San Francisco Contemporary Music Players at Dianne and Tad Taube Atrium Theater, April 13, 2023

San Francisco Contemporary Music Players present Temporal Excursions
Dianne and Tad Taube Atrium Theater
Diane B. Wilsey Center for Opera, Veterans' Building, 4th Floor, San Francisco War Memorial Performing Arts Center, 401 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94102 USA
8:00 PM, Thursday, April 13, 2023

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[7:07 PM] {‘How Music is Made’ featuring Artistic Director Eric Dudley in conversation with composer Brian Baumbusch}
[7:40 PM] {talk ends}

[8:02 PM] {Welcome from Richard Aldag, SFCMP Executive Director}
[8:04 PM] {pre-recorded house announcements}
[8:05 PM] {enter performers}

1. [8:06 PM] Conlon Nancarrow (1912–1997): Study No. 3a (1948) from the Boogie-Woogie Suite (1962), arranged for ensemble (2013) by Evan Ziporyn (b. 1959)
   [8:12 PM] {applause at end-work}

• Jeff Anderle: clarinet, bass clarinet;
• Eric Dudley: artistic director, conductor;
• Haruka Fujii: percussion;
• Douglas Machiz: cello;
• Keisuke Nakagoshi: piano;
• David Tanenbaum: guitar;
• Richard Worn: contrabass.

[8:13 PM] {ED talk about Baumberg's piece while setup takes place behind him}
[8:16 PM] {concert tuning}

Brian Baumbusch (b. 1987): Polytempo Music (2023, world premiere)

1. [8:17 PM] Pas de deux
2. [8:21 PM] Heliks 45
3. [8:25 PM] Counterclockwise
4. [8:29 PM] Hourglass
   [8:35 PM] {set ends}
   [8:37 PM] {set break!}

• Jeff Anderle: clarinet, bass clarinet;
• Hrabba Atladottir: violin;
• Brian Baumbusch: laptop;
• Matthew Boyles: clarinet;
• Kyle Bruckmann: oboe;
• Eric Dudley: artistic director, conductor;
• Haruka Fujii: percussion;
• Kristin Lloyd: harp;
• Douglas Machiz: cello;
• Keisuke Nakagoshi: piano;
• Kevin Rogers: violin;
• Christina Simpson: viola, violin;
• David Tanenbaum: classical guitar;
• Richard Worn: contrabass.

[8:49 PM] {performers getting ready for set two}
[8:51 PM] {concert tuning}
[8:51 PM] {applause to welcome ED}

Esa-Pekka Salonen (b. 1958): Catch & Release (2006, Bay Area premiere); score

1. [8:52 PM] I. Tema
2. [8:59 PM] II. Aria
3. [9:08 PM] III. Games
   [9:17 PM] {set ends}
   [9:18 PM] {show ends}

• Hrabba Atladottir: violin;
• Eric Dudley: artistic director, conductor;
• Haruka Fujii: percussion;
• William Harvey: trumpet;
• Peter Josheff: clarinets;
• Brendan Lai-Tong: trombone;
• Jamael Smith: bassoon;
• Richard Worn: contrabass.

Today's show was a good one for the pre-concert talk: Eric Dudley & Brian Baumbusch spent a lot of time going over the technical background behind what was going on in the music. I'm not sure that it helped me all that much as a listener once they were performing, but it gave me a lot to think about!

I enjoyed each of the pieces, but I was least happy with the one I was most interested in: from my seat up close, Ziporyn's arrangement of Nancarrow's Study No. 3a came off as rather unbalanced: the guitar on the left was much louder than the winds and strings at center and right, and nearly overpowered the boogie-woogie pulse of the piano (set up at the far left). Maybe I should have picked a seat further back from the stage?

Today's Baumbusch premiere was really a work-in-progress excerpt – it was truly the first live performance, but it was only 20 minutes of what's projected to be an hour-length piece. I found it interesting enough that I'll be looking for the full work to appear on a future program. Hopefully I'll be better able to follow Baumbush's polytempos in a second listen … there was so much going on today that I couldn't really latch on to any portion and tell myself, “yeah! that's what he was talking about!”.

Anyways, it was a fun show of unusual music, and I'm glad I attended.

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2023 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2023 event list! ☸ On to the next event!