Canadian songwriter Patrick Watson will be playing a pair of NYC shows this May to kick off a run of US dates. He visits Thursday, May 6th at the Bell House (tickets) and Friday, May 7th at 92YTribeca (tickets). Before those shows, he plays Canada with Timber Timbre (who play NYC and tour with the Low Anthem this April).

Opening the two NYC shows will be Doveman, who joined the National at their recent shows at the Bell House. Doveman/Thomas Barlett also plays with Nico Muhly at the Kitchen on March 18th and 19th in a project called Peter Pears. Tickets are still on sale.

Patrick Watson tour dates and videos are below...

Continue reading "Patrick Watson touring (dates), playing NYC shows w/ Doveman who plays w/ Nico Muhly @ the Kitchen this week"

Jonsi's "Go"

Sigur Ros have announced that they're taking an indefinite hiatus to focus on family and other projects. Members Kjartan and Georg are spending time with their newborn children, and singer Jónsi is releasing a solo album and touring. The band was previously reported to be working on a new record last year. Jónsi wrote on their site, "we started working on something a few months ago, then we scrapped everything and sold our studio and rehearsal space. now we are back in the drummer's garage, rocking out like we did when we were 14. i think it's gonna be good."

Jónsi's debut solo album, Go, comes out April 5th on XL Recordings. The song "Boy Lilikoi" is streaming on his website and its artwork is above. The album features arrangement work by Nico Muhly, percussion by Samuli Kosminen, and production by Jonsi, Alex Somers (Jonsi's boyfriend and Riceboy Sleeps partner) and Peter Katis (who has worked wth Interpol, The National & Tokyo Police Club).

Jónsi is working with London-based 59 Productions on the set, costumes and stage-show for his upcoming world tour, which will "open in North America in April 2010, and will come to Europe in late May [dates TBA still]." The company recently leaked teaser photos (possibly mock-ups of the stage), which are posted below. The full tour hasn't been announced yet, but it will come to NYC's Terminal 5 on Saturday, May 8th. Tickets go on sale Friday, February 12th at noon.

UPDATE: Full tour announced and it includes two NYC shows.

Jónsi played songs off the new record on NYC's Soundcheck on January 21st. That's streaming on the station's site. Videos from the making of the album, teaser pictures and album tracklist are below...

Continue reading "solo album & shows from Jonsi of Sigur Ros (who are on indefinite hiatus)"

Steely Dan's Donald Fagen will be joining Levon Helm at Terminal 5 on Thursday. It's also a chance to see Okkervil River who are opening for the show. Tickets are still on sale.

Okkervill River's Will Sheff (recently seen covering Fleetwood Mac) contributed to the new Norah Jones album.

Puss n Boots (aka Sasha Dobson, Catherine Popper, and Norah Jones (not Avril Lavigne as listed on Mercury Lounge's website) are opening for Doveman and friends at Mercury Lounge on January 12th. Tickets are still on sale. As previously mentioned, Doveman band member Sam Amidon opens that show too.

Tickets are also now on sale for the two "Doveman + Peter Pears : An Evening With Thomas Bartlett and Nico Muhly" shows at The Kitchen.

Norah Jones, Sam Amidon, Nico Muhly, and members of the National are among those who contributed to the new Doveman album.

Doveman, Sam Amidon and Nico Muhly are playing this year's Big Ears Fest which is curated by a member of the National.

Sam Amidon was reportedly "backed by Doveman, Beth Orton, Final Fantasy + Shazad Ismaily" at Rockwood Music Hall the other night.

Final Fantasy is not called Final Fantasy any more. Tickets are still on sale for the Owen Pallett show happening at Bowery Ballroom on January 18th.

Beth Orton and Shazad (who also plays in Doveman) both contribute to Sam's forthcoming album.

Beth Orton has some shows coming up of her own too. Video of Sam and Beth performing together in London, below...

Continue reading "Donald Fagen, Levon Helm, Puss n Boots, Norah Jones, Doveman, Sam Amidon, Beth Orton, etc (dates, tix & stuff)"

Terry Riley

Joanna Newsom is one of the announced acts for this year's Big Ears Fest in Knoxville, TN, March 26th-28th. Others on the initial lineup include Vampire Weekend, St. Vincent, the Calder Quartet, Andrew WK, The Ex, Gang Gang Dance, Clogs, 802 Tour (Nico Muhly / Doveman / Sam Amidon with Nadia Sirota), The xx, Javelin, DJ/Rupture (solo), DJ/Rupture and Andy Moor, My Brightest Diamond, Gyan Riley, and jj. The fest's artist in residence is composer Terry Riley and a number of his works will be performed (including 'In C'). Bryce Dessner of the National is also one of the curators. Weekend tickets are on sale now. Tickets to invididual shows will be announced later this month, along with the schedule (shows are at different venues around town).

Some of those initial acts have tours booked around the same time. That is the case for Vampire Weekend, the xx and jj tour and Joanna. More info on the fest below...

Continue reading "Big Ears Fest - March 26-28 in Knoxville, TN (Terry Riley in residence, Bryce Dessner curator, xx, jj, VW, WK & more)"

Sam Amidon @ LPR in June (more by Fresh Bread)

Solo artist & Doveman band member Sam Amidon's new record I See The Sign will be out in March on Bedroom Community and features contributions from Beth Orton, Shahzad Ismaily, Nico Muhly, and Valgeir Sigurdsson. Its first song "How Come the Blood" is up as a free download and streaming at MySpace.

Sam has a bunch of shows coming up, two of which are in NYC for now. He plays Rockwood Music Hall tonight (1/4), and then he opens (and probably plays as part of the "friends") at the Doveman & Friends show at Mercury Lounge on January 12th.

Beth Orton has shows coming up in NYC (and LA) this month too. Sam's new album cover art, some videos and all dates below...

Continue reading "Sam Amidon playing shows (dates), releasing new album featuring Beth Orton & others (MP3)"

What makes an album great? And perhaps even more critical for this list, what makes a great album gay? To create our list of the 100 Greatest, Gayest Albums of All Time, we polled more than 100 actors, comedians, musicians, writers, critics, performance artists, label reps, and DJs, asking each to list the 10 most important albums of their lives. After receiving responses from Boy George, Rufus Wainwright, Cyndi Lauper, the Indigo Girls' Amy Ray, Perez Hilton, Nate Berkus, Jake Shears, Ed Droste, Nico Muhly, John Cameron Mitchell, Wilson Cruz, Junior Vasquez, Janis Ian, Lady Bunny and a slew of others, we tallied the results to determine our top-100 list. [Out]

And the gayest album of all time goes to.... David Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. The entire list is at Out's site. They also ranked the The Gayest Christmas Songs, and The Gayest Videos

Pitchfork also just released their list of the Best Albums of 2009.

by Andrew Frisicano

ACME...outdoors in warmer times

Tonight (12/17) at the Tank, American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME) perform music from Phil Kline and John Cage (two earlier works, String Quartet in Four Parts and Credo In Us). Kline's annual Unsilent Night event just happened in NYC on December 12th (and is still to come in other cities). His piece Exquisite Corpses, on the program for ACME, also prominently features boomboxes. He's also put together a new acoustic arrangement of his string quartet The Blue Room and Other Stories (originally written for Ethel whose version is below), which ACME will be debuting. Tickets are on sale.

Kicking off tonight and running through this weekend, the Tank heads to Brooklyn to present the Blip Festival at the Bell House. If you can't be there, you can listen on WFMU.

Across town and also tonight (12/17), the New York Philharmonic will be launching its Contact! new music series at Symphony Space (95th and Broadway). Four composers - Arlene Sierra, Lei Liang, Marc-André Dalbavie & Arthur Kampela - will be debuting very different compositions with the group. Video and audio previews of those are below. Tickets are on sale. An encore performance (to borrow a phrase) takes place Saturday, December 19th at Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The second Contact! program - with new music from Sean Shepherd, Nico Muhly and Matthias Pintscher - comes April 16th at Symphony Space and April 17th at Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Videos and more info are below...

Continue reading "NY Philharmonic launches Contact! series tonight & ACME performs @ The Tank ++ other dates & videos"

by Andrew Frisicano

Thomas Bartlett aka Doveman

On November 1st, Doveman opened up at Mercury Lounge for The Ghost of a Sabre Toothed Tiger, a project that features Sean Lenon, his model girlfriend Charlotte Kemp Muhl (who, as announced from the stage, had only learned to play bass a few months prior), Cibo Matto's Yuka Honda and mi-gu drummer Yuko Araki. A week prior, both bands performed at Doveman's loft CD release party for The Conformist with different lineups.

The headlining Ghost of a Sabre Toothed Tiger is a relatively new project (with no records out) that plays tightly composed psychedelic pop. They also dip into Sean Lennon's previous catalog, like for an extended Maggot Brain-esque jam on his 2006 song "Dead Meat." Drummer Araki in particular hit all the fills and accents as if the songs were familiar jazz charts. Doveman came back to guest on GOASTT's last song, "Richard Brown," a jokey tune from an unfinished musical. The whole band (minus Kemp Muhl) is touring Japan right now with Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band in support of her latest Between My Head and the Sky.

Doveman was also joined by a stellar band that included National drummer Bryan Devendorf and guest singer Martha Wainwright. Bartlett is currently on tour opening for Swell Season. He'll be playing at Joe's Pub on December 2nd as part of the Happy Ending music and reading series with Amanda Stern, Hedwig's John Cameron Mitchell and Jonathan Caouette. Tickets are on sale.

Doveman will also be returning to Mercury Lounge for an as-of-now unannounced bill on January 12th. Then he and frequent collaborator Nico Muhly will be doing two nights (of TBA) at The Kitchen on March 18th and 19th.

More pictures from Mercury Lounge and tour dates are below...

Continue reading "Doveman played a show w/ Sean Lennon & Co. (pics), playing some more (Mercury Lounge, Joe's Pub, The Kitchen)"

by Andrew Frisicano

GVSU New Music Ensemble...

In 2007, Michigan's Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble recorded a stellar version of Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians, which they performed that year at the Bang on a Can Marathon (which ran 27 hours). Members of the group traveled to NYC to join in the Kronos Quartet-led performance of Terry Riley's In C last April at Carnegie Hall. Now, GVSU New Music Ensemble has put together their own recording of the classic composition, and they've invited 16 musicians and composers to remix the piece for a 2-CD set, In C Remixed, that comes out November 17th on Innova (the digital version came out Oct. 27th).

The remixers, who include Glenn Kotche, Nico Muhly, BoaC cofounder David Lang, and DJ Spooky (whose BAM Next Wave show happens the first week in December), all have a lot to say about In C and have come up with some diverse, left-field takes on the piece. They run the gamut from the straightforward electronic-music path to glitch-pop and twisted orchestral turns.

The GVSU New Music Ensemble will be in NYC to perform the piece live at (Le) Poisson Rouge on Sunday, November 8th. Joining them will be two album contributors, Dennis DeSantis and R. Luke DuBois, who'll do a remix of the performance live (and add video). Also on the bill are Slow Boys (fellow In C remixers Michael Lowenstern on bass clarinet and Todd Reynolds on violin). Tickets are on sale.

A video preview of the album and its full tracklist with contibutors are below...

Continue reading "'In C Remixed' - on CD & live @ LPR this Sunday"

by Andrew Frisicano

Speaking of Nico Muhly, he just played a Wordless Music show at Columbia's Miller Theatre on September 9th. There he performed with '802 Tour,' a round-robin style stage show with frequent collaborators Sam Amidon and Thomas Bartlett...

Mr. Bartlett's piano-driven ballads, including some from a forthcoming CD, "The Conformist," had a shadowy, confessional intimacy that was accentuated by his tremulous, nearly whispered crooning. In sharp contrast, Mr. Amidon affected a ragged backwoods yelp for traditional shape-note songs and other folksy material.

Mr. Muhly's appealing instrumental compositions drew on Philip Glass's harmonic stasis and the rhythmic vitality of Stravinsky and Ligeti, mixed with a flair for electronic counterpoint that was all Mr. Muhly's own. Yuki Numata, a terrific violinist from the ACME group, brought out an ardent romanticism in "Honest Music," for violin and electronics....

Where genres had been gently mixed during the concert, in an encore medley they were mangled outright. Mr. Muhly waxed rhapsodic at the piano in Mariah Carey's "My All"; Mr. Bartlett offered a limpid rendition of Neil Young's "Only Love Can Break Your Heart"; and Mr. Amidon turned R. Kelly's "Relief" into a suitably crooked hootenanny singalong. [NY Times]

Barlett's new Doveman CD, The Conformist, which features Muhly and Sam Amidon prominently, will be out October 20th on the Brassland label. Also featured on the disc are the National's Matt Berninger, Aaron and Bryce Dessner and Bryan Devendorf, a string section, and additional guest spots by Martha Wainwright and Norah Jones.

Doveman will be playing fall-winter dates (not announced yet), and unless they are solo shows, those will probably come after the Sam Amidon/Nico Muhly European tour (also with Ben Frost and Valgeir Sigurðsson) that runs October 24th to November 12th. The Eurotrip is less than a week after Muhly appears at the New Yorker Festival to discuss "Radical Opera" with Rufus Wainwright in a talk moderated by Alex Ross.

Martha & Rufus Wainwright recently played with their father at Highline Ballroom, and will both appear in an upcoming show at Carnegie Hall. Rufus also has another benefit show coming up in NYC soon.

The National (members) can be found at BAM at the of October with a member of the Pixies who just announced a 4th NYC show to happen in November.

The new Doveman track that National frontman Matt Berninger sings on, is streaming at Pitchfork.

Doveman album art above. Tracklist and some interesting videos, below...

Continue reading "Doveman's new album The Conformist w/ The National, Nico Muhly, Sam Amidon, Martha Wainwright & Norah Jones"

by Andrew Frisicano

Nadia Sirota

There were (more) strings at September 25th's inaugural show for the Archipelago music series, which happens at Galapagos one Friday a month through next May. Like the Undiscovered Islands fest in May, the shows will be featuring music that crosses boundaries between classical, indie, etc. (and like that fest, it's also being set up by the New Amsterdam label.)

The full schedule is below. It's full of treats (like a way-off show with music by Shara Worden aka My Brightest Diamond in April). The first show featured violist Nadia Sirota and percussion quartet Line C3. Coincidentally, Worden and Nadia will both be playing with the Dessner Bros.' BAM Next Wave show, The Long Count, at the end of October.

Both acts on the first night performed works by Nico Muhly (Line C3 did "Ta and Clap," written by Nico for them in 2004, and he joined Nadia for his piece "Keep in Touch," which features a vocal sample from Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons). Nadia & Nico actually discuss their collaborations in an episode of New Amsterdam's Podcast series.

Speaking of New Amsterdam, they also have a CMJ showcase coming up with Cantaloupe Records at (Le) Poisson Rouge on October 21st. Tickets are on sale. That will feature the music of David Lang and Julia Wolfe (Bang on a Can co-founders) and performances by NOW Ensemble, Darcy James Argue's Secret Society and more. Clips of the Lang-scored film (Untitled) will be screened between performances (the soundtrack of which will be out October 13th).

Full details on the Archipelago series below...

Continue reading "Archipelago music series to feature Shara Worden, Craig Wedren & more ++ New Amsterdam & Cantaloupe do CMJ"

photos by Chris La Putt

The Swell Season's new album, Strict Joy, is out October 27th on Anti-. On Monday night, September 14th, the Irish & Czech duo (who are no longer a couple) performed at 92YTribeca in Manhattan. 92YTribeca is an intimate, and kind of swanky, downtown NYC venue that is much smaller than the places the Academy Award-winning band played last time they were here (Radio City and Summerstage). It's also probably much smaller than the ones they'll play next (nothing announced yet) (Beacon Theatre?). Bands often visit NYC for press purposes before an album, and I think that's related to why this show happened. Limited tickets were sold for $35 a pop. It was a packed house with tables taking up most of the room. People stood on the sides and in the back.

The setup on stage was spare. Glen Hansard had an old acoustic guitar which sometimes had "a mind of its own". Markéta Irglová sat at the piano when she wasn't standing up singing, either with Glen or by herself. They alternated playing solo and together. They flew in the night before, and hadn't performed in a while. Glen related that last fact to his forgetting to pack a few things, like his guitar tuner. To remedy the situation, he told us he downloaded iTune, an iPhone app that helps you tune your instrument. He even gave a demonstration of it after showing us how the Brian Eno iPhone app works (not sure if it was the old one or the brand new one). The iPhone segment was one of Glenn's many trademark (and entertaining) stories of the evening. His funny anecdotes offset the feelings of woe that dominate Swell Season songs.

Glen was as modest and down to earth as ever. He became frustrated when his guitar didn't do what he wanted. He thanked everyone for coming (especially Paddy, or is it Patty, in the front row who he thinks has been at every NYC show he's ever played), and for paying money to do so. He acknowledged that he expected the great success of last year to not always be there in the future. I imagine he is fine with the possibility that it won't always be Radio City and the Academy Awards, but I have no doubt The Swell Season can do it again (even if their demographic becomes less my friends, and more my mom's). Everything else aside, Glen (who is also in the band The Frames), can sing and play. And so can Marketa. It was especially noticeable since I'd just returned at 5am that morning from ATP NY, a festival in upstate NY where I saw a variety of bands, of varying musical abilities, perform.

The Swell Season setlist ranged from new songs to old songs to covers to something Glen wrote the night before. I don't know exactly what Glen's relationship is to Nico Muhly (Nico may have worked on the new album), but I know that Nico and Glen have a friend and collaborator Thomas Bartlett (aka Doveman) in common. I didn't see Thomas there, but Nico (who performed with Thomas at the Miller Theatre just a few days earlier) was, and he played a solo piano song in the middle of Swell Season's set. It was kind of weird - maybe out of place. Glen introduced his friend Nico before leaving the stage (Marketa was already off). Nico then came up and played his song, and then Nico left and then the Swell Season came back. Regardless, special guests are always fun and I like Nico.

"Falling Slowly" (the big hit) was played early in the set, and my initial excitement turned into "I guess I'm sick of this song", but the Once songs they played at the end, "When Your Mind's Made Up" and "Lies", felt much better. Other highlights included an upbeat cover of Tim Buckley's :"Buzzin' Fly" mixed with a bit of Jeff Buckley's "Grace", anything Marketa did solo, and the closing number which was a cover of Daniel Johnston's "Devil Town". During that, Glen had the NYC crowd singing along to the chorus which he repeated a few times, partially A Capella and sometimes with accompanying funny faces, accents, and vampire gestures. He sang part of it with a German accent, and he ended with a pose he called a "Kanye moment". The crowd followed with a laugh and a standing ovation.

More pictures and tour dates (which were recently announced, but no NYC yet), and the NY show's setlist, below...

Continue reading "The Swell Season (and Nico Muhly & Brian Eno's iPhone app) played 92YTribeca - pics, review, setlist & 2009 Tour Dates "

802 Tour...

Wordless Music's four-night run at Columbia University's Miller Theatre (2960 Broadway at 116th Street) starts tonight (9/9) with a one-off show from the "802 Tour," a collaboration between Nico Muhly, Sam Amidon and Doveman (Thomas Bartlett).

That's followed by Do Make Say Think and Charles Spearin's "The Happiness Project" on September 10th (the same lineup that will tour together in November), Tim Hecker, Grouper and Julianna Barwick on September 11th (Grouper is also playing ATP NY), and the final night with Dan Bejar (Destroyer), Loscil and JACK Quartet on Saturday, September 12th. Tickets are still on sale for all events.

We also have two pairs of tickets to give away to each show. Full details are below.

Wordless Music's fall series continues after Saturday with shows from Deerhoof, No Age, múm, Mount Eerie, Broadcast & Atlas Sound, Why? and more.

Do Make Say Think's new album, Other Truths, will be released on October 20th via Constellation Records.

More on the "802 Tour" show with video, below...

Continue reading "Wordless events kick off @ the Miller Theatre TONIGHT -- win tix to Doveman, Destroyer & Do Make Say Think "

Bon Iver @ Sasquatch Fest (more by Chris Graham)

Tickets are now on sale for all of Merkin Hall's upcoming 2009/10 concerts. Those shows include the NY Guitar Festival's Silent Films/Live Guitars series (previously mentioned here), which features David Bromberg and Marc Ribot playing alongside Charlie Chaplin films on January 14th, Bon Iver's Justin Vernon (Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush) with Steve Kimock (Buster Keaton's Cops) on January 21st, and more. The full lineup, with details, is below.

The venue is also hosting the New Sounds series, which includes performances by ETHEL and the Bang on a Can All-Stars. Details on those are below. Check out a video of the BoaC All-Stars rehearsing a Steve Reich piece from a few years back below too. You'll notice Bryce Dessner of the National is in the ensemble in that video. He's currently working on his own new piece with brother Aaron and Matthew Ritchie to debut at BAM this fall.

Also, as part of their trio of "Contemporary Contexts" concerts, Merkin Hall will be bringing Signal, who will premiere a new work from Nico Muhly and UK composer Harrison Birtwistle, in May.

The full schedule is below...

Continue reading "Bon Iver, Marc Ribot & other NY Guitar Fest tickets on sale ++ full upcomng Merkin Hall schedule (New Sounds, etc)"

Doveman @ LPR in June (more by Fresh Bread)

Miller Theatre joins forces with the Wordless Music series to present a week of specially curated concerts highlighting the best of each organization's aesthetic and mission. For five nights, indie-rock and electronic-music performers share the stage with artists from the classical- and new-music world, for a week of unorthodox and unconventional musical meetings.

Of those five nights, four lineups at Columbia University's Miller Theatre (2960 Broadway at 116th Street) have been confirmed. Those will take place as follows...

Wednesday, September 9, 2009
The 802 Tour:
Nico Muhly + Sam Amidon + Doveman

Thursday, September 10, 2009
Do Make Say Think
Charles Spearin's "The Happiness Project"

Friday, September 11, 2009
Tim Hecker
Grouper
Julianna Barwick

Saturday, September 12, 2009
Dan Bejar (Destroyer)
Loscil
JACK Quartet

Ticket information HERE.

Those concerts are an addition to Wordless's upcoming schedule, which currently includes the Alarm Will Sound show tonight (July 22nd) at LPR, the Liquid Liquid & Rhys Chatham "200 Electric Guitars" performance on August 8th at Damrosch Park at Lincoln Center, and the Warp20 NYC series in early September.

The original "802 Tour" (the Doveman date above) took place in 2008. No word on whether they are actually going on tour again, or if this is just a one-off date with the same name.

Do Make Say Think and The Happiness Project also have a bunch of other tour dates scheduled, including two other NYC shows. Grouper is also playing ATP NY. Destroyer is going on a very short tour at the end of July that brings Dan Bejar to Bowery Ballroom on the 30th. All dates and a video from Doveman's June 18th show at LPR, below...

Continue reading "'Wordless Music' @ Miller Theatre w/ Doveman, Grouper & Destroyer ++ other tour dates"

photos by Fresh Bread

"When describing the show Sam Amidon, Doveman and members of The National put on at Le Poisson Rouge there is no way that I can be sarcastic or snarky. It was too amazing, beautiful, genuine, and polished for me to even pretend to funnily write about it. Basically, that music was the equivalent to being in love, drinking iced tea on a wooden porch on a perfect summer day, and moving away from home for the first time, all rolled into one. I'm still walking around with a goofy smile on my face, especially in lieu of sitting literally two seats over from the lead singer of The National..." [Gangster Legs]

Sam Amidon opened and played in Doveman at the Thursday night show. Add Thomas Bartlett (Doveman himself), two Dessners, Bryan Devendorf, Nico Muhly, Dawn Landes, and Oren Bloedow, and you had as many as eight people playing as Doveman at once. The show was in the round, so the audience was sitting all around the band. The setlist, which you can see below, included old songs, new songs, and covers including a show-closing cover of Tom Petty's "Free Fallin".

Grab a new Doveman track HERE. More pictures below...

Continue reading "Doveman (and Sam Amidon, members of the National, Nico Muhly, Dawn Landes...) @ Le Poisson Rouge, NYC - pics"

by Andrew Frisicano

The Walkmen @ Sasquatch 2009 (more by Chris Graham)

It Came From Brooklyn inaugurates a new series of live music concerts in the [Guggenheim] rotunda. The program will showcase ten bands over the course of five Friday evenings commencing mid-August, with each night featuring a music set by two bands, interspersed with a short reading by a Brooklyn-based writer or actor. The series, taking place within the rotunda, will cast a spotlight on Brooklyn's musical renaissance by providing a platform for a new crop of musicians. The line-up includes bands such as The Walkmen and High Places.

In fact, High Places and The Walkmen will play the same It Came From Brooklyn show, its inaugural night on Friday, August 14th. The Gugg website also NO LONGER reports that Grizzly Bear will be one of the series' acts. Stay tuned for more announcements.

UPDATE: We are told Grizzly Bear is not confirmed for this. They have been removed from the museum's website....

Those shows will be the second scheduled NYC gigs for both Grizzly Bear and The Walkmen (and only upcoming U.S. show currently for High Places). The Walkmen play a free show at the Central Park Summerstage with Dinosaur Jr. on Sunday, August 16th. Grizzly Bear will also play a free show, at the Williamsburg Waterfront with Beach House on Sunday, August 30th.

The museum's Frank Lloyd Wright-designed rotunda should add some interesting reverb effects to Grizzly Bear's harmony-heavy tunes. Especially good news if you missed the last three Grizzly Bear NYC shows, when they played May 28th and 29th at Town Hall and May 31st at MHOW.

Grizzly Bear collaborator Nico Muhly, who premiered a "scent opera" at the Gugg on May 31st and Jun 1st, recently defended the band's Town Hall show (at which he played keys) against the not-so-nice Times review...

Times: But wow, these songs are precious, and they occasionally came spangled with extras that made them even more so. The chorus was one of those elements, sorry to say.

Nico: Oh snap! Apology accepted. Now, I have major objections to the word "precious." It tends to be borderline homophobic in its coded usage, first of all, but second of all, it's a derogatory adjective with no alternative. It's reviewspeak. What I mean is: if you say, "that's ugly" somebody else can say, "no, it's beautiful." If you say, "it's over-stuffed" somebody can say, "really, I thought it was pretty thin." So the problem with a word like precious is that the scale of adjectives with "precious" on it belongs solely to the reviewer and is just a way of being mean. Case in point: this whole nonsense about Sufjan Stevens's's BQE Thing. Words like fey, twee, and precious have become these little nuggets of coded disdain, but they are really just useless self-congratulatory gestures on the part of the reviewer. What is the opposite of twee? Muscular? It all reminds me of the insane misogynist critiques of Jane Austen's novels. I guess the place for a word like that would be in a larger piece about the music world -- there was an enormous brouhaha in Iceland about the so-called Krútt scene. Krútt is probably the closest approximation in Icelandic of "precious" -- it refers to Múm, kind of Sigur Rós, and a lot of imitators: it denotes little bells, reversed glockenspiels, fairytale vocals, cutely-outfitted brass bands. Now, all of that is just a description and not derogatory; my iPod overflows with this shit. Anyway, to go to a concert of that kind of music and be like, "it's precious," all you're doing is going to a Chinese restaurant and being like, "wow, they were serving mad chinese food up in there!"

The full nearly-point-by-point analysis is up at his blog. David Byrne also recently took on a NY Times review on his blog.

All Walkmen, High Places and Grizzly Bear tour dates below...

Continue reading "Walkmen, Grizzly Bear?, High Places & other bands playing the Guggenheim, Nico Muhly critiques NY Times review"

"With a vital role on band sensation Grizzly Bear's new CD Veckatimest and an appearance this Thursday, May 28th, backing up the band at Town Hall, the Grammy Award-winning Brooklyn Youth Chorus embarks on a six-week run of performances spanning music as diverse as indie rock and Mahler's 8th. That's business as usual for the BYC, which has sung with Alicia Keys for a Sesame Street special, backed Elton John at his birthday concert at Madison Square Garden, premiered Philip Glass's Symphony No. 5 with the Brooklyn Philharmonic, and commissioned a body of work by musicians including Nico Muhly and Fred Hersch. The BYC is an astonishingly active group of kids that performs on the highest levels of the New York music scene, whether it be symphonic, rock, hip-hop, gospel, avant-garde classical, jazz..." [press release]

Unfortunately it looks like the Chorus will only be at one of Grizzly Bear's three NYC shows. All BYC dates below...

Continue reading "Brooklyn Youth Chorus backing Grizzly Bear at Town Hall, playing w/ Nico Muhly, Holy Ghost & more "

by Andrew Frisicano

Steve Reich clapping

Tonight (5/22) the Undiscovered Islands/New Amsterdam Records series at Galapagos continues with two sets: Sarah Kirkland Snider's Penelope performed by Signal, guitarist Steven Mackey and singer Rachel Calloway (conducted by Brad Lubman), and an opening performance by So Percussion. Tickets are still on sale.

So Percussion, who played with Dan Deacon at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple in December, was to premiere a new Deacon piece, but that debut has been postponed. Instead, Jason Treuting from So Percussion, writes...

we are playing some new music that we've been working on as meditations on the concept of city. the music has been focusing on the task oriented nature of a city and the parallel task-oriented nature of playing music. loops are made out of tasks and we have taken to transforming mundane objects into musical instruments like we haven't before. turning on lamps, writing on paper, pouring gravel, putting down ordinary objects in rhythm, etc. a few new videos by my sister jenise treuting will be busted out as well.

The other ensemble on that bill, Signal, has several other gigs coming up. They're performing Michael Gordon's Trance, for a second time, at the Bang on a Can Marathon on May 31st.

Signal just did the music of Philip Glass at (Le) Poisson Rouge on May 17th. They'll return to the venue on Friday, June 22nd for a concert and party to celebrate Steve Reich's 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Music for Double Sextet. Reich's original Sextet (1984) will be performed at that show, presented by Wordless Music, as well. Tickets are on sale.

That gig is your only way to check out the piece (except for streaming excerpts), as there's currently no way to buy a recording of it. Reich discussed this in a recent interview...

Newsweek: I missed the premiere of "Double Sextet" last year, and when I heard it had won, I found myself upset that there was no way to buy the piece yet.

Reich: Yeah, that's just part of the recording business. When you have a 24-minute piece, the official recording hinges on finishing and recording two other pieces to go with it [on a CD]. I'm working on two other pieces right now, and have to finish writing the second one, actually. I've got a piece for all rock-and-roll people already completed, and it's going to premiere later this year. [Nico Muhly's blog]

Commenters on Nico Muhly's post about the situation rightly point out that Double Sextet should be released ASAP to capitalize on the Pulitzer publicity. The 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Music, won by Bang on a Can cofounder David Lang for his the little match girl passion (streaming here), is just seeing a CD release, with four other Lang works, on June 9th via Harmonia Mundi.

Speaking of Reich and Bang on a Can, the composer will perform his own "Clapping Music" at the Bang on a Can Big Benefit Bash taking place Wednesday, June 3rd at (Le) Poisson Rouge. Other special guests include Meredith Monk, David Cossin, Wu Man, Maya Beiser, Talujon and Doug Aitken. Tickets will run you a $400 donation to the non-profit...

...which is why the regular-people-friendly festival is hosting a "Bang on a Can't Afford the Other Benefit" show at LPR later that same night (6/3) with So Percussion, Gutbucket, Newspeak and NOW Ensemble. Tickets for that are a more reasonable $20.

Speaking of new ensembles, Bang on a Can is forming a new street band called Asphalt Orchestra. That group will make its debut later this summer at Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival.

Full info on BoaC's Asphalt Orchestra, and its Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival plans, below...

Continue reading "So Percussion (but not Dan Deacon) tonight, Steve Reich's Double Sextet, Bang on a Can benefits, street band & more"

by Andrew Frisicano

Darcy James Argue

New Amsterdam Records is putting on Undiscovered Islands, a month-long exhibition of work by label artists and friends at Brooklyn's Galapagos Art Space (16 Main St in DUMBO). The series' four Friday shows start May 8th. Tickets are on sale now.

The lineups include two record release shows: one for Darcy James Argue's Secret Society's Infernal Machines on Friday, May 8th; and another on May 15th for Nadia Sirota's first things first. Sirota will be appearing with the Chiara Quartet, itsnotyouitsme, Clarice Jensen, Nico Muhly and others.

Friday, May 22nd's show will feature ensemble Signal premiering Sarah Kirkland Snider's Penelope with Brad Lubman, Steven Mackey and Rachel Calloway, and So Percussion playing new works.

The final Undiscovered Islands of the month will feature NOW Ensemble and Abigail Fischer premiering Missy Mazzoli and Stephen Taylor's "Song from the Uproar" followed by a preview premiere performance of William Brittelle's Television Landscape on Friday, May 29th. New work Television Landscape is described in the release as "a fully-notated concept album that brings together the epic tradition of Pet Sounds, Purple Rain, and OK Computer with Brittelle's idiosyncratic... compositional style."

Continue reading "Undiscovered Islands - an 'indie' classical series in May @ Galapagos, Matmos in Princeton & more "

by Andrew Frisicano

DOWNLOAD: Michael Gordon - Trance 2 (MP3)

Signal @ (Le) Poisson Rouge...

New York composer and Bang on a Can co-founder/artistic director Michael Gordon will bring his 1994 piece Trance to NYC for the first time in more than ten years on Wednesday, April 22nd at (Le) Poisson Rouge. Tickets are still on sale.

Signal, who performed at last year's Bang on a Can Marathon and showcased Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians at LPR in September (among other gigs), will play as a 22-piece ensemble for the performance. It will be the first time Trance has been performed by a group other than UK ensemble Icebreaker, who Gordon wrote the piece for and who has been performing the work regularly abroad.

[Gordon's] best works are characterized by insistently repeating rhythms and melodies and, in some cases, instrumentation that mixes rock and classical colorations. "Trance" (1994), an extended elaboration on a simple electric-bass riff, has become a post-Minimalist classic. [NY Times]

If you miss it, Signal will visit the piece again during the free, 12-hour Bang on a Can Marathon on May 31st at World Financial Center.

An MP3 of Part Two of the six part work (which was split into 7 MP3's), performed by Icebreaker, is posted above. The other five parts are, or will be, posted as free downloads on other websites this week. We're not allowed to tell you where they are though, but we can give clues and say that you won't find them at any of the usual suspects. The MP3's are scattered mostly across classical music-related sites. Find them all, and, in addition to having them all, you'll have the chance to win tickets to Trance at LPR. More details below.

And speaking of the Bang on a Can Marathon, we now have an even more-updated version of the lineup. Check it out below.

Nico Muhly's (hint) take on Michael Gordon, more upcoming Signal dates, and everything mentioned above, below...

Continue reading "Michael Gordon's Trance being performed, get MP3's, win tix + Bang on a Can line-up updated (again)"

by Andrew Frisicano

On Tuesday, April 28th, NYC public radio station WNYC will open the Greene Space, a new street-level venue on the corner of Varick and Charlton Streets in lower Manhattan. The space's inaugural 10-day festival kicks off the same day."Information about ticketing is forthcoming."

As Variety points out, the ground-floor venue will be "something of a downtown version of Rockefeller Center's "Today" show setup (minus the Al Roker groupies)."

"The Greene Space perfectly expresses WNYC's impulse to continue to innovate public radio and inspire people in new ways," said Laura Walker, WNYC President and CEO. "As we produce live events and audio and video programming streetside on Varick Street, we love the fact New Yorkers will be able to see our hosts in action, participate in political dialogues, and enjoy cultural performances. We become a part of the New York City and Hudson Square community in a tangible, visible way. WNYC has tremendous assets: its people, its ethos, its technology, its listeners and the city itself. Finally we have a way to combine them all."

Scheduled programs for the opening week and a half include Lou Reed, Santigold, and string quartet ETHEL appearing on the station's Soundcheck program on Wednesday, April 29 (2-3pm).

The same day, WNYC will host an "audio theater" presentation of H.G. Wells's The Invisible Man from 7-9pm. In the production, "Michael Riesman, Director of the Philip Glass Ensemble, will give a rare live musical performance on piano, blending music from multiple Philip Glass compositions and live improvisation into a never-before-heard piece."

One regular program to be held in the space will be "Evening Music LIVE with Terrance McKnight and David Garland," whose scheduled guests include "Simone Dinnerstein, Renè Pape, Gabriella Montero, John Zorn, Nico Muhly, Elliott Sharp, Jason Moran, Don Byron and Ute Lemper, among others."

For the space's "First 'First Friday'" on Friday, May 1st, WNYC is partnering with neighbor Sounds of Brazil (SOBs) for a "Cinco de Mayo on El Primero de Mayo" fest with food, music and dancing.

More info on the Greene Space's plans below...

Continue reading "WNYC opening the Greene Space in NYC with a 10-day festival "

Grizzly Bear w/ the Brooklyn Philharmonic (more by Kyle Dean Reinford)

Grizzly Bear founder Ed Droste told [The Quietus] that the collaboration was "one of the most challenging, exciting, exhausting but rewarding months of our lives." He added that it took a huge amount of preperation to put the event together, in part because of working practices: "So much work going into this one show! So much rehearsal as a band listening to MIDI versions of the arrangements and only a few hours we were allowed with the orchestra to rehearse because they are unionized and very strict with their time. So needless to say there was a sigh of relief when it went off without a hitch!

"I sure would have loved more time with the orchestra to rehearse and talk about the songs and get used to playing with 40 extra people behind you. It's so vastly different from performing just as a band because there is a score and a tempo and things need to be JUST SO. Luckily the conductor was BRILLIANT as was Nico Muhly and the two of them if needed, could casually adjust the tempo if one of us fell out."

Having just conquered BAM, Grizzly Bear announced two new NYC shows - this time at Town Hall. The May 28th & 29th dates go on sale Friday at noon. Tickets are $26.

Videos from BAM and all dates below...

Continue reading "Grizzly Bear announce 2 NYC shows @ Town Hall "

photos by Kyle Dean Reinford

Grizzly Bear

Thursday night (2/26), Sufjan Stevens and Shara Worden joined members of The National (Clogs) and Arcade Fire (Bell Orchestre) on stage with the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM.

Two nights later (2/28), members of the National joined Grizzly Bear (headliner) and Final Fantasy (opener and sometimes member/contributor to Arcade Fire) on the same stage with the same orchestra. Nico Muhly, who contributed arrangements to the show and to Grizzly Bear's new album, was on stage playing piano during both sets as well.

Members of Beirut, who played their own two shows at the same venue a few weeks earlier (but with their own orchestra), could be spotted in the indie-rocker heavy audiences at both the Clogs/BO and FF/GB shows. All this collaboration and support between the current group of popular "indie" artists is commonplace (especially in Brooklyn), and there's no better representation of that than the recently-released National members-curated Dark Was the Night compilation which pretty much everyone mentioned in this post so far (except the Philharmonic) contributed at least one song to. I'm still anxiously awaiting more news of the ultimate live representation of Dark Was the Night in the form of a concert at Radio City Music Hall. Speaking of which, that's where Dark Was the Night contributor David Byrne was playing for the 2nd night in a row on the same night as Grizzly Bear.

Final Fantasy

So, how was Saturday night? I thought It was great. Final Fantasy opened the show....

Mr. Pallett, who hails from a classical background, was in his element, if not his comfort zone. Many of his songs reflect orchestral dimensions, including "Horsetail Feathers," which required little reinvention, and "Arctic Circle," which led to a coda packed with chromatic suspense. The two newer pieces that closed his set were marked by pungent but graceful touches: a suggestively smudged viola part, a twitchy line for violins.

Usually, though, Mr. Pallett practices an art of accretion, looping his own violin and keyboard parts to create chamber-pop arrangements in real time. Without that hint of sorcery, his performance felt almost ordinary. And because he isn't a forceful or particularly magnetic singer, he sometimes sounded overwhelmed by the pomp... [NY Times]

Grizzly Bear came up next and even impressed the people who had never heard of either band that were sitting all around me ("Grizzly Bear can sing!") (BAM subscribers?). Grizzly Bear played a mix of old and new songs, some for the first time live, and many of them with the orchestra. Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen have such different voices, and write such different songs, but somehow they mash it all together and it becomes Grizzly Bear. More than ever it seems the two front-men are collaborating - singing at the same time, or back and forth. Ed also seems to be letting his voice out in a gothier, Depeche Mode/Dead Can Dance/Antony-like direction that I liked a lot. I can't wait to hear the new album. More pictures, a video and the setlist from the show, below...

Continue reading "Grizzly Bear & Final Fantasy w/ The Brooklyn Philharmonic @ BAM - pics, setlist, video"

DOWNLOAD: Motel Motel - Coffee (MP3)

Todd Barry in the Wrestler

today in NYC
* DANCE
* Les Paul @ Iridium
* Ferraby Lionheart @ Pianos
* Jimmy Eat World @ Terminal 5
* Whiplash @ UCB w/ Patton Oswalt
* It is It comedy @ Pianos w/ Todd Barry

Aziz Ansari was born today in 1983.

And a belated happy birthday to Yoko Ono who was born February 18, 1933.

If Pianos sticks to set times, you could potentially start the night with the free 8PM It is It comedy show . The lineup is Todd Barry (of The Wrestler), Chelsea Peretti, Kevin Williams, and Rob Cantrell. Then you could stick around for most of Ferraby Lionheart's set. It's his last residency show. Then you could jump in a cab and get to the UCB Theatre on 26th St. and see Leo Allen's free weekly Whiplash show. One of this week's guests is Patton Oswalt who just got done playing multiple nights at Caroline's.

As Todd told San Francisco Comedy Blog, he plays Mickey Rourke's boss at his day job. Mickey lost the Best Actor Oscar to Sean Penn at last night's Academy Awards which closed with a recorded cover of Bob Dylan by Beck. Mickey did win the Independent Spirit Award though.

Kate Winslet won best actress for The Reader. Nico Muhly composed the soundtrack to that movie.

M.I.A. did not win an Oscar.

Vicodin earrings.

Cheap Ballet tickets.

Tomorrow is Fat Tuesday.

They're giving away 2 VIP tickets to the REM tribute at Carnegie Hall to the the person who uploads the best video of themselves covering R.E.M. to YouTube.

Motel Motel were added to the upcoming Phosphorescent show.

Paul Weller won a Brit Award. U2, who are streaming their new album at MySpace, performed at the ceremony. Video below..

Continue reading "What's going on Monday?"