The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage : Blog

The Future is Unwritten

2012-05-18T17:42:22+00:00

Hello, PMP folks! My name is Jeff Arnal and I am the new Senior Program Specialist for the Philadelphia Music Project. I have an eclectic background in the performing arts. Like many musicians from my generation, my first project was playing in a garage band. From this seed, my musical thirst took off. This journey has taken me from my home in Georgia to the Peabody Conservatory, to composition studies with trans-media radical Stuart Saunders Smith, and master studies with visionary percussionist Milford Graves. I have since performed in traditional and non-traditional venues around the world with collaborative projects involving music, dance and film. Inspired by the DIY scene and Free Jazz pioneers, I became actively involved in creating performance opportunities for my immediate community, first in Baltimore in the 1990s and later in Brooklyn from 2000–12. I started self-producing concerts and festivals, and founded a small record label. I...

American Impresario: George Wein

2012-03-29T13:00:10+00:00

The Philadelphia Music Project is pleased to introduce the third in a series of articles under the banner American Impresario. The series will explore the careers and contributions of leading U.S. music curators whose creative work has profoundly influenced the field by giving listeners new ways to experience and understand music. George Wein at the 2010 Newport Jazz Festival (Credit: Ayano Hisa) The third article in the American Impresario series features George Wein, pianist, founder of the Newport Jazz and Folk Festivals, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, and many others. Outstanding music journalist Peter Keepnews interviewed Wein and surveys his long career and his influence on the field of jazz presenting. "I did not set out to make history": George Wein's Career in Presenting Jazz By Peter Keepnews The world had never seen anything quite like the two days of jazz in the open air that George...

Reflection on Einstein on the Beach trip-January, 2012

2012-02-14T16:15:03+00:00

Gene Coleman is an active composer and musician, and the founder and director of Soundfield, a producer and presenter of new and experimental music. I was recently invited by PMP to attend performances of Einstein on the Beach, the seminal opera by Philip Glass, Robert Wilson, and Lucinda Childs. As an artist who creates both music and films and has collaborated with dancers, I knew this was going to interest me in some fundamental ways. I was also very interested to take part in a trip that included people from both the music and dance worlds, as the chance to share experiences like this with people from different art forms is very valuable. Our trip included seeing some videos about the opera, which I found interesting, particularly in terms of learning more about Robert Wilson's work. The plan called for seeing two full performances of the opera at the Power...

Reflections on GlobalFEST 2012

2012-02-14T14:33:36+00:00

Image of BélO, Haitian musician, from GlobalFEST 2012 website Reflections: 1. Verónica Castillo-Pérez (Executive Director of Raíces Culturales) Any time there's an opportunity to see and be with fellow colleagues outside our normal work environment it's a benefit from the get-go for all involved. From the initial invitation I could see that there were participants that had been with me on our trip to Cuba like Lenny, Sara, Daniel and Helen. Often times we get so caught up with our busy workload that it takes trips like the one to GlobalFEST that reminds me of why I do what I do. On one hand, when I see the curation of an event with little glitches in it, like an overly packed space that it was really hard to get around to see and hear all the participating artists, it makes me feel better about our own productions. It reaffirms...

Reflections on SEM/CORD November 2011: Toni Shapiro-Phim and Alex Shaw

2012-02-13T20:58:03+00:00

Jessica Schwartz’s paper on the musical activism of women of Rongalap Atoll in the Marshall Islands, presented first thing Thursday morning, served as my introduction to the conference. These women’s stories and their songs, as well as the annual ritual-like presentation of their voices, emanate dignity and determination and serve as a slap in the face to the violations inflicted upon them by the United States government. The throat, according to Schwartz, is the center of emotions for the Rongalapese. Their throats and voices—and much else in terms of their bodies—were damaged by U.S. nuclear testing in the 1950s. They were relocated multiple times; their land made too dangerous to inhabit. Every year on Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day, organized women’s groups don t-shirts with “Project 4.1” across the front ("Project 4.1" was the medical study undertaken following the radioactive fallout in the Marshall Islands), and sing in defiance of their...

Steven Mackey in Philadelphia for His Tonic

2012-02-13T14:21:10+00:00

On Sunday afternoon I attended the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia’s “Mozart/Mackey” concert and there in the audience on the second row sat Steven Mackey who that evening would receive a 2012 Grammy Award for Small Ensemble Performance. The award was for his composition, Lonely Motel – Music From Slide, recorded by Eighth Blackbird. Why was he at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia instead of the Staples Center in Los Angeles? He was here for the world premiere performance of his Center-funded composition Tonic. When asked by the Philadelphia Inquirer’s David Patrick Stearns as to why he chose not to attend the Grammy Awards ceremony he said, “Look, if I miss my world premiere and end up not winning the Grammy, I’ll feel like, ‘What was that about?’ If I win, it’ll be whether I show up or not… I don’t have any discs in the pipeline for next year. So...

The Man Behind Bee Mask

2012-02-07T20:14:56+00:00

Two current grantees, International House Philadelphia and Vox Populi, are teaming up for an evening of contemporary music and art. As part of its PMP-funded Sonic Arts Union Series, I-House will present Chris Benedetto Madak - the man behind the long-running electronic music project Bee Mask and Deception Island label - at Vox Populi. His work plumbs the history of electronic and tape music, using synthesizers, sequencers, tape, and other electronics to reference German kosmische, musique concrete, noise, minimal techno, and drone. His most recent work was released by Spectrum Spools, an offshoot of the esteemed Editions Mego label. Past work has used computers, lightsensitive electronics, homemade tone generators, and other bespoke devices. For the concert at Vox Populi on February 10, Medak will give the world premiere of a new piece inspired by the Sonic Arts Union composers. The Sonic Arts Union was a pioneering composer collective, presenting original...

Muhal “Out-bebopped the Beboppers”

2012-01-25T17:37:10+00:00

Master jazz pianist and composer Muhal Richard Abrams is teaming up with Philadelphia’s 16-member ensemble Bobby Zankel and Warriors of the Wonderful Sound to compose a new work funded by the Philadelphia Music Program. The premiere is scheduled for April 28, 2012 at Montgomery County Community College. “Muhal is a whole different kind of genius,” Zankel says. “I think we have an affinity in the fact that, just like my music goes from Johnny Coles to Cecil Taylor, Muhal’s music totally defies any category. He’s done stuff that sounds like 21st-century European music in an African-American way, he’s got pieces dedicated to Muddy Waters, and he’s out-bebopped the beboppers.” (Source: Ars Nova Workshop, published January 25, 2012.) Now 81 years of age, the legendary Muhal has recorded and toured the United States, Canada, and Europe with his orchestra, sextet, quartet, duo, and as a solo pianist. His musical affiliations is...

The Power of High Quality Performance

2012-01-23T17:06:19+00:00

In David Patrick Stearns’ recent Arts Journal post, “Tales of Two Vespers: 350 Years Apart, They Give the World What it Needs,” he states, “Great music often takes on the color of its surroundings, but Vespers does so more than most musical containers—if only because, in most cases, the music is assembled to suit the particular occasion.” The two Vespers to which Stearns is referring in the title are Claudio Monteverdi’s of 1610, and Kile Smith’s of 2008, which received performances earlier this month in Philadelphia and New York City by Piffaro, the Renaissance Band, and The Crossing, a chamber choir conducted by Donald Nally. The year in which it premiered, the Philadelphia Music Project provided support for the production of a recording of Smith’s Vespers, featuring the same ensembles. Stearns writes of the time periods and environments in which the two works were composed and considers: “Art—that bête...

PMP Prof Development Trip: Havana International Jazz Festival 2010 Part 2

2012-01-18T13:41:36+00:00

Son music from Cuba, part 1: "Monte Adentro y Monte Afuera," Pancho Amat y el Cabildo Del Son from Pew Center for Arts & Heritage on Vimeo. Video shot by Lucas Rivera, Executive Director of Artistas y Musicos Latino Americanos (AMLA), 12/16/2010 at the Museo Nacional de la Musica in Havana, Cuba, during the Philadelphia Music Project's trip to the 2010 Havana International Jazz Festival. This tune is a tribute to Latin jazz played in son cubano style. Master tresero Pancho Amat is on the left in the black hat, playing the tres, the signature instrument of Cuban son (see his solo beginning at 1:06). With 100+ year old roots in eastern Cuba, son is one of the most important roots of salsa and timba, which are more contemporary dance music styles. Son music from Cuba, pt. 2: Trova Habana at the National Museum of Music, Havana,...