Persephone & the Phoenix; Nicole Brancato, keys. Photo by Rita Taylor, Banff Centre 2022. 

Join us for a multimedia presentation that showcases bold new approaches to classical music concert curation and production. Instrumentalists, vocalists, composers, and creators from all over the world meld tradition, innovation and new creation and showcase the evolving nature of classical music as a powerful, inspiring and engaging contemporary art form. 

Whether you are a seasoned classical music enthusiast, or simply enjoy live music and are curious about the evolving landscape of classical music, this is a live music experience not to be missed.

PROGRAM

INTERSTITIAL GESTURES
Kalaisan Kalaichelvan (composer), Benjamin Portzen (electronics), David Potvin (piano)

Poitu Varen  -  Kalaisan Kalaichelvan 

I: Rings

II: Trunk

III: Crown. 

Artist statement: Poitu Varen is a newly-created piece of concert music and installation art for piano and electronics that offers the opportunity to explore the intertwining histories of the piano, the Banff Centre and Sacred Buffalo Guardian Mountain. By allowing audiences to navigate a landscape of pianos and natural objects acting as “speakers” for transducer-diffused live electronics, the work seeks to facilitate an exchange of ideas and emotions between natural, sonic and human bodies, each with their own memories and performance practices.

Poitu Varen is designed with the Banff Centre’s enduring history of piano practice, creation and performance in mind. The Centre’s 108 pianos carry with them a long lineage of music makers and artists representing incredibly diverse traditions and histories. By activating these instruments in unique ways – through active performance and diffused resonance – we build a space of transformation where musical gestures and dialects are in deep dialogue with place, material and time.

IIDA-VILHEMIINA SINIVALO (cello)

Metsä  (Forest)  -  Tytti Arola
With electronics and forest aromas
(Note: please enjoy the aromas of the forest and pass along)

Aleatoric (Creature)  -  Lotta Wennäkoski
With audience participating with recording cellphones
(Note: if you would like to participate, please turn on your phone to record and then playback, as indicated by the performer)

oddjob  -  Jukka Tiensuu
Cello and electronics

Song of My Heart  -  Einojuhani Rautavaara
With David Potvin (piano)

Improvisation on Finnish folk tune  -  Traditional

QUARTET MALAMATINA
Tim Beattie (guitar), Finlay Hay (guitar), Ross Morris (guitar), Lenny Ranallo (guitar)

Cuban Landscape with Rain  -  Leo Brouwer

My Clock is Broken!  -  Laura Snowden 

Infinite Wave  -  Marco Galvani