STEVE HOROWITZ AND THE CODE ENSEMBLE JANUARY 29, 2010 | 8:30 PM JANUARY 30, 2010 | 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater California Institute of the Arts STEVE HOROWITZ AND THE CODE ENSEMBLE JANUARY 29, 30, 2010 | 8:30PM PROGRAM Pa Kua (String Quartet #2) (1999) Steve Horowitz The CalArts Quartet: Mona Tian, Nic Salas, violins; Alessandra Barrett, viola; Greg Byers, cello Invasion from the Chicken Planet (1991, Los Angeles premiere) Music: Steve Horowitz Video: Zig Gron Directed by: Alyson Schacherer Featuring Alyson Schacherer and the Cal Arts Players: Leila Ghaznavi, Narendra Gala, Justin Montalvo Special Guest Narrator: John Schneider The Code Ensemble NYC: Andy Barbera, guitar; Red Wierenga, keyboards; Michael Evans, drums, percussion, theremin; Devin Maxwell, conductor/percussion The CalArts Code Players: Lauren Davis, Chelsea Raskin, sopranos; Chase Morgan, tuba; Max Gualtieri, guitar; Michael Gold, keyboards; Matt Cook, percussion; Leonard Lee, violin; Nathan Phelps, bass Sound Design: Ryan Ainsworth and Stane Hubert; Lighting Design: Adam Frank; Stage/Production Manager: Danielle Korman Intermission Floaters (1989) Randy Hostetler For string quartet and video score Palm Quart (1988) Randy Hostetler with Francesca Talenti For string quartet and video score of palm trees in Los Angeles The Re-Taking of Pelham 123 (2005, Los Angeles premiere) Music by Steve Horowitz (based on the original 1974 score to the filmThe Taking of Pelham 123 by David Shire) Film: Jane Brill Sampling: Chris Romero Special Guest Soloist: Vinny Golia The Code Ensemble NYC: Andy Barbera, guitar; Red Wierenga, keyboards; Michael Evans, drums, percussion, theremin; Steve Horowitz, bass; Chris Romero, samplist, laptop; Devin Maxwell, conductor/percussion The CalArts Code Players: Lauren Davis, Chelsea Raskin, sopranos; Gregory Zilboorg, trum- pet, Chase Morgan, tuba; Max Gualtieri, guitar; Michael Gold, keyboards; Matt Cook, per- cussion; Mona Tian, Nic Salas, violin; Alessandra Barrett, viola; Greg Byers, cello, Nathan Phelps, bass Sound Design: Ryan Ainsworth and Stane Hubert; Lighting Design: Adam Frank; Stage/Production Manager: Danielle Korman PROGRAM NOTES Pa Kua (String Quartet #2, 1999) Steve Horowitz Pa Kua is the eight complementary pairs of opposites usually placed in a circle, the circumference of which symbolizes time and space. Each trigram of the Pa Kua represents a force in nature and there are four yin and four yang powers giving balance and harmony to the universe. The broken lines are yin and the unbroken lines yang. Floaters (1989) Randy Hostetler Palm Quart (1988) Randy Hostetler with Francesca Talenti James Randolph “Randy” Hostetler, July 28, 1963–Feb. 1, 1996 Randy was a great friend and monster talent; I miss him every day…—Steve Horowitz “I thought he was one of the most talented people I have ever met, and someone who was bound to make an indelible mark on the culture of our country sooner or later. Certainly he was a key figure in the world of struggling Los Angeles artists. With him surely a part of our hopes for a renewal of the arts in America has vanished. We must carry on.” —Frederic Rzewski During his brief career Randy Hostetler accomplished a great deal. His catalogue includes over forty works in a wide range of media—instrumental solo and chamber works, vocal music, film music, tape music, intermedia works, ex- perimental film and video, visual art and performance art. His Living Rom Series provided an outlet for experimental composer, artists and performers in Los Angeles, often attracting participants from as far away as the Bay Area and Las Vegas. —Arthur Jarvinen The Re-Taking of Pelham 123 (2005, Los Angeles premiere) “What most struck me about Steve’s music is that if I were hired to score this picture today instead of 1974, I would hope that my score would come out sounding the way that Steve’s does.” —David Shire, composer BIOGRAPHIES Andy Barbera is a graduate of California Institute of the Arts (BFA 1991 and MFA 1996 Guitar Performance). A player of electric, acoustic and nylon-stringed guitars, he enjoys a diverse musicmaking life as an improviser, collaborator, and studio guitarist in NYC. He has performed with a variety of artists including Miroslav Tadic, Peter Epstein, Ralph Alessi, Mike Cohen (kirtan), Scot Ray, and others. His current projects include a trio with bassist Sam Minaie and drummer Qasim Naqvi. Jane Brill is a filmmaker and freelance film editor in New York City. Her work includesControl , which won the award for best experimental film at the Athens International Film Festival in Ohio and screened at the Museum of Modern Art in New York; Bicycle Path, which had its broadcast premiere on Reel NY on PBS; and The Re-Taking of Pelham 123, which premiered at the New York Video Festival. She has also worked on a number of independent documentaries, including Strong Man which won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at Slamdance, and The Ten Commandments: Tyler’s Choice, which screened at the IFC Center in New York. As a producer, she has worked on documentaries for UNICEF and promotional advertising for a variety of cable networks including Showtime and The Movie Channel. Brill’s editing work includes feature-length and magazine-format documentaries for CBS, PBS, ABC, Logo and MTV, and commercials for Lifetime, the Sundance Channel and “Saturday Night Live.” She also enjoyed editing “Triumph the Insult Comic Dog in Quebec,” a performance video by Robert Smigel for “Late Night With Conan O’Brien.” Brill studied painting and video at the Boston Museum School of Fine Arts before graduating from California Institute of the Arts in 1988 with a degree in film/video. Michael Evans is an improvising drummer/percussionist/thereminist/composer whose work investigates and embraces the collision of sound and theatrics. As well as being a drumset player, his work with unusual sound sources includes found objects, homemade instruments, the theremin and various digital and homemade analog electronics. His work with the theremin varies the quality of its sound through set-up and technique. On the theremin he has performed with dancers and in group settings playing experimental, jazz, rock, ersatz lounge and chamber music. In 2000, he was photographed playing a Moog ether wave theremin for the front of Bob Moog’s Big Briar catalog. He has performed in multiple performances of the NYC Theremin Society’s Issue Project Room concerts during 2005, 2006 and 2007. He has studied movement/sparring/drumming with Professor Milford Graves, drum technique with Joe Morello, tabla with Misha Masud, kanjira with Ganesh Kumar and Haitian/Afro-Cuban hand drumming with John Amira. He has studied musicianship with Helen Hobbs Jordan, composition with Richard Cameron Wolf, and Blue Gene Tyranny and the theremin with Pamelia Kurstin.http://www.michaelevanssounds.com/ The films and videos ofZig Gron are captivating, funny and alive. His work has been screened at various venues, large and small, from Germany to Australia, including the Pacific Film Archives in Berkeley, the Dallas Video Festival (where his one-man tour-de-force video Mono Playhouse played to SRO crowds), the Chicago International Film and Video Festival (Certificate of Merit Award), the Chicago Underground Film Festival (where he won 2nd place for best feature), the Charlotte Film and Video Festival (Jurors’ Award), the Montreal International Festival of New Film and Video, and numerous galleries in New York and Los Angeles. Zig received his Masters degree in Film/Video from CalArts and works as an independent music editor on feature films in Los Angeles. Zig Gron is “disciplined in technical expertise and psychotic in imaginative gymnastics.” —George Kuchar Steve Horowitz is a creator of odd but highly accessible sounds, and a diverse and prolific musician. Steve’s 30-year career integrates his experiences as a bandleader with his explorations as a multi-faceted composer. Horowitz has a large catalog of music for traditional and unusual ensembles such as: string quartet, woodwind quartet, orchestra, Disklavier, solo contrabass flute, and of course the large electroacoustic chamber ensemble you will experience here tonight. Horowitz studied at the California Institute of the Arts with Mel Powell, Morton Subotnick, Michael Jon Fink and Stephen “Lucky” Mosko. He lectures at various schools including New York University, California Institute of the Arts, and Berklee College of Music in Boston and has received performance underwriting as well as commissions from: Meet the Composer Fund (1992 at the Lab SF, and 2005 at the Kitchen NYC); Amsterdam Fund for the Arts NL (2000 for ensemble tour); Fund for the Interactive Sound Arts Netherlands (1997, Graphic scores Mousetrap Quartet); Gravy Train Dance Company (1984 Choreographer Jo Ann Nerenberg); The Alternate Currents Ensemble (1994 Ribbon of Extremes); Music at the Anthology (MATA, executive producer Phillip Glass 2003 Vertical Field Horizontal Field for string orchestra and piano performed by SONYC, featuring soloist Joel Wizansky on piano); and The Astoria Symphony (Mix Re-Mix, world premiere). Touring projects in the US and the Netherlands have helped to form Horowitz’s unique perspective and voice. Horowitz and his music have appeared at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco, The Bimhuis in Amsterdam, and The Miller Theater and The Kitchen in NYC. He frequently collaborates with other artists—joining forces with an eclectic variety of musicians such as electric guitar wizards Elliott Sharp and Henry Kaiser, saxophone greats Lenny Pickett and Ralph Carney, The Clubfoot Orchestra, Glen Spearman, acoustic bassist Tatsu Aoki, and the Balkan music ensemble Zhaba. A culmination of years of investigation, The Code Ensemble explores Horowitz’s persistent musical themes: the intertwining of electric and acoustic instruments, new forms, extended techniques, interactivity, music for picture, theater and live performance. Drawing on a finely honed sense of humor, Horowitz looks deeply into the sociological filter and re-examines pop culture’s presentation of “truth” as entertainment.