July 13 –31, 2 016 Lincoln Center Festival lead support is provided by American Express July 28–30 Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse S¯o Percussion: Trilogy July 28 Reich, Dessner, Lang July 29 Xenakis, Ergün, Trueman July 30 Cage, Lansky, Mackey S¯o Percussion Eric Cha-Beach Josh Quillen Adam Sliwinski Jason Treuting This performance is made possible in part by the Josie Robertson Fund for Lincoln Center. Public support for Festival 2016 is provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and New York State Council on the Arts. – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION About S o– Percussion: Trilogy 2016 represents a milestone in defines percussion is not the specific So–Percussion’s work: 15 years of com - nature of instruments and playing exper - missioning new pieces for percussion. In tise, but rather our willingness to be flexi - 2001, we had our first professional season, ble and diverse with what we play. our first concert in New York City at the Bang on a Can Marathon, and the initiation So–’s four festival concerts began with of our first major commission, David Steve Reich’s Drumming at Alice Tully Hall Lang’s the so-called laws of nature. on July 16 as part of Reich/Reverberations, a three-concert series celebrating Reich’s Our history with Lincoln Center Festival 80th birthday. Drumming is the pillar that began in 2007 when we teamed up with supports most of the other works. the electronica duo Matmos for explo - rations of the tonal possibilities of uncom - Happily, it is becoming increasingly chal - mon objects. S o– returned in 2010 for lenging to explain to young musicians how Varèse (R)evolution, during which we unthinkable a full program of percussion played works by the great experimental music used to be in the western world. composer Edgard Varèse. Our latest Béla Bartók, for all of his fascination with Festival concerts represent a particular percussion, thought the idea novel and strand of our DNA: ambitious and lengthy “rather monotonous,” a fun but unserious works for chamber percussion. As such, experiment. they signify a very focused area of our work. Beyond these pieces, we have com - So– Percussion deliberately set out to missioned and facilitated commissions of increase the number and quality of pieces many smaller pieces, developed evening- that could follow in the footsteps of length theatrical projects of our own music Drumming. We weren’t content with a with collaborators like the choreographer splash of new ideas on otherwise tradi - Emily Johnson, and participated in hybrid tional programs—the goal was to rethink collaborations of original music with the entire concert program as an expres - groups like Matmos, where we often con - sion of contemporary ideas. To that end, stitute a band more than a chamber our aim was not only to produce a large ensemble. quantity of new commissions, but to inspire composers to make some of their Our original founding mission was to boldest statements through the percus - expand the exciting but underdeveloped sion quartet. repertoire for percussion quartet. This in itself is a lifetime’s worth of work, because Each performance opens with a shorter the very nature of percussion is broad and major piece from the tiny but brilliant reper - fluid. On any given day, a percussion quar - toire of percussion music that existed when tet’s palette could consist of only “un- we started our group. From there, the three pitched” sounds (noises or sounds that are concerts explore six of the most ambitious not part of the piano keyboard scheme); a works that have been written for us. mallet quartet of two marimbas and vibes; four players around a piano; or even a con - —Adam Sliwinski sort of amplified string instruments. What – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION So– Percussion: Trilogy July 28 Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse Steve Reich: Music for Pieces of Wood (1973) Guest Percussionist Yumi Tamashiro Bryce Dessner: Music for Wood and Strings (2013) Commissioned by Carnegie Hall Intermission David Lang: the so-called laws of nature (2002) Commissioned by S o–Percussion part 1 part 2 part 3 Approximate performance time: 1 hour and 35 minutes, with one intermission – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION So– Percussion: Trilogy July 29 Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse Iannis Xenakis: Métaux, from Pleiades (1978) Guest Percussionists Ian Antonio & Russell Greenberg (Yarn/Wire) Cenk Ergün: Proximity (2009) Commissioned by S o–Percussion Intermission Dan Trueman: neither Anvil nor Pulley (2010) Commissioned by S o–Percussion Act I: Another Wallflower (From Long Ago) Act II: 120bpm (Or, What is your Metronome Thinking?) Act III: A Cow Call (Please oh Please Come Home!) Act IV: Feedback (In which a Famous Bach Prelude becomes Ill-Tempered) Act V: Hang Dog Springar (A Slow Dance) Approximate performance time: 1 hour and 35 minutes, with one intermission – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION So– Percussion: Trilogy July 30 Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse John Cage: Third Construction (1941) Paul Lansky: Threads (2005) Commissioned by S o–Percussion I. Prelude II. Recitative III. Chorus IV. Aria V. Recitative VI. Chorus VII. Aria VIII. Recitative IX. Chorus X. Chorale Prelude Intermission Steven Mackey: It Is Time (2010) Commissioned by Carnegie Hall and the Chamber Music America Commissioning Program Staging elements and video created by Mark DeChiazza I. Metronome II. Steel Drums III. Marimba IV. Drums V. Epilogue Approximate performance time: 1 hour and 30 minutes, with one intermission – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION About the Programs This seemingly simple conceit actually makes Music for Pieces of Wood a July 28 consistently challenging piece to play, no Music for Pieces of Wood matter how many times we’ve done it. Any Steve Reich (b. 1936) musician, no matter how seasoned, must Music for Pieces of Wood grows out of the concentrate intensively on the task of keep - same roots as Clapping Music : a desire to ing a pattern steadily offset. The experi - make music with the simplest possible ence is akin to seeing yourself through a instruments. The claves, or cylindrical dimensional portal, maybe half a second pieces of hard wood, used here were into the future. That disorientation never selected for their particular pitches (A, B, goes away, but you develop coping strate - C-sharp, D-sharp, and D-sharp an octave gies such as the reassuring feel of the above), and for their resonant timbre. This physical pattern in your hands and arms. piece is one of the loudest I have ever composed, but uses no amplification what - Reich’s original version of Music for Pieces soever. The rhythmic structure is based of Wood calls for tuned claves. When we entirely on the process of rhythmic first started playing it, we grabbed some of “buildups” or the substitution of beats for the wooden planks that were lying around rests, and is in three sections of decreas - our studio for David Lang’s the so-called ing pattern length: 6/4, 4/4, 3/4. laws of nature . Reich first heard us do this —Steve Reich version in New York at the Look and Listen Festival. He was enthusiastic about the Each of our concerts in the Lincoln Center energy and feel of our performance, and I’ll Trilogy contains one classic work that never forget what he said about the opens the concert and launches the two planks: “Well, I guess I didn’t say you – So commissions. Music for Pieces of couldn’t do that, they are pieces of wood!” Wood is a masterly demonstration of a —AS deceptively simple concept: rhythmic ambiguity. It doesn’t ruin anything to Music for Wood and Strings explain the process, because the delight is Bryce Dessner (b. 1976) in the perception of its prismatic qualities. For several years I have been experimenting with simple chorales in my music that utilize Like Clapping Music , with which it shares triadic chord inversions that are aligned in its opening rhythm, Music for Pieces of complex rhythm patterns to create a kaleido - Wood consists of the same rhythm dis - scopic effect of harmony. These feature heav - placed in different parts. Unlike Clapping ily in my work for orchestra and two guitars, Music , it uses tuned instruments which St. Carolyn by the Sea (2011), and the writing create a harmonic tapestry. These dis - for my song cycle, The Long Count (2009). placed rhythms are introduced one note at a time, but in a carefully crafted sequence While I have used this technique on guitars that masks their identity and suggests and strings, I have not had the opportunity many possible ways of hearing where the to apply it to percussion instruments. For – main pulse and “downbeat” of the music this new S o Percussion piece I have been might be. working with instrument builder Aron Sanchez (Blue Man Group, Buke and Gase) to design four dulcimer-like instruments to – LINCOLN CENTER FESTIVAL 2016 SO PERCUSSION be played by the quartet. These are simply Dessner deftly composes each chordstick designed double-course string instruments to have a slightly different tuning, so that which are played like a dulcimer, but which more complex melodies can result from are specifically built and tuned to the performers trading back and forth in implement a more evolved hybrid of the the ancient technique known as “hocket.” chorale hocket. Each instrument is ampli - In this way, although the chordsticks fied using piezo pickups and will have eight sound very similar to the electric guitar, the double-course strings tuned to two har - composer actually uses a common percus - monies. With the use of dulcimer mallets, sion performance technique that is espe - the quartet players can easily sound either cially prominent in music from Africa and harmony, or play individual strings, Bali.