Lamb, Michelle Lou, Peter Evans, and Eduardo Leandro.

At the core of Yarn/Wire's artistic mission is its dedication to transformative work and creating unforgettable experiences. Through performances, commissions, collaborations, and mentorship initiatives, the ensemble's commitment to pushing creative boundaries leaves an impact on audiences and composers alike.

For more information, please visit www.yarnwire.org. 

*Photo Credit: Pascal Perich

 

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