CONTACT: Louisa Spier Jeanette Peach Cal Performances Cal Performances (510) 643-6714 (510) 642-9121
[email protected] [email protected] FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 17, 2017 Press Room Images of Julia Wolfe and Bang on a Can All-Stars available in the press room. CAL PERFORMANCES AT UC BERKELEY PRESENTS JULIA WOLFE’S PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING ORATORIO, ANTHRACITE FIELDS BAY AREA PREMIERE PERFORMED BY BANG ON A CAN ALL-STARS AND CAPPELLA SF SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 26 Berkeley, January 17, 2017—Cal Performances welcomes new music champions Bang on a Can All-Stars to Zellerbach Hall for the Bay Area Premiere of Julia Wolfe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning oratorio, Anthracite Fields, on Sunday, February 26, at 7pm. Wolfe’s concert-length work, scored for electric sextet and choir, is inspired by the stories of coal-mining families in Pennsylvania at the turn of the 20th century. For the performance, Bang on a Can is joined by Bay Area esteemed new music choir, Cappella SF, directed by Ragnar Bohlin. The Los Angeles Times wrote, Anthracite Fields “captures not only the sadness of hard lives lost...but also the sweetness and passion of a way Cal Performances / Julia Wolfe: Anthracite Fields, page 2 of daily life now also lost. The music compels without overstatement. This is a major, profound work.” Named after the technical term for the purest form of coal, anthracite, Anthracite Fields was developed through Wolfe’s extensive research about the coal-mining industry in an area very near where she grew up in Pennsylvania. Wolfe’s music is often distinguished by an intense physicality and rhythmic drive, and she freely crosses the boundaries between classical, jazz, rock, world, and experimental music in her acclaimed works.