For Immediate Release
Media contacts:
Jane Turnis
(719) 389-6138
JTurnis@ColoradoCollege.edu
Leslie Weddell
(719) 389-6038
Leslie.Weddell@ColoradoCollege.edu
CC’S ACCLAIMED BOWED PIANO ENSEMBLE TO PERFORM
PREVIEW OF UPCOMING LINCOLN CENTER CONCERT
Fish line, brushes, strumming explore piano’s many voices
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Oct. 9, 2006 – The Bowed Piano Ensemble, Colorado College’s internationally renowned experimental music group that gives voice to the piano’s many sounds by using fish line, brushes, strumming and dampened 
keystrokes, will perform in an upcoming concert in the Allen Room, Frederick P. Rose Hall, Home of Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City.
Area concertgoers can watch the unusual action and hear the ensemble’s Lincoln Center program a few days earlier, however, in a free preview concert at 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 22 in Packard Hall, located at 5 W. Cache La Poudre St. on the Colorado College campus.
The Bowed Piano Ensemble is an elite group of 10 students, faculty and staff musicians exploring the leading edge of performance with sounds made directly on the strings of a grand piano. The Ensemble gathers around the well of the piano, pulling “soft bows” (several strands of rosined fish line fastened together with color-coded tags) across the piano’s strings to produce sustained, resonant chords. The players also use “rigid bows” (hard brushes of rosined horsehair), piano hammers, damped keystrokes, strumming and pizzicato. This innovative technique results in an orchestral array of tone colors, harmonies and rhythms.
The ensemble has performed worldwide, with concerts in Europe, Australia, Canada and locations throughout the United States.
The group will perform conductor and director Stephen Scott’s “The Deep Spaces” with soprano soloist Victoria Hansen. The program will also include Scott’s new instrumental work for the Bowed Piano Ensemble, “The New York Drones.”
Hansen and the Bowed Piano Ensemble presented the world premiere of “The Deep Spaces” in the medieval Town Hall in Tallinn, Estonia in March 2005 and have recorded the work for New Albion Records.
Scott's composition of “The Deep Spaces” was made possible by a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation. Scott composed the piece while in residence in 2004 at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Study and Conference Center at Lake Como, Italy. Preview copies of the upcoming New Albion CD release of “The Deep Spaces” will be available for sale after the concert.
Bowed Piano Ensemble also will perform the concert at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 26 at the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati, Ohio; call (513) 345-8405 for ticket information. The New York City concert will be 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28 in the Allen Room, Frederick P. Rose Hall, Home of Jazz at Lincoln Center; visit www.jalc.org or call (212) 721-6500 for ticket information.
In addition to the ensemble’s upcoming performances in New York and Cincinnati, the group has made six European tours, two Australian tours, and has performed live and in broadcast throughout the United States and Canada. Highlights include a live national broadcast from the Sydney Opera House and appearances at many international festivals, including The Visual Music Festival in the Canary Islands, Other Minds in San Francisco, MaerzMusik in Berlin and ppIANISSIMO in Bulgaria.
For information, directions or disability accommodation at the Colorado College concert, members of the public may call (719) 389-6607.
About Colorado College
Colorado College is a nationally prominent, four-year liberal arts and sciences college that was founded in Colorado Springs in 1874. The college operates on the innovative Block Plan, in which its 1,960 students study one course at a time in intensive 3½-week blocks. For more information, visit www.ColoradoCollege.edu <http://www.ColoradoCollege.edu>.