Claire Chase, Katinka Kleijn, Cory Smythe, and Seth Parker Woods premiering Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s Ubique at Zankel Hall in May 2023.
Photo: Jennifer Taylor.
Calendar
Density 2036: part vii
- The Kitchen at Westbeth (map)
- Google Calendar ICS
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part vii (2020)
Liza Lim: Sex Magic for contrabass flute, electronics, and an installation of kinetic percussion
Density 2036: part vii
- The Kitchen at Westbeth (map)
- Google Calendar ICS
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part vii (2020)
Liza Lim: Sex Magic for contrabass flute, electronics, and an installation of kinetic percussion
Sex Magic at MaerzMuzik Berlin
- silent green Kulturquartier (map)
- Google Calendar ICS
Liza Lim’s “Sex Magic” is a ritual for ocarina, contrabass flute, electronics, and percussion. For the composer, it is about “the sacred erotic in women’s history” and “an alternative cultural logic of women’s power as connected to the cycles of the womb – the life-making powers of childbirth, the ‘skin-changing’, world-synchronising temporalities of the body and the womb centre as a site of divinatory wisdom”. The piece refers to several mystic and mythological figures – it ends with tenderness. The score cites the poem “Ulysses” by Alfred Tennyson: “The long day wanes / the slow moon climbs / Come, my friends / Tis not too late to seek a newer world.”
PAST EVENTS
At the center of flutist and curator Claire Chase’s Debs Creative Chair residency is the continuation of Density 2036—“one of the great musical undertakings of our time, a singular project by a singular artist” (The New York Times). Commissioned by Carnegie Hall and composed by one of today’s most captivating composers, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Density x is the culmination of Chase’s six-concert, citywide reflection on 10 years of Density 2036. Hear the world premiere of the latest addition to this monumental body of work.
Program
Density 2036: part ix (2022)
Craig Taborn: Busy Griefs and Endangered Charms (2022-2023)
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part viii (2021)
Matana Roberts: Auricular Hearsay (2021)
Ann Cleare: anfa (2021)
Wang Lu: Aftertouch (2021)
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part vii (2020)
Liza Lim: Sex Magic for contrabass flute, electronics, and an installation of kinetic percussion
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part vii (2020)
Liza Lim: Sex Magic for contrabass flute, electronics, and an installation of kinetic percussion
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part vi (2019)
Olga Neuwirth: Magic Flu-Idity for flute and typewriter (2019)
Pamela Z: Louder, Warmer, Denser for flute, bass flute, contrabass flute, and fixed media (2019)
Sarah Hennies: Reservoir 3 for bass flute and voices (2019)
Phyllis Chen: Roots of Interior for flute and heartbeat (2019)
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part iv (2016)
Richard Beaudoin: Another Woman of Another Kind for flute and eight voices (2016)
Suzanne Farrin: The Stimulus of Loss for flute and ondes Martenot (2016)
Pauchi Sasaki: Gama XV for two speaker-dresses (2016)
Vijay Iyer: Five Empty Chambers for flutes and fixed media (2016)
Tyshawn Sorey: Bertha’s Lair for flutes and percussion (2016)
PROGRAM
Density 2036: part iii (2015)
Dai Fujikura: Lila for solo flute (2015)
Francesca Verunelli: The Famous Box-Trick for bass flute, and electronics (2015)
Nathan Davis: Limn for bass flute, contrabass flute, and electronics (2015)
Jason Eckardt: The Silenced, a monodrama for solo flute (2015)
Pauline Oliveros: Intensity 20.15, Grace Chase for speaking flutist and Expanded Instrument System (2015)
The tirelessly creative flutist and curator Claire Chase has been called “the North Star of her instrument’s ever-expanding universe” (The New York Times). At the center of her Debs Creative Chair residency is the continuation of Density 2036. By annually commissioning a new body of flute repertory, this 24-year project consistently expands the boundaries of the instrument. Celebrating the 10th anniversary of this monumental project, Chase performs the first 10 programs in one exhilarating week, beginning with this Zankel Hall concert and culminating with the world premiere of the Carnegie Hall–commissioned Density x.
The Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra returns to Carnegie Hall under the exceptional leadership of Susanna Mälkki, a conductor revered for “the absolute integrity of her music-making” (Chicago Tribune) and ability to “invest anything she touches with persuasive grandeur” (San Francisco Chronicle). Mälkki’s critically acclaimed Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage debut came in 2022 when she lent her talents to conducting the New York Philharmonic, and it will be a thrill to see her lead her nation’s own Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra in this all-Finnish program. Hear masterworks by Sibelius and a transportive piece by Kaija Saariaho—an ideal showcase for Debs Creative Chair and endlessly creative flute virtuoso Claire Chase.
Founded in 1882, the highly regarded Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra (HPO) has the distinction of having premiered most of the great Finnish composer Jean Sibelius’s symphonies, with the composer himself conducting. That is in fact the case for the Symphony No. 2, featured on this program and called “a confession of the soul” by the composer—although many Finns of the day interpreted the work as a call for national independence.
Felipe Lara’s Double Concerto, written specifically for flutist Claire Chase and jazz bassist and singer Esperanza Spalding, employs a vast array of effects from both soloists. In Petrushka Stravinsky created an exciting new world of sound — shifting rhythms and keys, and echoes of a barrel organ — to tell the story of a puppet love triangle set at a Shrovetide Fair. Susanna Mälkki conducts.
Felipe Lara’s Double Concerto, written specifically for flutist Claire Chase and jazz bassist and singer Esperanza Spalding, employs a vast array of effects from both soloists. In Petrushka Stravinsky created an exciting new world of sound — shifting rhythms and keys, and echoes of a barrel organ — to tell the story of a puppet love triangle set at a Shrovetide Fair. Susanna Mälkki conducts.