Music
The Return of the Brooklyn Philharmonic
By George GrellaThe Brooklyn Philharmonic’s new Music Director, Alan Pierson, has been clear about his desire to make the ensemble “Brooklyn’s orchestra” and to do so by making music in neighborhoods throughout the borough. More than a traveling show, the orchestra will be making music that has something to say to the culture and history of each neighborhood.
Sun-Bleached Hand of the Man
By Dominic UmileHansen has been making wordless electronic music for years, building each piece with organic accompaniment that’s often treated to make it sound both warm and worn.
In Conversation
ALEX WATERMAN with Timothy Nassau
Vidas Perfectas, a new Spanish-language production of Perfect Lives, Robert Ashley’s visionary television opera from 1983, will premiere December 15 through 17 at Brooklyn’s Irondale Theater, with performances of the first three episodes of seven.
A LITTLE BRAIN SURGERY: Sonic Festival
By David St.-LascauxThat emerging composers are recognizing and incorporating voice and video is hugely encouraging, given the emotive power of the human voice and the potential for interweaving visual imagery and music in pure art in an age when music is routinely used to disingenuously manipulate viewers of cinema and broadcast “content.”
Tom Waits Takes His Old Fans For a New Ride
By Dmitry KiperBums. Drunks. Prostitutes. Travelers. Nighthawks. Hustlers. Throughout the 1970s—under the spell of Jack Kerouac, Edward Hopper, and Charles Bukowski—Tom Waits told sad, comic tales of the down-and-out.
The WKCR Bach Marathon
By Richard KostelanetzThe single most extraordinary radio show in New York City, perhaps anywhere in the world, is the Johan Sebastian Bach marathon that begins on WKCR typically a few days before Christmas and continues for several days afterwards.
OUTTAKES
By Steve DalachinskyIt’s the year 5772, and a lot has been happening since the Ark set sail. We’re quickly approaching the season to be jolly, or an approximation thereof. Occupy Wall Street is in its 27th year, or at least it should be. So I will speak on events that led up to where I am now, sitting in a cold room listening alternately to Fela Kuti’s Greatest Hits and Bill Dixon’s monumental November 1981.
