Related Objects

Charles Amirkhanian Collection ➔ New Music America: 1990: Montreal Musique Actuelles, 1 of 2

Digital Audio

Event Type

Interview and Music

Origin

C Amirkhanian

Identifier

NMA.1990.12.13.A

Program Series

New Music America

Program Length

138 min

Part

1 of 2

Dates

1990-12-13 | broadcast
| 1990-11-03 | created

Description

Charles Amirkhanian reports on happenings of the 1990 installment of the peripatetic New Music America Festival, which began in 1979 and was held this year for the first time outside the U.S. Montreal Musique Actuelles highlighted the work of Canadian composers, performers and improvisers alongside the work of such well-known Americans as La Monte Young, Scott Johnson, and Alvin Curran. Among participants interviewed are Jean Piche, a composer who directed the Festival and whose own work for percussion and tape was a highlight. Also heard are the voices of Montreal composer Linda Bouchard who lives in New York and is active as a composer and conductor; Jan Wolff, artistic director of Icebreaker, an internationally acclaimed center for avant-garde music in Amsterdam; electro-acoustic music specialist Hildegard Westerkamp of Vancouver; Shannon Peet, artistic director of the Toronto based ensemble Sound Pressure; composer Carolie Shoemaker of Seattle, and several other composers and audience members at the Festival. (- from the KPFA Folio)

Genres

New music
20th century classical

Musical Selections

Call to Prayer [excerpt] (1990) / Alvin Curran -- Elan (1990) / Linda Bouchard -- Transfiguration [excerpt] (1990) / Brian Cherney -- Bell Speeds (1983, 1990)/ John Oswald -- Oh! Mysterious Magnum: Such Magenta Vintage (1989) / David Mott -- Electric Quartet [5th movement] / Scott Johnson -- The Vermeer Room [excerpt] (1989) / Julia Wolfe -- école Polytechnique [excerpt] (1990) / Hildegard Westerkamp

Performers

Orchestre métropolitain du Grand-Montréal (Elan; Transfiguration)
Walter Boudreau, conductor (Elan; Transfiguration)
Sound Pressure (Mysterious Magnum)
David Mott, baritone saxophone (Mysterious Magnum)
Nouvel Ensemble moderne (The Vermeer Room)

Subjects

New music
20th century classical
Percussion with instrumental ensemble
Chamber orchestra music
Instrumental ensembles
Music patronage
Electro-acoustic
Electronic music

Acknowledgment

Funding for the preservation of this program made possible through a grant by Save America’s Treasures, a program of the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior.