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ARTS FEATURES » VSO’s New Music Festival taps the past for inspiration The five-day event nods to history, but its focus is on the absolute thrill of discovery by Alexander Varty on January 17th, 2018 at 12:55 PM

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4 Vancouver named second best North American city for filmmakers American soloist Rachel Barton Pine will perform Marcus Goddard’s Concerto, the first movement of which is derived in part from heavy metal. 5 This Saturday: March On– Vancouver takes the LISA-MARIE MAZZUCCO baton from last year’s Women’s March Not all of the music in this year’s edition of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival is entirely new. One whole night, the New Music for Old Instruments: After Bach collaboration with Early Music Vancouver on Friday (January 19), is devoted to contemporary compositions that reference the music of the Baroque era. Other works, such as Jocelyn Morlock’s Night, herself, draw from global traditions that are even older. And at least one world premiere touches on motifs—glissandos, slides, and passages of frenetic virtuosity—that have been developed over the 50-year history of a style that might be surprising to some: heavy metal.

It’s all part of a trend in contemporary through-composed music to step back from abstraction, gather inspiration from the past, and then move boldly forward again—a trend, Morlock says, that offers a great deal of pleasure to composers, performers, and listeners alike. “I’ve loved it since I tried it because it was so much fun,” the VSO’s composer in residence 6 A Harry Potter-themed reports, on the line from her Vancouver apartment. “I think part of it, sometimes, is using wizard’s brunch is music that you love for your own specific purposes, rather than starting kind of from the coming to Vancouver ground up, where any language is permissible. It’s interesting to maybe start with 7 Patti Bacchus: In a someone else’s language and play in that toybox. That’s why it’s fun for me. valuable civics lesson, a high-school quarterback “It’s sort of like wearing vintage clothes with something modern at the same time,” she wins fight to save spares adds. 8 A beginner’s guide to Of the three pieces that Morlock has in the New Music Festival, two make explicit allusion having dim sum in Metro Vancouver to the musical past. Her older work Revenant, which will be revived for the After Bach program, is based on ’s The Musical Offering, although Morlock 9 NDP Leader Jagmeet essentially asks her musicians to play the great German’s theme backward. (Such was his Singh gets engaged to genius that this makes complete sonic sense.) fashion designer Gurkiran Kaur Sidhu “That’s the spine of the piece, and then there are numerous variations on that as it goes 10 What’s behind the Tomo along,” she explains. “But that is where I started from.” name of a new Vancouver cohousing project Night, herself, which will be premiered as part of Dawn to Dusk: From Aurora to Winter Sky on Monday (January 22), applies a similar compositional strategy to excerpts from HOLD THE MOMENT Henry Purcell’s proto-opera The Fairy Queen—but it closes with an extended ostinato passage that is inspired by, but doesn’t directly quote, the overlapping rhythmic patterns of Balinese gamelan music. It’s just one more sign, Morlock says, that is no longer restricted to the European tradition.

“Anything is permissible,” she notes happily. “And that includes combining various styles, certainly. It’s an interesting thing to be allowed to do.”

Further evidence that classical music is moving into a more inclusive phase will be found in Marcus Goddard’s , which—in a significant coup for the VSO trumpeter and composer—will be premiered by American soloist Rachel Barton Pine as part of Dawn to Dusk. From her home in , Pine reports that she knew she wanted to perform Goddard’s music the moment she heard his string quartet Allaqi—and that if the The Georgia Straight: A 50th Anniversary concerto’s first movement is at least in part derived from metal, it’s the perfect fit for her Celebration Book abilities and interests. This beautifully produced co!ee-table book brings together over 100 of Georgia Straight's “It’s not that an audience member is going to sit there and hear some kind of crossover- iconic covers, along with short essays, insider rock piece, ’cause that’s not what it’s about,” says the violinist, who has already performed details and contributor reflections, putting each astute and convincing chamber-music arrangements of Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train” of these issues of the publication into its and ’s “One”. “But just as Bartók or Dvořák would take eastern European folk historical context. music and incorporate it into their ‘high art’, in a similar way the more serious genres of heavy metal are ripe for inclusion in our language of classical music. It’s really come full BUY NOW circle, because a lot of those subgenres have been inspired by classical all along.”

Pine will also join VSO concertmaster Nicholas Wright in performing Anna Clyne’s Grammy Award–winning Prince of Clouds and Morlock’s evergreen Cobalt as part of Cobalt Clouds and Clear Blue Seas on Saturday (January 20). What links all three pieces, she says, is that they offer accessible pleasure to the listener while also giving the Blue Jacket Boy No one knows... performers a chance to find their own personal voice, without the pressure of playing I saw you on the 99 B- ...that I make seven pieces already defined by past generations of virtuosos. line today. We both got figures a year. I live and o! at Granville and dress modestly, and “One thing that I like about all three of the works that I’ll be doing is that while there’s consecutively got on don’t talk about some use of extended techniques, they don’t go crazy with it,” she says. “There’s definitely the 10... money. The... still the traditional violin-playing, where you’re going to hear the singing voice of the violin, and the exciting virtuosity of the violin—you know, the violin played as ever, but MORE I SAW YOUS » MORE CONFESSIONS » with these composers’ modern twist. “And for the audience,” she continues, “I think that they’re going to hear everything they READ LIKE A LOCAL like about hearing a violin concerto, in terms of the lyricism, in terms of the really STRAIGHT NEWSLETTER intense, fiery passages and virtuosity and warmth and passion. But they’re also going to hear three pieces that they’re not familiar with that are going to be really exciting new Get the latests events and news updates discoveries—and that’s just an absolute thrill.” Your email The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival takes place at the News: Weekly top stories various venues from Thursday to Monday (January 18 to 22). the List: Contests,events and prebuys

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