Monroe NY News

The Eastman Musica Nova Ensemble presents two upcoming performances on Monday, February 20 and Friday, April 7 featuring new and exciting works alongside seminal compositions of the 20th century. The ensemble’s next performance on February 20 at 7:30 p.m. in Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre, includes Tania León’s Rítmicas. 

A Cuban-born composer who received a 2021 Pulitzer Prize for her work Stride, León turns 80 this year and was recently one of five named 2022 Kennedy Center honorees. Brad Lubman, Professor of Conducting and Contemporary Ensembles at Eastman, considers León to be a “very unique voice” in contemporary music. Also on the February 20 program is Pierre Jalbert’s Transcendental Windows and Annesley Black’s LAUF. 

Lubman touts Jalbert for writing “very colorful and captivating music,” and notes that Black, a Canadian composer, is becoming more widely known internationally.

Musica Nova’s final performance of the school year will take place on April 7 at 7:30 p.m. in Kilbourn Hall, with the program’s first half consisting of Anton Webern’s brief but masterful Five Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 10, conducted by master’s student Luke Poeppel, and Helmut Lachenmann’s Mouvement (– vor der Erstarrung) (or “before freezing”). In program notes, Lachenmann describes the work as expressing the body’s final movements before death, or “music of dead movements––practically the last convulsions.” Lubman says it is rarely heard in the United States, even though the 87-year-old composer is “one of the most influential composers and musical thinkers of our time.”

The second half of the concert features DMA conducting candidate Georgia Mills leading György Ligeti’s virtuosic Chamber Concerto for 13 Instruments, an iconic work in the contemporary ensemble repertoire. As the DMA candidate’s final concert, Mills will give a 20-minute lecture and demo of the work before launching into the full performance. “During her time studying with me, Georgia Mills has become an outstanding conductor, not just in terms of her conducting technique –– which is excellent –– but also in her ability to create a very positive, yet efficient and musical atmosphere, building a great rapport with any ensemble with whom she works,” says Lubman.

Both upcoming performances of the Eastman Musica Nova Ensemble are free and open to the public. Visit our Concerts and Events Calendar to learn more about these and all upcoming events at Eastman. 

Media only: Lauren Sageer, Assistant Director of Public Relations and Digital Content,(585) 451-8492, lsageer@esm.rochester.edu

Original source can be found here.