Author Archives: Consortium

CCC Season Finale with Lakeshore Rush

Sunday, May 6 2018
2:30 PM
Ganz Hall, Roosevelt University
430 S. Michigan Avenue, Chicago
Donations accepted at the door

Our final concert of the season is Sunday, May 6 at 2:30 PM, Ganz Hall at Roosevelt University.

Our guest artists for this concert are Lakeshore Rush, a sextet consisting of flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano and percussion.

There will be three world premieres by our member composers: Night Contemplation and Dance by Elizabeth Start, Curved Silence by Beth Bradfish and Ji Chon Myong by Kyong Mee Choi. Until the Sunrise by Laura Schwendinger will receive its Chicago premiere. Portrait of a Moment by Timothy Dwight Edwards has been previously performed by Eighth Blackbird, Contempo and other ensembles.

Here is what people are saying about these composers:

Timothy Edwards is a versatile composer both in electronic and live acoustic music of all combinations. His often playful music was described by the Chicago Sun Times as having “a sense of purposeful direction that kept us anxious to hear what would happen next.”

Elizabeth Start’s work is described as “engaging Buoyancy… a bustle of rhythmic energy, tightly assembled,…(Chicago Tribune) …”Full of great ideas, fun accidentals, suggested dances.  Wonderful stuff…”  (WMUK-FM)

About Laura Schwendinger’s Creature Quartet release featuring the JACK Quartet, “The sheer intensity of both music and performance thereof is spellbinding, as if the passion of the composer for her subject shines through like a light.”

Kyong Mee Choi’s music pays intimate attention to dynamic and expressive gestures and the organic evolution of a deeply personal sonic journey. Along the way it becomes the felt experience of each listener who attends to it.”

“(Beth) Bradfish is a groundbreaking electronic composer whose works are as heartfelt as they are daring. Bradfish’s work has an emotional immediacy that lends it an incredible power.”

We will also feature the winner of our competition for a work to be included on this program. From thirty-nine impressive international entrants we chose Amos Gillespie, a local composer and his piece, The Spanish Speakers.

The concert will conclude with David Lang’s these broken wings, an unusual post-minimal work whose hypnotic slow movement includes various metal objects being dropped to the floor.

We are happy to be presenting the program in Ganz Hall at Roosevelt University, a lovely space in which to enjoy chamber music such as this.

We look forward to seeing you there and celebrating the end of our 28th season!

Lakeshore Rush competition deadline extended to October 15

The Chicago Composers’ Consortium announces a call for scores for its upcoming collaboration with Lakeshore Rush (www.lakeshorerush.com) on May 6, 2018. The winner of the call for scores will have her/his work programmed alongside those of members of the Consortium. There will also be a small stipend offered for travel. A concert recording will be made for the winner’s personal use.

The original deadline of October 1 has been extended to October 15. See the competition details here

2017-2018 Season

Friday, October 20, 2017 at 7:30 • Chamber works
Chamber works including flute, clarinet, violin, cello, guitar and piano by George Flynn, Marta Ptaczynska, Randall West, Lawrence Axelrod, Elizabeth Start and Timothy Johnson
North Shore Baptist Church 5244 N. Lakewood Ave
Tickets: $20/$10 students/seniors

March 18, 2018 • Cello-stravaganza
Featuring cellist Craig Hultgren, with cellist Elizabeth Start, pianist Lawrence Axelrod, and others
Composers: Misha Zupko, Seung-Won Oh, Lawrence Axelrod, Timothy Johnson and Kathleen Ginther.

Sunday, May 6 • Lakeshore Rush
Lakeshore Rush: flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano and percussion
Composers: Beth Bradfish, Kyong-Mee Choi, Laura Schwendinger, Timothy Edwards, and our competition winner

Our 2017-2018 season, details.

Axelrod/Huydts

Music for two pianos

Lawrence Axelrod and Sebastian Huydts, pianists

For our final concert of the 2016/17 season, the Chicago Composers’ Consortium will present pianist-composers Lawrence Axelrod and Sebastian Huydts in a program of music for two pianos. This lesser-known keyboard repertoire offers amazing sonic possibility, especially in this exciting collection of 20th and 21st century pieces. Lawrence Axelrod’s As Summer Wanes, an elegaic work that explores both extended techniques and gentle lyricism, will receive its premiere. Sebastian Huydts’ substantial Fifth Sonata, with powerful echoes of Shostakovich and Spanish music, will finish the program. The classic repertoire is a delightful mix of styles. Debussy’s exquisite En blanc et noir shows great breadth of compositional and emotional range, from joyous to intensely personal to fun. Britten also juxtaposed seriousness and fun in his Introduction and Rondo alla burlesca. Frank Martin’s Overture and Foxtrot contrasts a highly organized sonata-form movement and a jazz/popular dance-inspired movement with highly individual melody and tonality.

Please join us for this wide-ranging and exciting program!

Thursday, May 18, 7:30 pm
Sherwood Conservatory Concert Hall
1312 S Michigan Ave
Chicago

Lawrence Axelrod ~ As Summer Wanes (world premiere)
Sebastian Huydts ~ Fifth Sonata, op. 39 (for two pianos)
Claude Debussy ~ En blanc et noir
Benjamin Britten ~ Introduction and Rondo alla Burlesca
Frank Martin ~ Overture and Foxtrot

$20/$10

Chicago Stories happens Saturday, April 22, with five orchestral world premieres about Chicago specially commissioned for this concert, all by composers associated with Chicago. The Consortium teams up with the Chicago Composers Orchestra, a Chicago-based 40-member orchestra that is dedicated to presenting works by living composers.

Chicago Stories features five premières of orchestral works about the City of Chicago. Among them is From Jørgensen to Johnson by Timothy Ernest Johnson.

From Jørgensen to Johnson is based on my family history in the city of
Chicago. My ancestors were Danish immigrants to the Logan Square
neighborhood during the late 19th Century through the first quarter of
the 20th Century. During this period Logan Square was primarily
Norwegian and Danish. My grandfather’s grandfather Christian Jorgensen
gave rise to three generations of Johnsons, most of whom were raised
in the family home on the 2700 block of North California Ave.

My grandfather’s cousin Rockne Johnson did extensive research into
Johnson family history in Chicago and in Denmark. My musical ideas are
based on stories I read in his book “From Jørgensen to Johnson.” The
piece is meant to evoke this earlier time and the experience of
immigrants growing up in a large, loving family in a tough
neighborhood. There were family sing-a-longs around the piano, a
neighborhood football league called “prarie football” (resulting in
many fights) and the wonders of a city that was modernizing right
before their eyes. These Johnsons would have seen beautiful Logan
Boulevard and the Illinois Centennial Monument being built, among many
other things.

The family was not without tragedy as well, losing my grandfather’s
beloved Uncle Alvin and Aunt Daisy to appendicitis at young ages,
within a few years of each other. I was captivated by the story of
Daisy in particular, the sweetheart of the family, the only girl among
12 children, and whose death at age 15 left a deep and lasting mark on
her family, especially her parents and my grandfather’s beloved Uncle
Wally. Wally was a music lover: classical music, ragtime, waltzes and
musicals. He was the youngest of the 12 and his older sister Daisy was
his protector and confidant. This piece is dedicated to Wally and
Daisy Johnson.

_________________________________

When one stands underneath the sculpture called Cloudgate (or “the Bean”), one experiences a dizzying, magical feeling of visual distortion and warped reality.  I thought it would be really neat to try to capture that feeling through music. —Martha Horst

The structure of Cloudgate directly correlates to the structure of Kapoor’s sculpture of the same name.

The music forms a palindrome through the repetition of six distinct musical sections (A-B-C-D-E-F-F’-E’-D’-C’-B’-A’ ). Each section features symmetrical motives inspired by the object’s reflective qualities.

During the middle F section, the music mimicks the visual phenomena of the scultpure’s “omphalos” – a concave chamber that warps reflections – through the use of copious extended techniques. The structure of Cloudgate directly correlates to the structure of Kapoor’s sculpture of the same name.

Dr. Horst’s composition will be featured in the Chicago Composers’ Orchestra concert Chicago Stories on April 22, 2017 at St. James Cathedral, 65 East Huron, in Chicago. The concert begins at 7:30 pm, and will feature other premieres of compositions about the city of Chicago:

Water Bloom II by Kyong Mee Choi

Logan Square: Tough Neighborhood by Timothy Johnson

Océanie La Mer by Laura Schwendinger

With the Flow: Musings on the Chicago River by Elizabeth Start

The second day of the Chicago Electro-Acoustic Music Festival features music by several consortium composers: Beth Bradfish, Kyong Mee Choi, Tim Edwards, Casey Ginther, Tim Johson and Betsy Start will all have works presented on Friday, April 7 at 7:30 PM. There will be a panel discussion with the composers including the featured guest composer, Elainie Lillios, preceding the concert at 6:00 PM.

Elainie Lillios’ (featured guest composer) music reflects her fascination with listening, sound, space, time, immersion and anecdote. Her compositions include stereo, multichannel, and Ambisonic fixed media works, instrument(s) with live interactive electronics, collaborative experimental audio/visual animations, and installations. Recent awards include a 2016 Barlow Foundation Commission Award, a 2013-14 Fulbright Scholar appointment in Thessaloniki, Greece, First Prize in the 2009 Concours Internationale de Bourges, Areon Flutes International Composition Competition, Electroacoustic Piano International Competition, and Medea Electronique “Saxotronics” Competition and Second Prize in the 2014 Destellos International Electroacoustic Competition. Her music has also been recognized/awarded by the Concurso Internacional de Música Electroacústica de São Paulo, Concorso Internazionale Russolo, Pierre Schaeffer Competition, and La Muse en Circuit.

She has received grants/commissions from INA/GRM, Rèseaux, International Computer Music Association, La Muse en Circuit, NAISA, ASCAP/SEAMUS, LSU’s Center for Computation and Technology, Sonic Arts Research Centre, Ohio Arts Council, and National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts. She has been a special guest at the Groupe de Recherche Musicales, Rien à Voir, festival l’espace du son, June in Buffalo, and at other locations in the US and abroad. Elainie serves a Director of Composition Activities for the SPLICE institute (www.splice.institute) and is Professor of Composition at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. Elainie’s acousmatic music is available on Entre Espaces, produced by Empreintes DIGITALes. Other pieces appear on Centaur, MSR Classics, StudioPANaroma, La Muse en Circuit, New Adventures in Sound Art, SEAMUS, Irritable Hedgehog and Leonardo Music Journal. elillios.com

Cheer on the CCC, Quintet Attacca AND the Cubs this Sunday!

The time of the Sunday October 30  concert has been changed to 2:00 pm in order to avoid conflict with the evening World Series game.

Quintet Attacca
Sunday, October 30, 2016 • 2:00 pm

Nichols Hall
Music Institute of Chicago
1490 Chicago Ave, Evanston, IL

$20 general admission / $10 students and seniors