Classical Schmassical: Recent Episodes
Alexa Letourneau, Composer
Classical Schmassical: an Anti-Classical Classical Music Podcast is a new podcast about the world of classical music. Join me for weekly discussions with guests as we question what it means to be a classical musician in the 21st century, tackling everything from extended techniques to arts activism and much more.
Join me in conversation with Asher Laub about his career path as a multidisciplinary musician, shaped by changing goals, influences, and even his physical health.
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Guest Bio
Asher began classical violin training at the tender age of 2 and had already performed with the Buffalo philharmonic by age 13. Asher’s expertise in improvisation across multiple genres has led him to a career as a soloist in demand,
performing at venues such as Madison Square Garden,
Hammerstein Hall, Lincoln Center, the Jacob Javitz
Center and across four continents. Asher has also been
featured on PBS, and has made headlines on CNN,
WABC, NBC, and the New York Post among many other major news sources. He has been booked to perform at special events for Google, Nickelodeon, TNT, National Geographic, Citigroup and a list of notables including George W. Bush, Ivana Trump and many others.
In 2014 Asher lived a musician’s nightmare when he lost the strength to play his violin for a number of years. Refusing to accept conventional advice he found a way to heal, building his strength to an unprecedented level. He used this experience as fuel to reinvent his live concerts as a high-energy contemporary violinist. In only a few months, Asher learned to merge, popular tunes and breakdancing choreography into his performances.
Asher also uniquely performs as a DJ violinist bringing his experience as a live performer and technical prowess as an audio editing and mixing guru to countless clubs and stages.
Asher has been privileged to teach children and adolescents from under resourced neighborhoods in the Bronx for almost 4 years. This has fostered his drive to make a positive imprint on others.
With a growing fan base in the tens of thousands, Asher is working to influence societal norms and conventional thinking about musical performance, helping to break down social and physical barriers for his fans and beyond.
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Join me in conversation with Emi Ferguson about her work as a flutist, composer, and most recently, author, with the release of her new book Iconic Composers.
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Guest Bio
Emi is very proud to be named a 2023 Avery Fisher Career Grant awardee, and can be heard live in concerts and festivals around the world as a soloist and with groups including AMOC*, the New York New Music Ensemble, the Handel and Haydn Society, and the Manhattan Chamber Players. She has spoken and performed at several TEDX events and has been featured on media outlets including The Discovery Channel, Vox's "Explained" series on Netflix, Amazon's The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Juilliard Digital's TouchPress apps talking about how music relates to our world today. A passionate chamber musician of works new and old, Emi has been a featured performer at the Marlboro, Lucerne, Ojai, Lake Champlain, Bach Virtuosi, and June in Buffalo festivals and has premiered works by many of today’s leading composers, working most recently with composers Michael Hersch, Roscoe Mitchell, Emily Koh, Gabriela Ortiz, and Georgina Derbez.
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Join Murph and Alexa as they talk with composer, educator, and publisher Adrian Gordon about his career and new book, Note to Self: A Music Director’s Guide for Transitioning to a New School and Building a Thriving Music Program
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Adrian Gordon is an internationally performed composer and seasoned music educator.
After 17 years of teaching music in the classroom in South Florida and going through four music director job transitions in two different schools, as well as general music, choir, and two string orchestra positions, Adrian realized there was a gap in his music education training. Even though his undergraduate and graduate programs were musically and pedagogically extensive, he never felt as though they touched on those hard-to-navigate areas of transitioning between jobs.
Adrian currently serves as the director of orchestras at Providence Day School in Charlotte, NC. He believes in the power of music education in a child's life and understands the necessity of having passionate, confident, and supported music teachers at the helm, promoting great musical experiences for students.
In addition to teaching, Adrian is the founder of Leap Year Music Publishing, which publishes string music for elementary, middle, and high school ensembles. His compositions appear on the Florida, Texas, Maryland, and Georgia Orchestra Association Music Performance Assessment Lists. His compositions are distributed through J.W. Pepper and have been performed throughout the world. He takes pride in creating music that is fun and pedagogically sound at all levels.
Adrian received his BA in music from the University of Miami and his master's degree in music education at Florida International University. Born and raised in Miami, FL, he currently resides in Charlotte with his wife, Kelly, and their two sons. Learn more at www.adriangordonmusic.com
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Join me (new host Murphy Severtson!) as I talk with Joshua Roman on what it means to be a soloist, artistry, collaboration, and chronic health.
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Joshua Roman is a cellist, composer and curator whose performances embrace musical styles from Bach to Radiohead. Before setting off on his unique path as a soloist, Roman was the Seattle Symphony’s principal cellist - a job he began at just 22 years of age. He has since become renowned for his genre-bending repertoire and wide-ranging collaborations. He was also named a TED Senior Fellow in 2015.
Collaborators include Tony-winner/MacArthur Genius Grant recipient Bill T. Jones and East African vocalist Somi, the JACK, St. Lawrence, and Verona Quartets, Tony-nominated actor Anna Deavere Smith, poet Tracy K. Smith, violinist Vadim Gluzman, and conductor David Danzmayr.
Roman’s outreach endeavors have taken him to Uganda with his violin-playing siblings, where they played chamber music in schools, HIV/AIDS centers and displacement camps.
On January 14th, Roman will perform Tan Dun’s Crouching Tiger Suite and premiere Donna Milanovich Composer in Residence Reinaldo Moya’s cello concertino “Rise,” with the Chicago Philharmonic. Also programmed on the concert, guitarist Sharon Isbin will also perform the American Premiere of Dun’s Concerto for Guitar and Orchestra (Yi2).
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Join me as I talk with the members of the newly formed Mosaic Composers Collective, of which I am a member!
Collective Mission Statement:
Mosaic Composers Collective, featuring Kevin Arthur Jr., Aidan Arbona, Naamia Rivera, Murphy Severtson, Alexa Letourneau, and Ashtyn Brown, is a gathering of composers in pursuit of an intimate – yet fearless – sound exploration of humanity’s many colorful spheres. Centered in curiosity, the Collective strives to create and curate that which challenges the world around them.
Artist Bios:
New York-based composer and cellist ASHTYN BROWN (b. 2002), originally from Windsor, Colorado, is a fierce advocate of new art who seeks to become a vessel for the sonic imaginations of the world around them. They believe that music is social in nature and deeply respect the personal tenets that have always thrived in human sound. Ashtyn works to carefully curate this material themself, utilizing identity and anecdote as a space of community between composer, performer, and listener.
MURPHY SEVERTSON (b. 1999) is a composer, improvisor, and academic from Delray Beach, Florida. Currently based in New York City, they received their undergraduate degree from St. Olaf College in 2022. In 2021, they composed Standing Upright, a testament to the strength of those struggling with chronic illness, for the American Prize-winning St. Olaf Band, funded by the St. Olaf CURI Project. Recently, their music has explored Florida nature, specifically mangrove trees and forests. A commissioned piece for high school band and choir, Tangled Roots, will be premiered in early 2023. Murphy finds the greatest amount of joy in making music that allows the audience, performers, and all those involved to be equal and loved collaborators.
NAAMIA RIVERA (b. 2004) is a black/hispanic composer and flutist based in New York City. They went to Fiorello H. Laguardia for Instrumental Music and they were a student of Music Composition and Flute at The Juilliard School Music Advancement Program. As a composer, they are interested in writing music about social justice, improvisational music, electronic/ambient music, and music from different countries/cultures. Naamia is in the studio of Valerie Coleman, where they study Composition and Flute simultaneously.
New York based creative ALEXA LETOURNEAU (b. 1998) is a composer, flutist, singer, researcher, and educator. An Ohio native, Alexa began playing the flute at eight years old. Within weeks, they were taping 5 pens together to draw a staff on which to begin composing. At present, their works are focused upon an exploration of shared human identity through sonic journeys, and as a performer, they frequently play premiers and workshop pieces with living composers. Alexa is not only a musician, however; they spend their free time developing recipes, writing poetry, and sewing increasingly outrageous costumes.
KEVIN ARTHUR JR. (b. 2004) is a Philadelphia born composer and instrumentalist with training in both jazz and classical music. He was a member of the Philadelphia All-City Fellowship and attended The Philadelphia High School for Creative and Performing Arts. His musical style is uniquely contemporary in approach with powerful infusions of Jazz, yet deeply romantic at heart. He enjoys the creative freedom that composing gives him, along with the beautiful collaboration it fosters.
AIDAN ARBONA is a composer, pianist, and educator from Brooklyn, New York. Inspired by eclectic musical styles such as: Opera, Bebop, Funk, Lofi, Postmodernism, Grunge, and EDM, Aidan’s music is a mixture of dense harmony, syncopation, counterpoint, and interesting timbral mixtures. Eager to write new music for modern musicians, Aidan approaches music with a sense of realism and optimism, both acknowledging the struggles present in modern society and confident that we can work together to ease them in the future
Join me as I talk with Robert Dillon of Third Coast Percussion about his work as a percussionist, composer, and ensemble member, including working with Philip Glass and their exciting upcoming season, both in Chicago and around the world.
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Robert Dillon is an Ensemble Member and Development Director of Third Coast Percussion. He has also performed as a substitute with the Chicago, Boston, and San Diego Symphony Orchestras, and served as principal percussionist in the Madison Symphony Orchestra from 2007-2008. A passionate educator, he previously served as chair of percussion studies at Merit School of Music and a percussion instructor at Loyola University Chicago.
Robert Dillon is an Ensemble Member and Development Director of Third Coast Percussion. He has also performed as a substitute with the Chicago, Boston, and San Diego Symphony Orchestras, and served as principal percussionist in the Madison Symphony Orchestra from 2007-2008. A passionate educator, he previously served as chair of percussion studies at Merit School of Music and a percussion instructor at Loyola University Chicago.
Robert has appeared numerous times on the Chicago Symphony’s contemporary music series, MusicNow, as well as the University of Chicago’s Contempo series, and was a member of the unique, international 12-percussionist Ensemble XII, which grew out of Pierre Boulez’s Lucerne Festival Academy (Switzerland). Robert was a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and participated in programs at the Tanglewood Music Center, Spoleto Festival USA, National Repertory Orchestra, and Pacific Music Festival (Sapporo, Japan).
In addition to Third Coast recordings, Robert can be heard as a soloist on Innova Records (Christopher Adler—Ecstatic Volutions in a Neon Haze), and a performer on Naxos Records (American Music for Percussion, Volume 1) and Parlour Tapes+ (Katherine Young – Diligence is to Magic as Progress is to Flight). He has performed as a soloist in America, Switzerland, and Jordan.
Robert holds a Bachelor of Music from Northwestern University and a Master of Music from the New England Conservatory, where he received the John Cage Award for Outstanding Contribution to Contemporary Music Performance. His teachers include Michael Burritt, James Ross and Will Hudgins.
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Third Coast Percussion is a Grammy Award winning percussion quartet hailing from Chicago.
Founded in 2005, Third Coast Percussion has performed hundreds of concerts across the country, presents an annual concert season at home in Chicago, teaches musicians of all ages and experience levels, and has commissioned dozens of new works by composers including Glenn Kotche, Philip Glass, Devonté Hynes, Chris Cerrone, Augusta Read Thomas, Donnacha Dennehy, and David T. Little.
The mission of Third Coast Percussion is to inspire and educate through the creation of exciting and unexpected musical experiences.
Third Coast Percussion's vision is a world-wide audience that embraces creativity, curiosity, and community through music.
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Join me as I talk with arts administrator Christina Salerno about her artistic practice!
Guest Bio:
Appointed the Executive Director of Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra in January 2017, Ms. Salerno joined the symphonic world having spent seven years as Executive Director of Salt Creek Ballet (SCB). While at SCB, Ms. Salerno led a campaign to build all new sets and costumes for the company’s annual production of The Nutcracker and successfully brought live orchestral accompaniment back to the production. Her passion for increasing the visibility and capacity of arts organizations has led her to lead initiatives aimed at increasing contributed and earned revenue levels, developing board capacity, and building innovative community engagement programming. Ms. Salerno holds a Masters of Performing Arts Administration degree from Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts and a Bachelor of Arts degree with a concentration in Nonprofit Administration from Skidmore College. She has appeared as a guest lecturer for Loyola University’s Dance Department and Arts Reach, and currently serves as treasurer for the Illinois Council of Orchestras and VP Philanthropy of the Hinsdale-Clarendon Hills chapter of the National Charity League. Prior to moving to the management side of arts organizations, Ms. Salerno enjoyed a 15-year professional ballet career as a soloist with Boston Ballet, Zurich Ballet and The Royal Ballet in London.
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Join me as I talk with composer Reinaldo Moya about his artistic practice!
Guest Bio:
Reinaldo Moya is a graduate of Venezuela’s El Sistema music education system. He is the recipient of the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letter, the McKnight Composers Fellowship, the Van Lier Fellowship, and the Aaron Copland Award. He was the winner of the Ellis-Beauregard Foundation Composer Award, leading to the commissioning of his Piano Concerto for Joyce Yang and the Bangor Symphony Orchestra.
As the Composer-Residence at The Schubert Club 2017-19, he wrote Tienda: a chamber opera praised by The Star Tribune for its "proud individuality... [and] textures of pulsing vibrancy, subtly shading harmonies to trace the fragile emotional arc of his central characters." His opera Memory Boy, with a libretto by Mark Campbell, was commissioned by the Minnesota Opera and premiered in 2016.
His works have been performed by the Minnesota Orchestra, the San Diego Symphony, the Juilliard Orchestra, the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela, the New Jersey Symphony. Other performers include the Jasper and Attacca String Quartets, the Oberlin Conservatory Orchestra, the Da Capo Chamber Players, the Lysander Piano Trio, among others.
He is a graduate of The Juilliard School with masters and doctorate degrees, studying with Samuel Adler and Robert Beaser. Mr. Moya has taught at St. Olaf College the Interlochen Arts Camp, and is currently Assistant Professor of Composition at Augsburg University in Minneapolis.
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Join us as Joy Guidry and I talk about their new album, identity in music, and how to fix the problems with the music community as a whole.
Guest Bio:
Radical self-love, compassion, laughter, and the drive to amplify Black artmakers and noisemakers comprise the core of NYC-based bassoonist and composer Joy Guidry’s work. Their performances have been hailed by The San Diego Tribune as “lyrical and haunting…hair-raising and unsettling.” A versatile improviser and a composer of experimental, daring new works that embody a deep love of storytelling, Joy’s own music channels their inner child, in honor of their ancestors and predecessors. In every aspect of their practice, Joy seeks to support, hire, and promote Black artists. To this end Joy has spearheaded Sounds of the African Diaspora, a competition and commissioning platform for composers from the African diaspora. This new initiative ensures that composers from the diaspora have access to the space, resources, and time necessary to foster new, innovative music.
Joy holds a bachelor’s degree in Bassoon Performance from the Peabody Conservatory and a Graduate Performance Diploma from the Mannes School of Music. They have performed with the Dance Centre Kenya Ballet Orchestra, International Contemporary Ensemble, Alarm Will Sound, and have been a featured soloist in Yvette Jackson’s opera Fear is their Alibi that premiered at the 2021 PROTOTYPE festival. They have been commissioned by The National Sawdust, Long Beach Opera, JACK Quartet, and the I&I Foundation, and they have attended and been featured by prestigious festivals including the Spoleto Festival USA and the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Guidry is a finalist for the 2021 Berlin Prize for Young Artists taking place in Berlin, Germany in June 2022.
More info on Radical Acceptance, Joy's debut album:
“Radical Acceptance is a personal practice that has evolved in my life over the past year. This doesn't mean there aren't still tough times, but times of warmth and comfort are much more present these days. I will never be able to change my past, the things that hurt me, but I can live in a peaceful and beautiful life of my own creation. The most important thing I've had to teach myself is that there is nothing wrong with my body or my brain. My body is fat, and I struggle with my mental health daily, and neither of those things make me any less of a human being. I know that my Black, Fat, Queer and Non binary body is valid in every way. Learning to love my whole self unconditionally will be a lifelong journey, but I am just so happy to be where I am today. This is my radical acceptance.” - Joy Guidry
“Radical Acceptance is a radical geography that defies the status quo of everyday harm that speaks straight to the senses and emotions of the listener. The organizations of sounds, tracks, rapid fingering and figures of soul-piercing resonance bring our bodies, feelings, and intuition to an evocation of a powerful relationship with those who we’re performing alongside, and those who are listening to us.” - Marshall Trammell
Released on February 4th, 2022 on Whited Sepulchre Records
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Join me as I chat with Wang Lu and Kelly Rourke about what it means to write an opera, as well as their most recent project, "The Beekeper."
Guest Biographies:
Composer and pianist Wang Lu writes music that reflects a very natural identification with influences from traditional Chinese music, urban environmental sounds, linguistic intonation and contours, and freely improvised traditions, through the prism of contemporary instrumental techniques and new sonic possibilities.
She is currently the David S. Josephson Assistant Professor of Music at Brown University, after receiving her doctoral degree in composition at Columbia University and graduating from the Beijing Central Conservatory of Music. Wang Lu’s works have been performed internationally, by ensembles including the Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Alarm Will Sound, Minnesota Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lille, Holland Symfonia, Shanghai National Chinese Orchestra, Taipei Chinese Orchestra, Musiques Nouvelles, Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, International Contemporary Ensemble, Ensemble Dal Niente, Third Sound, Yarn/Wire, Curious Chamber Players, Ensemble Pamplemousse, Argento, the Aizuri Quartet, the New York Virtuoso Singers, Momenta Quartet and violinists Miranda Cuckson, Jennifer Koh, and pianist Joel Fan among others.
Wang Lu has received the Berlin Prize in Music Composition (Spring 2019 residency) and was a 2014 Guggenheim Fellow, and she has received commissions from the Koussevitzky Foundation at the Library of Congress and the Fromm Foundation at Harvard. She won first prize at Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne’s Young Composers Forum in 2010 and shared the Tactus International Young Composers Orchestra Forum Award in 2008. She was selected for a Tremplin commission by IRCAM/Ensemble Intercontemporain in 2010 and the International Composition Seminar with the Ensemble Modern in 2012, and has also received two ASCAP Morton Gould awards.
Kelley Rourke is a librettist, translator and dramaturg. She has collaborated with composers including John Glover, Laura Karpman, Ben Moore, Kamala Sankaram and Wang Lu on new operas. Her modern English adaptations of numerous standard and not-so-standard operas have been hailed as “crackingly witty” (The Independent, London) and “remarkably well wedded to the music and versification in arias” (New York Times). She has written libretti for four youth operas, with performances across the country. In collaboration with artists including Tharanga Goonetilleke, Amy Severson, Erik Teague and S.Katy Tucker, she has created print and video adaptations of operatic stories.
Her work has been commissioned and performed by the Metropolitan Opera, Washington National Opera, English National Opera, Welsh National Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Boston Lyric Opera, Young People’s Chorus of NYC, Seattle Opera, Minnesota Opera, Carnegie Hall, Urban Arias (Washington, DC), Met LiveArts, Houston Grand Opera’s HGOco, San Francisco Conservatory, Milwaukee Opera Theatre, American Opera Projects, Atlanta Opera, Kentucky Opera, Walnut Hill School for the Arts, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, and Nautilus Music-Theater, among others.
Kelley has been engaged as a guest lecturer at Boston University, Carnegie Mellon University, NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Walnut Hill School for the Arts, and University of Maryland College Park; and as librettist mentor for Washington National Opera’s American Opera Initiative. She was founding editor of Opera America magazine and a contributor to the New Grove Dictionary of American Music. Kelley is resident dramaturg for The Glimmerglass Festival
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Join me as I chat with Lidiya Yankovskaya about her work as the first female conductor of a multi-million dollar opera company!
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Guest Bio:
Russian-American conductor Lidiya Yankovskaya is a fiercely committed advocate for Russian masterpieces, operatic rarities, and contemporary works on the leading edge of classical music. She has conducted more than 40 world premieres, including 16 operas, and her strength as a visionary collaborator has guided new perspectives on staged and symphonic repertoire from Carmen and Queen of Spades to Price and Prokofiev. As Music Director of Chicago Opera Theater, Ms. Yankovskaya has led the Chicago premieres of Jake Heggie’s Moby-Dick, Rachmaninov’s Aleko, Joby Talbot’s Everest, Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta, and the world premiere of Dan Shore’s Freedom Ride. Her daring performances before and amid the pandemic earned recognition from the Chicago Tribune, which praised her as “the very model of how to survive adversity, and also how to thrive in it,” while naming her 2020 Chicagoan of the Year.
In the 2021/22 season, Ms. Yankovskaya makes a trio of Texan debuts, leading performances of Carmen at Houston Grand Opera, a tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg at Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and concerts featuring works by Gershwin and Dawson at Fort Worth Symphony. Elsewhere, she debuts with Chicago Symphony Orchestra in Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, makes her Minnesota Opera debut with Voices United, leads a program of Brahms and Wagner at Elgin Symphony, and makes her Pasadena Symphony debut conducting works by Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Gabriela Lena Frank. At Chicago Opera Theater, she conducts the Chicago premiere of Mark Adamo’s Becoming Santa Claus and a concert version of Carmen, starring Jamie Barton opposite Stephanie Blythe.
Ms. Yankovskaya has recently conducted Don Giovanni at Seattle Opera, Pia de’ Tolomei at Spoleto Festival USA, Il barbiere di Siviglia at Wolf Trap Opera, Ellen West at New York’s Prototype Festival, and the world premiere of Taking Up Serpents at Washington National Opera. On the concert stage, she has been recently engaged with Chicago Philharmonic, Rhode Island Philharmonic, and the symphony orchestras of Hawaii and Oviedo, Spain.
Ms. Yankovskaya is Founder and Artistic Director of the Refugee Orchestra Project, which proclaims the cultural and societal relevance of refugees through music, and has brought that message to hundreds of thousands of listeners around the world. In addition to a National Sawdust residency in Brooklyn, ROP has performed in London, Boston, Washington, D.C., and the United Nations. She has also served as Artistic Director of the Boston New Music Festival and Juventas New Music Ensemble, which was the recipient of multiple NEA grants and National Opera Association Awards under her leadership.
An alumna of the Dallas Opera’s Hart Institute for Women Conductors and the Taki Alsop Conducting Fellowship, Ms. Yankovskaya has also served as assistant conductor to Lorin Maazel, chorus master of Boston Symphony Orchestra, and conductor of Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra. She has been featured in the League of American Orchestras Bruno Walter National Conductor Preview and Cabrillo Festival for Contemporary Music, and assisted Vladimir Jurowski via a London Philharmonic fellowship.
Ms. Yankovskaya’s belief in the importance of mentorship has fueled the establishment of Chicago Opera Theater’s Vanguard Initiative, an investment in new opera that includes a two-year residency for emerging opera composers. Committed to developing the next generation of artistic leaders, she also volunteers with Turn The Spotlight, a foundation dedicated to identifying, nurturing, and empowering leaders – and in turn, to illuminating the path to a more equitable future in the arts.
Join me for a discussion with violinist Caitlin Edwards as we discuss her career as a violinist, the relationship and intersection between Classical and Black music, and her recent grant from 3arts Entertainment.
Guest Bio:
Caitlin Edwards is a classically trained violinist, arranger, recording artist, and teacher based in Chicago. She has performed with the Sphinx Symphony Orchestra, Nairobi Philharmonic, Grant Park Festival Orchestra, and Chicago Sinfonietta. She’s played and recorded with artists such as John Legend, Ms. Lauryn Hill, Common, and with PJ Morton’s on his “Gumbo Album”, for which she received a Grammy Certificate. She also recorded for the Disney movie score, The Lion King, at Sony Studios. For a more detailed list of Caitlin’s work please check out her professional biography and collaborations on her website, https://www.caitlinedwards.com/.
MISSION
Music is a gift, a force that transcends all of our differences. Music is healing to a broken soul, clarity in the midst of confusion, life to those who seek it. It is my mission to share my gift to all. I will help educate and inspire the next generation of young Black musicians. My dream is to see the normalization of Black voices and faces in traditionally monopolized spaces through increased visibility and disruption of the status quo in classical music. Ultimately, I want people to see themselves in my music, connect, and heal in their own way.
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Elijah Daniel Smith and I discuss compositional process, pedagogical development, and his upcoming piece for the Chicago Symphony's Homecoming concert.
Guest Bio:
Described by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as a “rising star”, composer Elijah Daniel Smith is quickly establishing himself as one of today’s leading young composers. From orchestral compositions to multimedia and interdisciplinary collaborations, Elijah’s affinity for dense and complex textures, rhythmic ambiguity and fluidity, and rich gravitational harmonies shines through in all of his creations. Elijah’s music has been premiered and performed by world renowned ensembles such as Mivos Quartet, Sō Percussion, Sandbox Percussion, Contemporaneous, Ensemble Linea, Ecce Ensemble, Fuse Quartet, and Earspace. Upcoming commissions include new works for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for MusicNOW, Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, Bergamot Quartet, and saxophonist Julian Velasco on behalf of the Luminarts Cultural Foundation.
Elijah’s creative endeavors extend beyond the realm of traditional concert composition, including interdisciplinary work and commissions from multiple dance companies and choreographers throughout the United States. His ability to realize his own dynamic multimedia visions was cultivated by his experience as a recording, mixing, and mastering engineer for his own studio music, film scores and electro-acoustic music. In his 2019 multimedia project Come, Clarity, Elijah exercised his visual artistry as a filmmaker and photographer, creating the film as well as composing and producing the music himself.
Elijah is currently pursuing his PhD in Music Composition at Princeton University as a President’s Fellow after earning a Bachelor of Music degree in Music Composition from the Boston Conservatory in 2017, and a Master of Music degree in Music Composition from the Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University in 2020.
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Join me in conversation with powerhouse musicians Renee Baker, Adegoke Steve Colson, and Vanessa Rose discussing the upcoming anniversary concert, put on by the AACM, ACF, and Great Black Music Ensemble.
Guest Bios:
A visual artist, filmmaker, composer, violinist and re-contextualist, Renée C. Baker is an multi-disciplined engineer. She utilizes movement, film projections of real and imaginary objects, vignettes and sounds to create an exquisite arena of surrealist activity.
Steve Colson – aka Adegoke – pianist and composer, has performed internationally as a leader of jazz ensembles ranging from trios to orchestras. A critically acclaimed figure in modern jazz, Steve’s compositions are finding their way into the “jazz standard” repertoire and are being performed and recorded by some of today’s jazz greats as well as by his own group. He became a member of The Association for Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in the early 70s, a musicians’ collective that has influenced music internationally in the 20th and 21st Century.
Vanessa Rose became President & CEO of the American Composers Forum in January 2019. For more than a decade, Vanessa has been working with artists and organizations dedicated to living creators, including the International Contemporary Ensemble, the Lark Play Development Center, The Knights, the American Composers Orchestra, and Arco Collaborative. She has led organizations through significant transitions: establishing new leadership positions, building effective planning strategies, clarifying mission-driven priorities, and strengthening racial equity work.
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Today on Classical Schmassical, internationallly renowned pianist and commercial musician Emile Pandolfi talks about his career, making his start, and bringing emotion into your playing, as well as his newly released book, "Play it Like You Mean It."
Guest Bio:
With over 30 recordings in his discography, Emile Pandolfi ranks among America’s most popular piano artists. With the majority of his performance repertoire being lush, intricate arrangements of Broadway and standards that form the canon of "The Great American Songbook," his influences are, in fact, more classical than pop. It is this subjective layering of classical style that Pandolfi infuses onto the broad palette of selections—from his beloved Chopin, to Andrew Lloyd Webber, to "Once Upon a December," from Anastasia—performed in his live concerts and recordings that resonates with audiences everywhere.
For more information on Emile and his music, visit his website at: https://www.emilepandolfi.com/ and check out his youtube channel, with many wonderful arrangements, at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8V0lD8nqBEjw5QfQmELdjA
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Join me for a short and sweet episode of Classical Schmassical, where I talk to Lena Smith about trombone, mental health, personal identity, and belonging in the music world.
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Classical Schmassical returns with an incredible discussion featuring Marcus Norris, new composer in residence with the Chicago Philharmonic.
Guest Bio: Marcus Norris’ first foray into making music came in the form of producing rap beats on pirated software, installed on a Windows 98 computer that he Macgyvered together from spare parts while laying on the floor of his childhood bedroom. Though he came to composing concert music later, he transferred that same imagination and ingenuity to writing music of all kinds. Marcus has been called a “New Musical Talent in our Midst” by Chicago’s N’digo Magazine, and has made a number of achievements, including being selected as an inaugural Composer-in-Residence for the Chicago Philharmonic from 2021-24, being awarded the prestigious Cota-Robles fellowship for pursuing his PhD at UCLA, being chosen in 2020 for the LA Philharmonic’s National Composers Intensive, and in 2017 winning 1st prize in the Southeastern Composers League Competition. His violin concerto “GLORY” opened to three sold-out performances when premiered by the Jackson Symphony Orchestra in 2019, and then was subsequently performed in Guangzhou, China later that year. His Dance Suite “I Tried So Hard for You” premiered in Havana in 2018, closely following the Russian String Orchestra premiere of “My Idols Are Dead” in Moscow. In 2020 he founded South Side Symphony – the only orchestra that would perform “Back That Thang Up” on the same concert as Beethoven.
For more information on Marcus and his music visit www.MarcusNorris.com and www.SouthSideSymphony.org .
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Join me as I talk with multi-instrumentalist and musical theater performer Meghan Doyle about guitar in different contexts, gear setup in a big city context, and dealing with imposter syndrome.
Guest Bio: Meghan Doyle is a New Jersey based multi-instrumentalist. She is primarily a guitarist but also plays drumset, bass, a little bit of keys, and the occasional bit of banjo, mandolin, lap steel, and trombone. She also has a wealth of experience in both live audio and recording, and a bit of experience in theatrical lighting and production. Recent credits include: Legally Blonde (National Tour), Fun Home (Arden Theater Company), Michelle Foster’s Broadway 2020, The Picher Project (A New Musical: Concert Edition), Bridesmaids: a Dance Narrative, and Various 54 Below and Green Room 42 Credits. Upcoming projects include Get Happy!: A Judy Garland Tribute at Papermill Playhouse, and Sweet Seasons: Michelle Foster’s Carole King tribute in Haddonfield, NJ. Meghan has three cats and an awesome wife.
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On today's episode of Classical Schmassical, I'm joined by score-maker James Creed as we talk about a composer's role in music through notation, performance, score, and compositional voice.
Resources mentioned:
Piano Studies 1-6 Bandcamp:
https://jamesmcreed.bandcamp.com/album/piano-studies-1-6
James' Scores: https://jamescreedmusic.wixsite.com/website/scores
Talk with Lola de la Mata and Joanna Ward on open/text notation: https://www.mixcloud.com/Feminist_Library/lola-de-la-mata-and-joanna-ward-discuss-open-scores-and-sound-through-a-feminist-lens/
James is a score-maker and guitarist currently based in London, UK.
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Join me as I talk with astrid [Seamus] hubbard flynn about being a composer-flutist and incorporating equity into artistic practice as white musicians.
Resources mentioned:
Alex Temple's article Composers Performers and Consent: https://nmbx.newmusicusa.org/composers-performers-and-consent/
Resmaa Menakem's book My Grandmother’s Hands: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781942094470
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Guest Bio: astrid hubbard flynn (b. 1999, they/them), from Saint Paul, Minnesota, is a composer, flutist and noise-maker whose mediums range from staff notation to electronics to text-based and graphic-based improvisation. astrid is currently pursuing a B.A. in Music at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, where they have studied composition with Kristina Warren, Wang Lu and Eric Nathan. Outside Brown, they have also studied with Libby Larsen, Abbie Betinis and Edie Hill. As a music educator, astrid has designed discussion sections on popular music, facilitated introductory aural skills lab sections, and helped organize concerts through Brown's student-run composer organization, Fermata. astrid's music has been performed by professional ensembles such as Minnesota's Zeitgeist, New York's YarnWire and Switzerland's Kukuruz Quartet, and at summer festivals such as Minnesota's Source Song Festival and Maine's Atlantic Music Festival.
Join me for a discussion on electronic music, education within the classical canon, and allyship in musical practice with Jonathan Baldwin.
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Guest Bio:
Jonathan Baldwin is an electronics and woodwind musician based out of Dayton, Ohio. Holding a BM in Music Education from Wright state university where he studied Saxophone with John Toerner, and Bassoon with Bill Jobert, and was initiated into the Theta-Eta Chaper of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, he found a love for teaching, performing, and building a community for everyone to experience music. Jonathan began his practice and writing of electronic music during a gap year, in which he composed a short EP of what he describes as “terrible, yet wholesome, macaroni art style” electronic music, which sparked a love for composing, performing, and teaching electronic music. In addition to the Electronic music he writes under the Psuedonym ‘FutureBjard’(pronounced future-bard), he also performs with a brass band called ‘JAMR’(pronounced Jammer), which frequently busks outdoors in their hometown of Dayton. All of this music can be streamed on your platform of choice. Some of Jonathan’s other hobbies and interests include tabletop RPG’s, magic the gathering, Video Games, and talking a lot of smack before ultimately losing at any fighting game.
Guitarist and composer Duck Armstrong joins me today to discuss guitar, genre, accessibility, and the way that art is all a social construct, and what that means for us as artists.
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Guest Bio:
Duck Armstrong (they/them) is a multimedia artist currently in Dallas, Texas. They frequently explore visual art and music through use of ink, watercolor, and electric guitar and pedalboard.
Soprano Jessica Lewis joins for a talk about effective use of the voice and the opera industry at large on today's episode of Classical Schmassical.
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Guest Bio:
Jessica Lewis is a young American soprano astounding audiences with her shimmering and agile coloratura. She is currently a young artist performing as Violetta in Vincerò Academy’s La Traviata. A recent masters graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music (2020), her staged scene performances of Gilda (Rigoletto), and Despina (Così fan tutte) were cancelled due to the pandemic. Other roles learned include Königin der Nacht (Die Zauberflöte), Baby Doe (The Ballad of Baby Doe), and Musetta (La Bohéme).
In 2020, she co-created and produced a virtual benefit concert supporting racial justice initiatives that featured more than 30 artists and benefitted grassroots racial justice organizations. As an interpreter and advocate of new music, Ms. Lewis is becoming known for her interpretations of Larsen and Laitman.
Jessica currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio, and studies with soprano Kathryn Lewek. She can be found on Instagram at @jlewsings.
On today's episode of Classical Schmassical, Mark Mathison talks about being a multi-instrumentalist with degrees in bassoon performance and physics, and how such diverse interests can find balance in his life.
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Guest Bio:
Mark Mathison is a multi-instrumentalist composer from Minneapolis. He received his B.M. in Instrumental Performance along with a B.S. in Physics from Illinois Wesleyan University in the spring of 2020. As a composer, he primarily focuses on the intersection of music with the physical world, both acoustically and electronically, as well as the approachability of new music outside of the classically-trained context. He also strives to promote access to education, as well as inclusivity and intersectionality in the fields of music and science.
In this episode, Connor Johnson talks about trumpet, composing, and accessing new genres of music!
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Guest bio:
Hi, I’m Connor Johnson and I’m a trumpet player and composer from Michigan. I’m currently finishing up my undergrad at Michigan State University, where I’ve really grown to love playing and writing new music.
Sam Moffett discusses theory, pedagogy, and the ways education shapes young musicians in today's episode of Classical Schmassical!
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In this episode, Shoshana Klein, one of the two directors of zFestival arts organization, chats about building community, running a festival with only two months notice, and perfectionism in the music education system.
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Guest bio:
Shoshana Klein is an oboist and arts administrator currently(ish) pursuing her master’s degree at McGill University. She received her bachelor’s degree in music and psychology as well as an advanced musical studies certificate from Carnegie Mellon University. Shoshana has worked on the administration and production side of the music industry in the past with CityMusic Cleveland, ChamberFest Cleveland, El Sistema Global, and Alia Musica Pittsburgh. She now acts as one of the administrators for zFestival, an online new music and multidisciplinary festival. Shoshana is particularly interested in contemporary applications and social impacts of music. With a specific interest in new music, she has attended the Fresh Inc and Bang on a Can Festivals, as well as Project Trio's improvisation Studio. She has performed dozens of world premieres and original compositions, including performances at venues in Montreal, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago, North Adams, Massachusetts; and New York City.
From double bass extended techniques to how new music can fit in to the orchestral audition circuit, Dean Mason and Ian Fales share their thoughts on the music of the past and present.
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Guest Bios:
Dean Mason is a composer and bassist from South Jersey. As a composer, he has created pieces ranging from solo and chamber works to choir, band, and orchestral music, as well as scores for film and video games. As a contrabassist, he currently performs with the Philharmonic of Southern New Jersey, and his concert performance experience consists of everything from the medieval era to the contemporary, as well as jazz, rock, and popular music. Finally, as a bass guitarist, Dean regularly performs around South Jersey and Philadelphia, and is currently the bassist for pop punk band All Systems Go.
Born in Naples, Florida, Ian Fales is a double bassist and educator based in New York City devoted to bringing classical and contemporary art music to new audiences through engaging and thoughtful performances. Ian earned his undergraduate degree from New York University, where he double majored in Double Bass Performance and International Relations and he is currently pursuing a Master of Music degree from Mannes at The New School. Ian’s work has led him to be a musical guest for the ADCA Orchestra, Opera America, and Loro Piana, and he’s participated in a number of festivals, including Music Academy International, the 44th Nordic-German Orchestra Week, and most recently, zFestival, a virtual music festival. As an educator, he provides virtual double bass lessons and has coached youth chamber ensembles and sectionals for various youth orchestras in the Naples, FL area.