West Coast String Summit
Josh Zubot Strings. Photo credit Genevieve Monroe.
West Coast String Summit – Mar. 9 – 12, 2023
Presented by Vancouver New Music, Vancouver Improvised Arts Society, NOW Society in partnership with the Roundhouse
Concerts at 8pm each night
Artist chats take place March 9 – 11 at 7:15pm each night
The Roundhouse, Performance Centre (181 Roundhouse Mews)
ANNEX (823 Seymour Street)
8EAST (8 E Pender St)
Single tickets for March 9–11 $19–$39; 3-night pass $50
Tickets available through Eventbrite, and at the door.
Tickets for March 12 (8EAST) by donation, available at the door.
Meredith Bates & Alex Abahmed (Vancouver) • Nicolas Caloia & Malcolm Goldstein (Montreal) • Eyvind Kang (US) • Quatuor Bozzini (Montreal) • Quatuor d’occasion (Montreal) • Sapphire Haze (Vancouver) • Josh Zubot Strings (Vancouver)
Vancouver New Music, Vancouver Improvised Arts Society and NOW Society partner to present the first West Coast String Summit from March 9th to 12th, a new annual celebration of creative music and the power of strings. The West Coast String Summit brings together quartets, ensembles, duos and solo string players for collaborative, eclectic explorations of string music: from contemporary string quartets to improvisation to string and electronic duos.
Join musicians from Vancouver, Montreal and the US for four days of concerts, open chats and a special workshop with renowned composer and musician Malcolm Goldstein.
Schedule:
Thursday, March 9; 8pm – Roundhouse Arts & Recreation Centre
Eyvind Kang (US)
A solo performance on Viola d’amore by Eyvind Kang.
Kang is a composer, violist and conductor who has has released many acclaimed albums on labels such as Tzadik, Ipecac, Abduction and Ideologic Organ, as well as worked on hundreds of recordings as an instrumentalist and arranger.
His compositions have been played by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, the Winnipeg Symphony, the Seattle Chamber Players, MG_INC Orchestra, Coro di Camera di Modena, Orchestra del Teatro Communale di Bologna, and the Israeli Contemporary Players, among other ensembles.
As a violist he has been featured by a wide range of independent musicians including Bill Frisell, Laurie Anderson, John Zorn, the Sun City Girls, and Secret Chiefs. Kang has also performed solo pieces by Christian Wolff, Giacinto Scelsi, Ornette Coleman, Satyajit Ray, and Hanne Darboven. His ongoing, genre defying collaboration with composer and singer Jessika Kenney has been described as “serious, refined music” (The New York Times), taking the form of sound actions and installations, choral and orchestral works, and minimalist vocal and string arrangement, with two releases on Ideologic Organ (2011, 2013) curated by Stephen O’Malley.
Josh Zubot Strings (Vancouver)
Josh Zubot Strings brings together the idiosyncratic talent of composer and improviser Josh Zubot with acclaimed musicians Jesse Zubot, Marina Hasselberg, Meredith Bates and James Meger.
Meredith Bates & Alex Abahmed (Vancouver)
Inertia is an electroacoustic work for solo violin and electronics. The piece consists of live violin, pre-recorded samples, real-time effects processing and a sound palette inspired by film music/sound and Arab music.
Friday, March 10; 8pm – Roundhouse Arts & Recreation Centre
Quatuor Bozzini (Montreal)
Quatuor Bozzini has been an original voice and strong advocate in new, experimental and classical music since 1999. Driving the hyper-creative Montréal scene and beyond, the quartet cultivates an ethos of risk-taking, experimentation, and collaboration, venturing boldly off the beaten track. With a rigorous eye for quality, they have nurtured a rich and diverse repertoire, regardless of trends. This has led to over 400 commissioned pieces, and some 500 premiered works. Their open, collaborative, artist-led approach has resulted in the realisation of numerous innovative and highly-praised productions, including inter-disciplinary projects with video, theatre and dance.
Sapphire Haze (Vancouver)
As a duo, their work has been presented at SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts, Vines Art Festival, Modulus Festival, Gateway Theatre and The Fox Cabaret. Recently, they were the featured artist for Music on Main’s 2021/2022 Emerge on Main program, and made their international debut at the New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival in June 2022. Currently, they are sound designing with rice & beans theatre and devising an original interdisciplinary work with choreographer and dancer Natalia Martineau about where colonial imposition lives in our bodies.
https://sapphirehazemusic.com
Malcolm Goldstein + Nicolas Caloia (Montreal)
Saturday, March 11; 8pm – ANNEX
Quator d'occasion
Malcolm Goldstein – violin
Jean René – viola
Émilie Girard-Charest – cello
Nicolas Caloia – contrabass
This music, for bowed string instruments, was composed by Malcolm Goldstein in 2018-19. The concert’s program will include the following structured improvisation compositions. They are intended as a process of discovery to be enacted within the structures of the particular performance activities which are specified for each piece.
The Quatuor d’occasion was formed in 2011 on the initiative of Malcolm Goldstein. Since then they have performed in most of Montreal’s experimental and improvised music venues. Meeting regularly for several years, the quartet’s musicians have developed a common discourse and created their own group sound.
Program:
Because a circle is not enough, music for bowed string instruments (2018-19)
Because a circle is not enough : an étude to focus the body/breath/gesture in relation to performed sound. Will be performed as a duo and by the entire ensemble.
reflections on a cavatina / adagio : phrases of timbrally varied, single sustained tones quietly expanded from a tonal centre.
Songs and interludes : a shifting of balance between tone and timbre phrases and events as rest points.
haiku sounding : songs with a structure analogous to the Japanese haiku form, transformed through the process of linkage to create a series of songs. To be realized by the full quartet and as a duet.
on and on and always slowly nowhere : Endless nuances within a single sound and gesture are revealed within a focused structure of long sustained bowings.
extraordinarily variable, this source : a flow of various fast staccato and spiccato articulations with modification of timbre and articulation, creating endless nuances within an on-going sound texture.
Statement and Responses : a structure that begins with several “statements” of brief timbre phrases analogous to spoken language, which then opens to “responses” of short phrases of repeated rhythmic patterns. Can also be realized as a dialogue between two musicians.
for the left hand alone : free-flowing and patterned rhythms performed with left hand pizzicato.
Storytelling : music that comes from the musicians’ experience(s) in life, recalled and realized in sound as episodes of sonic enactment.
décollage / collage : a melodic line that is endlessly transformed by omitting and replacing elements.
boundless the source, overflowing in song : the quartet musicians establish a texture derived from the performance activities explored in preceding pieces, from which each musician emerges with their own personal improvised song.
Sunday, March 12; 8pm – 8EAST
Improvisation session with visiting and local musicians
Tickets will be available only at the door, by donation.
An evening of improvised string exchanges featuring: Nicolas Caloia (double bass), Émilie Girard-Charest (cello), Parmela Attariwala (viola), Marina Hasselberg (cello), Lan Tung (erhu), Sina Ettehad (kamanche), Torsten Müller (double bass), and Josh Zubot (violin).
Call to musicians
Improvisation as a process of discovery
A workshop for bowed string instrument musicians led by Malcolm Goldstein
Friday, March 10; 1–3pm – The Roundhouse, Performance Centre
Space is limited; registration required.
To register email strings@newmusic.org with your name, contact information (email and/or phone number), the instrument you play, and how long you have been playing.
Professional and non-professional musicians welcome. Open to all instrumental players, however preference will be given to bowed string players: violin, viola, cello, bass, viola da gamba, erhu, kamanche, etc.
Deadline to apply: 1 March 2023
The workshop, led by composer, improviser and violinist Malcolm Goldstein, will focus on listening internally to one’s own body/breath energies as expressed externally in sound/space through the enactment of gesture. Specific frameworks will be explored in which each musician can learn of their own ways of attention to reveal possibilities of improvisation, each their own way of sounding.
Questions? Email us at strings@newmusic.org
Top photo: Quatuor d’occasion.