In lieu of live performances, we’re bringing you sounds created by past and future CUSP performers.
YOU can support these artists by subscribing to their YouTube channels, following them on Instagram, and buying their albums!
JUNE EDITION
Yusef A. Lateef · Romance for Soprano Sax and Harp: I. With Love (1991)
Admiral Launch Duo: Jonathan Hulting-Cohen (saxophone) · Jennifer R. Ellis (harp)
Check out the other two movements and purchase Admiral Launch’s album HERE.
Joo Won Park · 100Hz Perfect 4th
100Hz Perfect 4th is a track from Joo Won’s new album, RMHS, which stands for "remove music, hear sound." In one sound, there are more than melody, harmony, or rhythm that one can listen to and ponder.
Download RMHS music generator or listen to an entire album HERE.
Follow Joo Won on Instagram: @joowonmusic
Anthony R. Green · Collide-oscope II (2016)
Desdemona: Adrianne Munden-Dixon, violin; Carrie Frey, viola; Julia Henderson, cello.
This piece is structured around textures and pitch collections. The performers love the playfulness of how those elements play out and "collide," and wanted to give you a taste of them before they play this piece live in Cleveland at Re:Sound 2021 next June! You can find Desdemona as part of the Open Improvisations: ONLINE Edition on fb this summer! Here's a duo improv from Carrie and Adrianne on IG, which is also a great place to follow their happenings this summer:
Follow Desdemona and Anthony on Instagram: @desdemonaensemble, @piargno84
Kaija Saariaho · Changing Light (2002)
Anna Elder (voice) · Sarah Steranka (flute)
The piece has been written for Edna Michell's Compassion project. In the composition I follow the idea of a dialogue, suggested by the text I have chosen. The intimate nature and fragile sound world of the duo mirror the fragility of our uncertain existence. – KS
Anna will performing vox and electronic pieces by composers Brian Riordan and Curtis Rumrill on The Quarantine Concerts on June 21 @ 6:30 CST with Omaha Under The Radar out of Experimental Sound Studio. Link coming soon!
Follow Anna on Instagram: @elderannac
Molly Jones · Moth Lady Escape / Death
from acting on air soundtrack
This track is the final movement of an opera, Acting On Air, that Molly staged last October in Detroit. An ensemble of experienced and inexperienced performers presented a modified version of the Icarus story, an abstracted narrative in which the ensemble collectively enacted a struggle for liberation through simple choreography, projection, and electronic music. – MJ
Follow Molly on Instagram: @molly_e_jones
Yiheng Yvonne Wu · Your Hat (2018)
Christopher Clarino · voicing by Billieanne McLellan
When Christopher Clarino invited me to write a piece incorporating American Sign Language (ASL) and percussion, I expected to search for some balanced integration of music and signing. But how could I bridge the two worlds as a hearing person without understanding the Deaf experience? What I do understand is being multilingual, the beauties and sadness of living between worlds, the in-translatability of some experiences. The English-language poet Li-Young Lee’s metaphor about being a “guest in the language” had long resonated with me, and with my own history of having been a child immigrant on my mind, I wrote the story “Your Hat,” an allegory about being a “guest.” I then decided this would be a “silent” piece—the signs needed to speak for themselves. Even without conventional instruments, there would be plenty of “musical” elements—patterns, duration, speed, effort, dynamic gesture. Chris performs original ASL interpretations of my English text. Interspersed are three ASL poems, in which I specify the ASL signs. But it is in the nuances of the interpreter’s gestures and facial expressions that the emotional content of ASL lives.
Follow Chris on Instagram: @cclarino
Leah Asher · Retreat Into Afters
from her album retreat into afters
Retreat into Afters (SCRIPTS records, 2018) captures the stillness, hope, isolation, and intimate moments at the end of a three year period in which Leah was living in a small town in Northern Norway. The tracks on Retreat into Afters were created by editing cohesive structures from layers of improvisations on violin and viola. Without electronic manipulation, the heart of the album and Asher's main interest as a performer is creating intricate sounds, rich textures and unexpected sonic effects using an acoustic instrument.
Follow Leah on Instagram: @leahgasher