Shruthi Rajasekar is a past winner of Zeitgeist's Eric Stokes Song Contest. She has also written work for the ensemble that you can hear when Zeitgeist performs with Nirmala Rajasekar on June 9th at Caponi Art Park. Go Shruthi! https://www.icareifyoulisten.com/2019/04/5-questions-to-shruthi-rajasekar-and-ninfea-cruttwell-reade/?fbclid=IwAR2SVguNTNbNn75ArZ-I_YiX1IE5axN255tc5MWwHhgW52Xz9Rl2coq-cEY 1 day 18 hours ago.
Zeitgeist shared a post. We're playing "mini-concerts" from 1-3pm during the Saint Paul Classical Music Crawl. Stop by! 1 day 21 hours ago.
From 59 to 60: The Music Of Justin E. A. Busch. - Tuesday night at Studio Z 4 days 55 min ago.
Zeitgeist shared a post. Please note: 2 weeks 1 day ago.
Zeitgeist’s Early Music Festival devoted to the work of Pauline Oliveros is now finished. What an amazing time that was! How much we all learned-about music, listening, ourselves, and others! Deep gratitude to all listeners and artists who convened to make music such beautiful music together. Special thanks to Viv Corringham for creating "Listening for Pauline and IONE" for Zeitgeist and for guiding everyone in a deep listening workshop. And to Carole Ione for providing permissions and working with us to present Oliveros' work. Shout out to Isaac Mayhew who created our exhibit and Katherine Bergman who made sure all of us knew what was being performed and when. And, the performers. It is a delight with every festival to bring together so many talented musicians who approach new music with such love and care. Thank you Pat O'Keefe, Nicola Melville, Patti Cudd, Alexandra Hecker, Tiffany M. Skidmore, Joan Hutton, Michael Duffy, Adam Zahller, Walt Skidmore, Svea Drentlaw, Gabrielle Doran, Justin Spenner, Joey Crane, Benjamin J M Klein, Philip Blackburn, Ann Millikan, Dameun Strange, Ryan David Stevens, Laura Harada, Michelle Kinney, Drea Reynolds, Isaac Mayhew, Paul Cantrell, Brian Heller, and Jill Dawe. And, of course, much gratitude to MSAB and National Endowment for the Arts and Zeitgeist's many individual donors for supporting this festival. 2 weeks 1 day ago.
Sounds from the heavenly orchestra? Revelations from the junk yard? Quarter-tone Chinoiserie? Yoko Ono with sticky tape? The American experimental tradition in music goes to the heart of the pioneer spirit. These rugged individualists, sonic prospectors, and intransigent iconoclasts -- composers who have forged their own paths, come what may -- often find the sort of lasting place in our collective imagination that eludes their less adventurous contemporaries. Billings, Ives, Cowell, Partch, Cage, and Nancarrow loom large among the usual suspects like adamantine faces on new-music's Mount Rushmore. But where are the women? Was it really only Ruth Crawford-Seeger who stepped out of the kitchen for a while?
If Tigers Were Clouds opens with "Xanadu" (hold your laughter) by Mildred Couper (1887-1994...Innova wasn't kidding about that eight decades thing), a piano duet tuned a quarter-tone apart. Despite both pianos' constant pull to their appropriate tonal centers, the mix results in a surreal effect, texturally "Impressionistic" in a Debussy style, harmonically skewed like a Cage prepared piano work. Say what you will about her relationship to the implosion of the Beatles, but Yoko Ono's "Pieces For Orchestra" is an excellent example of the Fluxus movement in action (an example of a Fluxus score might read "write a poem, crumple it up and kick it around the room"). "Five Will Get You Seven" by Annie Gosfield (at 43, the youngest composer here) plods along as marimbas, cymbals, cowbells and snare drums weave together with isorhythmic independence, like a parade gone wrong. This continues until the five-minute mark, when a bass clarinet takes over, creating a subtle and intimate atmosphere through the use of silence, extended techniques, multiphonics and simple harmonic gestures.