Mike Anderson
June 17, 2015
WISN 12
Mike Anderson reports on the upcoming Rolling Stones performance and their back-up singers, the UWM Concert Chorale. Watch the entire clip here: WISN 12
Music
06/25/2015
Music - UWM Concert Chorale sings backup for The Rolling Stones
Todd Hicks
June 24, 2015
TMJ4
A local choir got more than a little satisfaction.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee's Concert Chorale sang backup for one of the biggest rock groups in history, The Rolling Stones, Tuesday night.
Durlam and members of the choir are still giddy from their performance.
"You feel like a rockstar for a short time," said UWM Choir Director Zachary Durlam. "It was amazing to feel that rush of energy from all the fans.
Read the full article here: TMJ4
Music - UWM chorus members to perform with The Rolling Stones
David Schuyler
June 17, 2015
Milwaukee Business Journal
Members of the UWM Concert Chorale will perform with The Rolling Stones when the legendary rock and roll band makes its pre-Summerfest appearance at the Marcus Amphitheater June 23.
On recent tours, the Stones have been selecting local choirs to perform on stage during the song, "You Can't Always Get What You Want." An announcement from UWM did not indicate what song or songs the UWM students may perform.
Read the full article here: Milwaukee Business Journal
06/18/2015
UWM chorus members to perform with The Rolling Stones
David Schuyler
Milwaukee Business Journal
June 17, 2015
Members of the UWM Concert Chorale will perform with The Rolling Stones when the legendary rock and roll band makes its pre-Summerfest appearance at the Marcus Amphitheater June 23.
On recent tours, the Stones have been selecting local choirs to perform on stage during the song, "You Can't Always Get What You Want." An announcement from UWM did not indicate what song or songs the UWM students may perform.
Read the full article here: Milwaukee Business Journal
06/11/2015
UWM Music Professor Composes New Work to Glowing International Review
UWM - Music Composition & Technology Professor and Unruly Music Festival Director, Christopher Burns, has long been enamored with composer Luigi Nono. "La Lontananza Nostalgica Utopica Futura" (Nono's work for violin and electronics, composed in 1988-89) has been featured on several of Christopher's past recital programs, but in 2011, Christopher received an unlikely, but timely invitation to perform his favorite piece with renowned violinist Miranda Cuckson.
On their collaboration, Christopher states, "Her thoughtfulness, detailed musicianship, and inventive approach to the performance of the Nono, inspired me to compose a new work especially for her." The result, "Come Ricordi Come Sogni Come Echi," was also written as a response to the then late composer, Luigi Nono. The translation, "Like Memories Like Dreams Like Echoes," is a six-part study that examines some of "La Lontananza's" most compelling ideas and elements.
Christopher's piece was recorded for Miranda's most recent album, "Melting the Darkness," (Urlicht Audiovisual, November 2014) and received glowing reviews in popular music magazines, including DownBeat & The Wire: Adventures In Modern Music.
Listen Here
"…the six-part Come Ricordi Come Echi Come Sogni by Christopher Burns — written as a response to the late Luigi Nono masterpiece La Lontananza Nostalgica Utopica Futura, which they’ve worked extensively on together — is a gripping study of the many frictive, textured sounds used in the original piece.” — Peter Margasak, DownBeat Magazine, March 2015
“Christopher Burns’ Come Ricordi Come Sogni Come Echi (2011) is a solo violin tribute to Luigi Nono. The new piece is a gritty, demanding listen, with vocal accompaniment by the soloist, and subsequent microtonal counterpoint.” — Andy Hamilton, The Wire, April 2015
06/08/2015
Music - Music That’s Fresh Off The Page
Michael Barndt
Urban Milwaukee Dial
June 4, 2015
The Fine Arts Quartet’s second concert in the Summer Evenings series on Sunday June 7th features three compositions separated by centuries. The Quartet (violinists Ralph Evans and Efim Boico, cellist Robert Cohen and violist Juan-Miguel Hernandez) will play works by Beethoven, Debussy and GuillaumeConnesson.
Ludwig van Beethoven wrote String Quartet No 1 in F major, Op.18, no 1 in 1799. This early work reflects his debt to Mozart and Haydn.
The first movement contrasts a light, syncopated melody with a sparse motif that critic Joseph Kermandescribed as “a coiled spring, ready to shoot off in all directions. ” The emotional second movement is said to be inspired by the tomb scene from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
Read the full article here: Urban Milwaukee Dial
05/20/2015
Dance - UWM’s Summerdances
John Schneider
Shepherd Express
5/12/15
Modern dance in Milwaukee is unthinkable without UW-Milwaukee’s Peck School of the Arts dance department. The faculty includes leaders of every major modern dance company in town. The department conducts dance research and experiments as serious as those of any school of science or technology and offers opportunities for audiences to enjoy the results. Chief among these is Summerdances, the annual concert of new work by faculty, guests and students that closes each school year.
Read the full article: Shepherd Express
04/20/2015
Music - Unruly Music Festival: Night Three (April 18, 2015)
Unruly Music Festival: Night Three (April 18, 2015)
A review by UWM Music student, Aidan Menuge
This season of Unruly concluded tonight with a performance of bassoonist and electronic performer Katherine Young’s piece Diligence is to Magic as Progress is to Flight in collaboration with violinist and violist J. Austin Wulliman. The hour-long, multi-movement piece comprised the entire program for the evening, and what an evening it was!
The piece began with Katherine Young at her laptop and an extended electronic introduction, the material seemingly derived from recordings of Wulliman performing on his violin. The visceral sounds of wood and string surrounded and whirled about the audience, as though the listener were almost inside a violin itself.
Wulliman’s entrance onto the stage signaled the next section, and the electronics combined with his performance on an amplified violin. Timbres and gestures crossed from the digital world into the acoustic and back again, and the sounds chosen seemed to suggest the slow emergence of the violin from the electronics, with whispered gestures and slow, pressured bowings.
This form seemed to continue through the next movement as Wulliman moved to another violin and performed a flurry of staccato phrases. This was followed by a change to the viola underscored by brief, interjecting drum strikes from Katherine Young and the electronics. It seemed as though the strings had overtaken, and the electronics were set fade away into nothingness.
A bassoon and violin duet followed, with the only electronics coming from Katherine Young’s effect pedals on the bassoon and the amplification of the violin. Airy bowings and breathy tones allowed timbres to flow from one instrument to the other, and the listener’s attention was constantly torn between the two performers.
The electronics then began to return, at first through a projected film and then with gestures much like those that began the piece. They had not been removed, but continued to thrive alongside the violin as the piece came to an end.
Summarizing such an expansive work invariable leaves something out, but what I have described above was the exciting unfolding I experienced as a listener at this semester’s exceptional finale to the Unruly Music Festival.
04/18/2015
Music - Unruly Music Festival: Night Two (April 17, 2015)
Unruly Music Festival: Night Two (April 17, 2015)
A review by UWM Music student, Aidan Menuge
Tonight’s account of Unruly Music will be a little different than yesterday’s as I had the exceptional fortune to have one of my own pieces premiered by the festival’s second guest artist ensemble, Quince! From the perspective of a student, I think it worthwhile to discuss the experience I and the other student composers had working with the ensemble.
Working with a professional ensemble of such caliber is a rare opportunity for younger composers like myself - and such a treat. Hearing your own music, your ideas, shaped by the hands of musicians with such experience and expressive finesse, gives the work life beyond the composer’s score. The results of the little black dots that are sometimes envisioned, and others happily unexpected, find new character and meaning.
Quince’s Elizabeth Pearse, Kayleigh Butcher, Amanda DeBoer Bartlett, and Carrie Henneman Shaw worked diligently, not just on Friday, but in the preceding months, to make sure each student’s piece had that kind of life and energy. I am glad to have had the opportunity to work with such an approachable and enthusiastic group.
Most of Quince’s concert program premiered works by UWM composers: one faculty piece by Professor Amanda Schoofs, four graduate works, and a composition by senior Warren Enstrom. Such a program is difficult to pull off, because each composer has their own voice and the soundscape is constantly shifting.
As a vocal quartet, Quince had the advantage of a somewhat homogenous sound, but the modern voice also has a myriad of timbres at its disposal. Fortunately, these two elements worked beautifully together, and Quince led the listener across a wonderfully diverse sonic spectrum. The exciting part was not how all the pieces could be tied together through the voice, but exploring the different timbres and harmonies unique to each work. Perhaps I am biased, but I think this will likely go down as my favorite Unruly night this semester.
04/17/2015
Music - We Love The Tango
Michael Barndt
April 17, 2015
Urban Dial Milwaukee
Classical musicians who play brass or wind instruments have few opportunities to perform chamber music. The first of two UW-Milwaukee’s Chamber Music Milwaukee concerts, scheduled for this Sunday, provides this outlet for players and audience alike. The second concert, called “The Tango Project” and scheduled for Wednesday, offers a wide range of instrumentalists in works based on the tango.
Read the full article here: Urban Dial Milwaukee
