Like physicists who seek the building blocks of the universe,
composers still hunt for the fundamental substance of music. The stakes
are similar and staggeringly high: Whoever gets to the core can
mold music in new and powerful ways.
For some, the root of music resides in notes like C, E, and G, and
their relationship to each other: Arnold Schoenberg’s so-called
“12-tone system”—the meticulous composer preferred to call it a
“Method of Composing with 12 Tones Which Are Related Only with One
Another”—trail-blazed a parallel path to the tonal music most of
us hear today. John Cage, and before him Edgard Varèse,
introduced nonpitched sound into their respective compositions
and proved that emotionally moving music could contain masses of sound
that submerge or even lack identifiable notes like C, E, and G.
The equally radical Harry Partch offered musicians another route; he
insisted on restoring the metaphorical relationship between whole
numbers and musical notes. Partch’s rediscovery reminds us that
many microscopic “notes between the notes” have been part of music for
millennia. The late James Tenney, in his obscure but essential 1961
treatise META+HODOS suggested examining what people actually
perceive (he called it “clang” after the German word for
“sound”) regardless of whether any old-school notes are
involved.
Other composers search for the core of music in social
relationships. Both Charles Mingus and Miles Davis likened putting
their respective bands together to an alchemical process, mixing
rational calculation with intuition. In the book
Musicking, Christopher Small contends that music is a
verb and must be approached as a nexus of social and sonic connections
among performers and listeners.
Violist and composer Eyvind Kang
continues the tradition of
composer-as-
investigator. Fresh from touring with Laurie
Anderson, the Vashon Island–based Cornish grad is returning to
his alma mater and convening a nine-piece improvising ensemble to
perform his new work Grass.
Inspired by the physicist and mathematician Gottfried Leibniz (1646–1716), Kang plans to explore “monadologies” of
improvisation. For Leibniz, “monads” (or in this case sounds) and their
relationships (the “monadologies”) were more than mere particles, but
vibrant living things. According to a text supplied by Kang,
Grass will be “guided from within the sounds, with respect to
the sounds as conscious entities, and informed by new discoveries in
acoustics and psychoacoustics.”
The all-star lineup—which includes trombonists Stuart Dempster
and Julian Priester, trumpeter Cuong Vu, and pianist Cristina
Valdés—attests to Kang’s devotion to exploration. Count on
quiet sounds, transgenre mashups, and drones that unfurl into
sensuous textures. Get a free preview at the open rehearsal earlier in
the day, at noon. 
Hear Grass Fri Nov 14, PONCHO Concert Hall at Cornish
College, 710 E Roy St, 325-6500,
8 pm, $7.50/$15.
Thurs 11/13
KIDNAPPING WATER: BOTTLED OPERAS
Exuding an exquisite darkness, the new installation by Byron Au Yong
and Randy Moss creates a space where shifts, gradients, and slivers of
black bewitch the eye. Recordings mingling traditional operatic voices
with water-based percussion hover in each corner; somehow it all gets
sucked into the eerily bottomless pool at the center. Closes Fri Nov
21. Jack Straw Productions, 4261 Roosevelt Way NE, 634-0919,
Mon–Fri 9 am–5 pm, free.
HANSEL AND GRETEL
Music history has not one but two Engelbert Humperdincks. If you
remember the 1970s, the morning-after paean “After the Lovin'” sung by
Engelbert Humperdinck (1936–) may still infest your brain. His
unrelated predecessor (1854–1921) served as an assistant to
Richard Wagner and wrote Hansel and Gretel, one of the big opera
hits of the 1920s. Here, singers from Seattle Opera’s Young Artist
Program sing a portable English adaptation of the elder Humperdinck’s
fairy-tale opera. Seattle Opera keeps these singers busy: The following
night on Fri Nov 14, they animate another adaptation, Tatyana’s
Letter, a slimmed down version of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene
Onegin at 8 pm, $20. City Hall, 600 Fourth Ave, 684-7171,
noon–1 pm, free.
SEATTLE SYMPHONY
Conductor Andreas Delfs fills in for an ailing André Previn
(get well soon, Maestro!) to lead the band in Beethoven’s Symphony
No. 7. In addition, pianist Peter Donohoe sallies through the
rambunctious Concerto in F major of George Gershwin. Also Fri
Nov 14 and Sat Nov 15 at 8 pm as well as Sun Nov 16 at 2 pm.
Benaroya Hall, 200 University St, 215-4747, 7:30 pm,
$17–$105.
Fri 11/14
MCCOY TYNER QUARTET
Blazing guitarist Marc Ribot joins this pianist, who is touring
behind his strongest disc in recent memory, Guitars (Half Note).
Still revered for his tenure with John Coltrane in the early 1960s,
Tyner’s unmistakable left-hand comping made Coltrane and his legendary
quartet more than merely funky; his propulsive groove—an
accelerating accumulation of syncopated chords—sliced up time
itself. With bassist Gerald Cannon and Eric Kamau Gravatt on drums.
Moore Theatre, 1932 Second Ave, 292-2787, 8 pm,
$39.50–$54.50.
Sat 11/15
BRAHMS GIRLS
This a cappella group devoted to repertory for women’s voices sings
music from the Renaissance, German folk songs, and works by Brahms.
Also Sun Nov 16 at 3 pm. Queen Anne Christian Church, 1316 Third Ave
W, 726-6088, 8 pm, $10–$25.
Mon 11/17
UW CONTEMPORARY GROUP
Students and faculty present works honoring two major musical
centennials of 2008, Olivier Messiaen (1908–1992) and the
still-thriving Elliott Carter (1908–). A couple pieces get
excerpted: Chris Lennard plays three of the Eight Pieces for Four
Tympani and pianist Alastair Edmonstone tackles two of Messiaen’s
formidable Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant-Jésus, the “Regard
du Père” and “Par lui tout a été fait.” Cristina
Valdés is the piano soloist in Messiaen’s masterpiece for
chamber ensemble, the Oiseaux Exotiques (“Exotic Birds”).
Derived from transcriptions of birdsong, Messiaen stocked the musical
aviary of Oiseaux with hooting wind instruments and swarms of
xylophone, woodblock, and other percussion that skitter and swerve; a
secret sequel to Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, the
Oiseaux could easily have been titled Autumn Ritual. I’m
also eager to hear Lee Hancock essay Carter’s Piano Sonata,
whose fervent, pastoral ripples of notes belie a seething complexity.
Meany Theater, UW Campus, 543-4880, 7:30 pm, $10.
