Tune-In Festival
eighth blackbird, red fish blue fish, Argento Chamber Ensemble, Newspeak, Sympho, Paul Haas, John Luther Adams
February 16, 2011 - February 20, 2011
Wade Thompson Drill Hall
Grammy Award-winning eighth blackbird curates and performs at the Armory’s five-day music festival, bringing together some of today’s leading new music groups, including red fish blue fish, Argento Chamber Ensemble, Sympho, and Newspeak. Within the vast Wade Thompson Drill Hall, the audience becomes part of the musical experience. Works by Steve Reich, Frederic Rzewski, John Cage, Louis Andriessen, Kurt Schwitters, David T. Little, Stefan Weisman, and Matt Marks will be performed. Closing the festival is the New York—and indoor—premiere of John Luther Adams’ percussion-only Inuksuit, which features 72 performers moving throughout the expansive hall during the performance. The festival also includes the world premiere of ARCO, a new work commissioned by the Armory, co-composed by Paul Haas, Paul Fowler, and Bora Yoon, and performed by Sympho.
eighth blackbird’s program is inspired by Stravinsky’s provocative statement, “Music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all.” At the heart of the festival are two concerts that challenge Stravinsky’s statement by taking radical positions: for the negative (powerFUL), and for the affirmative (powerLESS). The concluding event (Inuksuit) provides musical (or spiritual) balm after the fray.
Performances
ARCO
Wednesday, February 16, 2011 at 7:30pm
POWERFUL
Thursday, February 17, 2011 at 7:30pm
POWERLESS
Friday, February 18, 2011 at 7:30pm
INUKSUIT
Sunday, February 20, 2011 at 4:00pm
“The mix-and-match citations – melodic, harmonic and rhythmic – were obviously fraught with intellectual subtlety and evolutionary significance.”
The Financial Times on "ARCO"
“The highlight was a riveting performance of John Cage’s early masterpiece “Credo in Us” … in the cavernous armory its martial rhythms, beaten out on tin cans and with an electric buzzer, were less biting than poignant”
The New York Times on "powerFUL"
“I was entranced by the shimmering soundscapes of “In Vain,” a 75-minute work for 24 musicians, when I first heard it at the Miller Theater in 2009. It proved equally dazzling when the Argento Chamber Ensemble performed it in pitch darkness in the vast Park Avenue Armory”
The New York Times on "powerLESS"
“no recording, even the most sophisticated, will begin to capture the head-spinning richness of the sound in the room.”
The Rest Is Noise on "Inuksuit"
About the Program
Each concert is preceded by an Artist Talk with Armory Consulting Artistic Director Kristy Edmunds and the artists and key creative forces behind the evening’s concert.
Gallery
Support
The 2011 Tune-In Music Festival is supported by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, The Reed Foundation, and the Amphion Foundation, Inc.
