Rituals is a four-movement concerto for percussion and orchestra composed by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich. The piece was co-commissioned in 2003 by NEXUS, the IRIS Orchestra, the Pearl Corporation, Kathleen Holt and Stephen Lurie, and Adams Musical Instruments. The recording is available from NAXOS. Rituals has received high praise. New Music Box calls it “one of Zwilich’s most exciting compositions to date” and said, “Wherever you are, demand that your local orchestra programs this blockbuster …
“Paul Horn + NEXUS” is an album that has been long out of print. It was originally released in 1975 (one of NEXUS’ earliest recordings) on Epic (KE33561). Through inspired improvisations, NEXUS with Paul Horn on flutes and alto sax created an emotionally potent and stylistically diverse album merging rhythms and cultural influences from South America, Africa, India, Tibet and the U.S.A. The NEXUS personnel at the time were John Wyre, Russell Hartenberger, Bob …
How is your New Year? Everyone at NEXUS is busy. Ray has been lining up the many logistics for a very busy Spring that will take NEXUS from California to Arkansas, then Georgia, Ohio and Rochester NY. Bob is figuring out his travel plans for the month of March that encompasses NEXUS’ visit to Wittenburg University in Springfield OH as well as other dates in the area on …
My eleventh residency at the Showa Music Academy in Kawasaki since 1998 included:
* performance on a gala percussion concert in the academy’s opera house (Teatro Giglio)
* 44 private lessons
* 11 small ensemble coaching sessions
* 1 Creative Music Making (freeform improvisation) workshop
* 1 videotaped interview for students in the English language class
* 1 formal address to the entire Showa faculty and administration at their monthly meeting
Here is a listing of the repertoire I heard in lessons and rehearsals during my 2-week …
On Sat. Dec. 11 at the end of the first week of my residency at Showa, I woke up and 7 AM and worked on my computer for several hours. It was a free day with no lessons and only rehearsals scheduled for the afternoon. From noon until 5 PM I was involved in a run-through of next week’s concert, which will be a very important one for Kaz and for Showa. Kaz’s students have been winning competitions and drawing attention to the Showa percussion …
At Holiday time I usually write about the great Family and Pops concerts that NEXUS has available, or I remind you of their choral repertoire. (If you are not familiar, click here and here!) But Garry Kvistad just sent me an article from the American Bell Association that has me thinking about the many winter holiday percussion traditions.
I have been visiting the Showa Academy of Music in Japan almost every year since 1998. When NEXUS toured to Okinawa in 1997, I was introduced to Kazunori Meguro by Yoji Sadanari, who had studied at the University of Toronto in the 1970s, and who knew all of us in NEXUS.
When Kazunori (‘Kaz’) invited me to come to Showa for a 2-week teaching residency I …
Last night, I had a wonderful meal at a great little Toronto restaurant called Southern Accent. A couple of friends remember performing Zydeco at that restaurant, some years back. It reminded me that I had some notes put away for a blog post!
Zydeco is a form of American roots music that evolved from the late 1800s among the black and multiracial French-speaking Creoles of south and southwest Louisiana. Zydeco first …
Further to Bob Becker’s blog posting of Dec. 8, 2011 I also received a request from Yale graduate student Victor Caccese to addess a few questions about the beginning of NEXUS. Mr. Cahn, I mainly want to ask you about the start of Nexus with your first performances in 1971. Even though all of its members have accomplished a great deal by themselves …
In December, 2011 I received a request from Yale graduate student Victor Caccese to answer a few questions about how NEXUS began and developed.
VC: Mr. Becker, I mainly wanted to ask you about the start of NEXUS with your first performances in 1971. Even though all of its members have accomplished a great deal by themselves I want to focus on the percussion group NEXUS and how it has grown and flourished through the years.
What was …
The musical Chess recently completed its run here in Toronto, and I just finished reading The Eight by Katherine Neville. The latter is a fascinating romp of a novel featuring a mystical chess set and a tapestry of historical characters scouring the world for it. Not least among them is the opera composer Francois-Andre Danican Philidor, who caught my attention especially because …
NEXUS has just returned home from the whirlwind that is the Percussive Arts Society’s International Conference (PASIC) in Indianapolis. Garry Kvistad found an interesting email in his in-box from his cousin in Chicago: a great article from the Arizona Republic. Do you think the triangle is a “no-brainer” kind of percussion instrument? Check out this article!
NEXUS member Bill Cahn has a lecture/demonstration available on small percussion instruments that includes …
The questions below about starting a career in music performance were submitted to me by Peter Ferry, a third-year applied percussion major at the Eastman School of Music. They are all good questions which are frequently asked by career-track music students. The responses are never easy or simple, and can be complex enough to fill volumes. There are no “one-size-fits-all” answers to any of these questions because individual situations are so varied. However, it can be very useful to gather multiple opinions from people …
The last two weeks of October have been rich in concerts and unexpected percussion influences. It kicked off mid-month with the wonderful SFJazz Collective presenting their take on the rhythmic-rich Stevie Wonder repertoire as well as a selection of new compositions at Koerner Hall here in Toronto. A couple days later, NEXUS presented their glorious exploration of new works with 2X10 at Walter Hall. Naturally, the Walter Hall concert has led into lively discussions …
Click HERE to read about the recognition by the Toronto Arts Awards of NEXUS’ 40th Anniversary season.