October 25, 2009 PROGRAM

Program October 25, 2009

Octet Tim AuBuchon
1. Old and New
2. Dark Window
3. Little Guy
4. Pink Fedora
5. The Dirge
6. Personal Multipalities

Marc Landes, trumpet
Mitch Paliga, alto and soprano sax
Tim AuBuchon, tenor sax
Steve Schnall, bari sax and bass clarinet
Ryan Shultz, bass trumpet
Jeff Kowalkowski, piano
Dave Smith, bass
Doug Bratt, drums

Sonata for Flute and Piano Tom Stevens
Laura Koeple-Tenges, flute
Tom Stevens, piano

little rootee tootee (after Thelonius Monk) Frank Abbinanti
Frank Abbinanti, piano

the time inside a year David McDonnell
Jason Adasiewicz, vibraphone
Jeff Kowalkowski, piano

Chris and Nancy Lemons Chris Lemons

Olivia Marita Bolles
Blake Taylor, percussion

Gimlet Eye Julia Miller
Julian Berke, keyboards
NIck Alvarez, drums
Julia Miller, guitar

Vibraphone Journal (excerpts) Eric Roth
Katie Wiegman, vibraphone
{Improvisation} lead by: Jason Adasciewicz/Dave McDonnell


NOTES
Octet--Tim AuBuchon
I have wanted to write for a jazz group of this size for several years. The idea started right before I left Chicago to take a teaching position at Truman State University in Kirksville, MO in the fall of 2002. Since then, the demands of a full-time job and my growing family (three kids, currently 6, 4, and 1 ½ ) have kept the octet plans on hold. I was very fortunate in the spring of 2009 to receive a Truman Faculty Summer Research Fellowship, which allowed me to study with noted jazz composer Joey Sellers for a week this past July. Much of the writing for this project was completed during that week.
In working on the octet music, I generally wanted to avoid the usual melody/solos/melody format and instead attempted to develop longer forms. Improvisation is very important to me, so rather that just write more material, I tried to integrate the improvised solos and written material in a way that would still allow the musicians to stretch out and shape the music. To varying degrees, you may hear the influence of Ornette Coleman, Dave Douglas, Ben Allison, and Thelonious Monk.

Sonata for Flute and Piano--Tom Stevens

little rootee tootee (after Thelonius Monk)--Frank Abbinanti
I've studied composition with Richard Teitelbaum, Ralph Shpaey and Ben Johnston. I've been active on the new music scene since 1983. I don't get many commissions anymore but when I did I had opportunities to write for large orchestras and chamber groups, as the Chicago Chamber Orchestra, Chicago Pro Musica, Harper Symphony, New Valley Symphony, Asusa Pacifica Orchestra, Trio Hernadi, and AMM. Now I'm putting into final form three chamber concerti called "power clowns", one for English Horn, another for Contrabass and another for Bb Clarinet;and also piano solos,"Deep South" "African Kinderszenen" for prepared piano; duets, and chamber pieces, a piano concerto "Mudmarch" and pieces for orchestra as "femmes de la revolucion". I'm also journal Editor for Contemporary Music Review (England), one devoted to Frederic Rzewski. This will be published in a year or so.
The challenge in playing Monk's music for piano solo is that you simply cannot play what you like, when you like, and not all his pieces are doable as a piano solo, so I'm thrilled whenever I can add a new tune. I've reached the ends of the fruitful lands now, I play everything there is to play of Monk as a piano solo, and "little rootee tootee" is a less serious,more playful etude-piece than say "Bright Mississippi",or "Crepuscule with Nellie" where thoughts of exodus and lifeworld are part of what the music says.

the time inside a year--David McDonnell
This duo is an expansion of the concepts used in a computer piece called Song of Overtones, in which I attempted to combine the compositional approaches of Charles Wuorinen and Tristan Murail. In fact much of the form, notes and rhythms are taken from that piece, but adapted both for the instruments themselves and human capability. The concept behind the title refers to the technique I used to generate the formal and rhythmic attributes of the piece: using the series of notes which form the melodic backbone of the music, taking the proportions inherent in that series and using those to determine the formal and rhythmic aspects of the music. As I was writing the music however, certain parts seemed as if they needed to be expanded within the already finite form of the music. This reminded me of the way memory can perceive a finite block of time as having parts within that are disproportionally longer in relation to other parts. It also recalled to me the replicant character Rutger Hauer plays in Phillip K. Dick's Blade Runner and the speech he gives at the end of the movie about the passing of time and memory.
David McDonnell received his Bachelor of Music in Composition from De Paul University. He plays saxophone, keyboards and electric bass. He spent most of his 20's playing in avant-rock and jazz ensembles such as Bablicon, Michael Columbia, Icy Demons, Need New Body, Herculaneum and The Hats. Music by these groups, excepting The Hats, can be found on the Misra label, Chicago's 482 and Alabaster labels and Europe's Clean Feed, Leaf and Pickled Egg labels. David's solo project, "the diminisher", was put out by Portland Oregon's Unsound Records in 2006. He completed his Masters in Composition at De Paul in 2009, and is currently pursuing a DMA in composition at the College Conservatory of Music at University of Cincinnati. While continuing activities on the Chicago scene, he lives in Cincinnati with his wife and dog; they help him write his music.

Chris and Nancy Lemons--Chris Lemons

Olivia--Marita Bolles
Marita Bolles is a Chicago-based composer whose music has been commissioned and performed internationally by performers who share a commitment to newly composed and experimental music. She completed her undergraduate at the University of MIchigan, and received her MA and PhD from the University of California, San Diego where she studied with Roger Reynolds. She is recently back from residencies at Ragdale and Yaddo where she completed a commission for the St. Paul-based new music ensemble Zeitgeist. Future projects include the production of objects de la musique--sound objects that incorporate her original music into interactive environments (books, boxes, etc.); she is currently designing a prototype of these objects with funds from the Chicago Artists Assistance Program. Her music is available on itunes.
Olivia is a percussion solo underwritten by the American Composers Forum with funds from the Jerome Foundation. It was composed percussionist Patti Cudd and is the first in a series of five pieces belonging to the suite Cities and Signs, inspired by Italo Calvino's book Invisible Cities. The score is notated in a way that has an increasingly open architecture, therefore each interpretation by a percussionist is unique and beyond the usual expectations of the performer's interpretive voice.

Gimlet Eye--Julia Miller

Vibraphone Journal--Eric Roth
ericrothmusic.com