Either/Or: 2021-22 Spring Season

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - New York experimental music ensemble Either/Or (EO) presents its 2021-22 Spring Season with two not-to-be-missed concerts: Variegates & Reactivities on Thursday, May 19 and Morton Feldman’s Triadic Memories on Friday, June 24.  The May 19 event is a mixed program of solos, duos, and ensemble works from an expansive group of creative perspectives including those of composers Raven Chacon, Michelle Lou, and Talib Rasul Hakim. On June 24, virtuoso pianist and EO member Taka Kigawa performs Feldman’s ravishing and colorful work from the early 80s.

Thursday May 19, 8:00 pm EST

Variegates & Reactivities 

University Settlement’s Speyer Hall

184 Eldridge Street New York, NY 10002

Tickets purchased in advance via Eventbrite

$20 | $10 Students & Seniors

>>No ticket sales at the door<<

>>Proof of Vaccination, ID, & Masking Required<< 

On Thursday May 19, 2022 at 8pm in University Settlement’s Speyer Hall, EO presents Variegates & Reactivities, a program of solos, duos, and ensemble works from an expansive group of creative perspectives. This cohort of composers represents continuing musical dialogs (Grisey, Hakim, and Chacon) and newly initiated investigations (Bland, Da Costa, and Lou) for the group.

Featuring EO flutist Margaret Lancaster and stellar guest performer Madison Greenstone on clarinet, Talib Rasul Hakim’s (1940-88) Duo is a special addition to EO’s growing TRH repertoire (initiated in Nov ‘21). This work introduced Hakim’’s music (then Stephen A. Chambers) to the NYC music community during a Music In Our Time concert at Town Hall in 1965. Greenstone’s learned performance of Gérard Grisey’s classic Deux Pièces pour Clarinette Contrebasse builds on previous EO presentations from the Frenchman’s oeuvre including Solo pour Deux (1981) and Périodes (1974). In December ‘21, EO took its initial step into the idiosyncratic creative world of composer, performer, and current Whitney Biennial artist, Raven Chacon with Whisper Trio, a brief, barely audible recitation in Diné (Chacon is a citizen of the Navajo Nation.) In the program note for his 2004 graphic score …lahgo adil’i… (the full title translates to “acting differently in the presence of strangers'') Chacon says the piece is “a reaction to some listeners (or performers of my early works) believing that they should be hearing some kind of ‘Native American influence’ in my music. Whatever that meant (to them). So this piece puts that burden into the hands of white performers, as that is who is the majority in music institutions in this country.” For EO’s realization, Chacon will visually guide the group through the score while the individual players consider their own interpretive paths.  

Each of the three composers on the program that are new to the EO fold use very personal, distinctive languages in their compositions. Noel Da Costa (1929-2002) was a Jamaican-American artist and educator born in Nigeria. In 1967, Da Costa co-founded the Society for Black Composers with Mr. Hakim and a number of others. He was also deeply involved in the important Symphony for the New World as a performer, composer, and organizer. Trombonist and event Curator Chris McIntyre recently retrieved Da Costa’s 4 Preludes from the Library of Congress and he’ll be joined by EO’s Director Richard Carrick on piano in its first performance in decades. Ed Bland’s (1926-2013) career was also quite diverse, straddling the various worlds of concert music, literary criticism, filmmaking, film and TV composing, and beyond. He made a number of flute pieces, of which For Flute (to be performed by Ms. Lancaster) is the most virtuosic and visceral. Finally, EO delves into the singular realm of 2018 Rome Prize winner Michelle Lou’s music. Lou’s bio states that her work “studies the possibilities of how strange form(s), functioning as behavior/as odd containers of strange objects/material can shape experiential time.” Outlines for bass flute (Lancaster), bass clarinet (Greenstone), and horn (Nicolee Kuester) articulates these preoccupations by using audio phone apps, tone generators, wine glasses, and more to alter and skew static instrumental sounds, along with time and listening itself. 

Friday June 24, 7:30 pm EST

Morton Feldman’s Triadic Memories

Tenri Cultural Institute

43A W 13th Street, New York, NY 

Tickets purchased in advance via Eventbrite

$20 | $10 Students & Seniors

>>No ticket sales at the door<<

>>Proof of Vaccination, ID, & Masking Required<< 

On Friday, June 24 at Tenri Cultural Institute in Manhattan, EO is proud to present a solo concert of Morton Feldman’s epic Triadic Memories, a celebration of new beginnings and historic reflection during a summer we hope is a new stage of us living post-pandemic. EO has a long tradition of performing Feldman’s music, most notably the 2014 US tour of the four and a half  hour long For Philip Guston.

Taka Kigawa, celebrated pianist and longtime collaborator with EO will bring this piece to life in the acoustically serene Tenri Cultural Center on West 13th Street.  

About Either/Or
Winner of the 2015 CMA/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming, Either/Or is a flexible chamber ensemble based in New York City that presents a repertoire of new and recent chamber music informed equally by American Experimentalism and European avant-garde practice, with special emphasis on artists outside the institutional mainstream and on works exploring nontraditional ensemble formations.  Director Richard Carrick and Curator Christopher McIntyre draw on a broader collective of 17 regular soloists (and guests) to realize the unique requirements of each project.  Since its founding in 2004, Either/Or has premiered more than 125 works (as well as dozens of student compositions), toured throughout the US and Sweden, and recorded for labels such as New Focus, New World Records, Starkland, and Sterling Classics.

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