For Immediate Release
Media contacts:
Jane Turnis
(719) 389-6138
JTurnis@ColoradoCollege.edu
Leslie Weddell
(719) 389-6038
Leslie.Weddell@ColoradoCollege.edu
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Jan. 18, 2008 – The Bowed Piano Ensemble, Colorado College’s internationally recognized experimental music group that performs using fish line, ribbon, mallets and brushes on the interior components of a grand piano, will present a rare local performance of Stephen Scott's “Vikings of the Sunrise: Fantasy on the Polynesian Star Path Navigators” on Thursday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in Packard Hall, 5 W. Cache La Poudre St., on the Colorado College campus. The event is free and open to the public.
The Bowed Piano Ensemble is a team of 11 performers who each coordinate bowed, brushed or hammered notes with their fellow musicians to create haunting, beautiful music that is as interesting to watch as it is to hear. The group is directed by composer and CC music professor Scott, who founded the ensemble in 1977.
“Vikings of the Sunrise,” composed in 1995 and premiered that year in Norway, Estonia, Germany and Belgium, is Scott’s best-known work; it has been featured in several National Public Radio broadcasts, and the Bowed Piano Ensemble’s New Albion recording was recently named by Gramophone Magazine as among the 50 best recordings ever made. Other reviewer comments:
“... An excellent concert to close – and even save – a new season of the Visual Music Festival. ... One of the best concerts ever heard (and seen) in the auditorium at Jameos del Agua.”
– Jesus Montesdeoca, Canarias (Lanzarote, Canary Islands)
“... The first truly provocative work of new music for the ’90s.”
– John Diliberto, Billboard
“... Vividly evocative.”
– Jim Aiken, Keyboard
“... Brilliant. … If you can sail these mythic waters, you’re in for quite a journey.”
– Tom Manoff, NPR’s “All Things Considered”
“... [a] grand experiment.”
– Leanne Hanson, NPR’s “Weekend Edition Sunday”
The ensemble also will perform three concerts, including “Vikings of the Sunrise” and the world premiere of “Pacific Crossroads” with the Pacific Symphony, in February at Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa, Calif. For information on those performances, visit www.pacificsymphony.org.
The Bowed Piano Ensemble has made seven European tours and two Australian tours, and its recent U.S. performances have included the prestigious Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, S.C., and Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City.
The Ensemble's most recent recordings, both with Victoria Hansen as soprano soloist, are “The Deep Spaces” (New Albion) and “Paisajes Audibles/Sounding Landscapes” (Albany Records). These works have been performed in Berlin, Sofia, Tallinn, Gent and Prague and in major U.S. cities, and they have been favorably reviewed in the national and international press.
Stephen Scott joined the Colorado College music faculty in 1969. He has also taught at Evergreen State College and as visiting composer at Eastman School of Music, Aspen Music School, New England Conservatory, Princeton University, University of Southern California, and at festivals and conservatories in Germany, Belgium, Holland, Estonia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Lithuania, Ireland, Norway, England, Canary Islands and Australia. Awards include a Rockefeller composer residency at Como, Italy, commissions from The Pacific Symphony and the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, a grant from the Peter S. Reed Foundation, the New England Conservatory/Rockefeller Foundation Chamber Music Prize, and a National Endowment for the Arts Composer's Fellowship. Entries on his music appear in the major biographical dictionaries of music and his work is discussed in several books and articles on contemporary composition.
For directions or disability accommodation at the concert, members of the public may call (719) 389-6607.
About Colorado College
Colorado College is a nationally prominent, four-year liberal arts college that was founded in Colorado Springs in 1874. The college operates on the innovative Block Plan, in which its 1,975 undergraduate students study one course at a time in intensive 3½-week blocks. The college also offers a master of arts in teaching degree. For more information, visit www.ColoradoCollege.edu <http://www.ColoradoCollege.edu>.