Darmstadt: Essential Repertoire :: Wednesday, December 1, 2010 at 8:00 p.m. through December 4, 2010 at 10:00 p.m. :: at ISSUE Project Room at the OA Can Factory, 232 3rd Street, 3rd Floor Brooklyn, NY 11215 :: Doors for all concerts open at 8 pm. Music begins at 8:30 pm. :: Tickets $10/$8 ISSUE Project Room members ::

Darmstadt “Classics of the Avant Garde” presents its third annual week of Essential Repertoire at ISSUE Project Room, an adoration and exploration of the experimental tradition in classical music, named “one of the most significant presentations of the season” by Time Out New York in 2008 and reviewed by the New York Times in 2009.

This year’s festival kicks off with an evening of Luciano Berio’s first ten Sequenzas for solo instrument, noted for their virtuosic implementation of extended technique, performed by a generation-defining group of players in New York’s booming new music community. Rare readings of Karlheinz Stockhausen’s pioneering electronic and electroacoustic works, Gesang der Jünglinge, Kontakte, and Mikrophonie, by Iktus Percussion Quartet and guests, follow. The aleatoric procedures and graphic notation strategies created in the open scores of Cage’s Concert for Piano and Orchestra and Wolff’s For 1, 2, or 3 People will be performed by the venerable S.E.M ensemble on the Friday night. The festival finale acknowledges repetitive systems with a double bill of two cornerstones of New York minimalism—Tom Johnson’s An Hour for Piano performed by Joseph Kubera, paired with a suite of the Knee Plays from Philip Glass/Robert Wilson’s landmark opera, Einstein on the Beach, arranged and led by protean violinist, Mary Rowell, and brings this year’s Essential Rep to a close.

Wednesday, December 1
Luciano Berio: Sequenzas I – X (1958 – 1984) :: Claire Chase (flute), Shelley Burgon (harp), Daisy Press (voice), Stephen Gosling (piano), Chris McIntyre (trombone) John Pickford Richards (viola), James Austin Smith (oboe), Joshua Modney (violin), Joshua Rubin (clarinet), Gareth Flowers (trumpet)

Thursday, December 2
Karlheinz Stockhausen: Gesang der Jünglinge (1955-56): Four-channel version prepared by the Computer Music Center, Columbia University Kontakte (1958-60) :: Denise Fillion (piano), Chris Graham (percussion), Levy Lorenzo (electronics)
Mikrophonie (1964-65): Iktus Percussion Quartet with Levy Lorenzo and Elad Shniderman (electronics)
(The concert will be preceded by the recording of a lecture given by Stockhausen on his approach to electronic music) :: Special Thanks to Terry Pender and the Computer Music Center, Columbia University

Friday, December 3
John Cage: Concert for Piano and Orchestra (1958); Christian Wolff: For 1, 2, or 3 People (1964); Peter Kotik: Kontrabandt (1967) :: Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble, Petr Kotik director

Saturday, December 4
Tom Johnson: An Hour For Piano (1971) Joseph Kubera (piano); Philip Glass: Knee Plays from Einstein on the Beach (1976) :: Mary Rowell (violin, arrangement), Geoff Burleson and Joseph Kubera (organs), Eve Beglarian and Ekmeles vocal ensemble featuring Christie Finn, Jeffrey Gavett Daniel Neer, Megan Schubert, Fabienne Seveillac, plus Nick Hallett and Joseph Keckler (voices)

Darmstadt “Classics of the Avant Garde” is the Brooklyn-based contemporary music series led by composer-musicians Zach Layton and Nick Hallett. Originally started as a “listening party” of avant-garde recordings at Galapagos Art Space, Darmstadt quickly evolved into a live performance series, and in 2007 was included in the New York Times Best of New Music rundown. Darmstadt is sponsored by ISSUE Project Room, and presents two annual programs there: a month-long Institute of premieres, workshops, video screenings, and lecture-performances in June and an Essential Repertoire festival of cherished works from the experimental music canon in the Fall. A new initiative, Experiments in Opera is planned for 2011.