LOU’S TUBES AND CULINARY DELIGHTS Our busy April 2018 took us to Kingston NY to help the Ulster Chamber Music Series celebrate their 50th and to Hyde Park NY to the Culinary Institute of America! In Kingston, the hall was set with big suspended tubes at the compass points for the concert opener, “Greeting Prelude”… Read more »
ROBIN ENGELMAN Six years ago, on February 26th 2016, we received the sad news of the passing of NEXUS founding member Robin Engelman. The tributes poured in – moving, funny, telling – as colleagues, students, friends read the announcement. You can see these amazing comments on the home page of Robin’s website at www.robinengelman.com. Andrew… Read more »
FEELING THE PULSE Spring touring took us to California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, the Episcopal Collegiate School in Little Rock AR, La Grange College GA and Wittenberg University OH. We opened each with Music For Pieces Of Wood, and we had guests provide “the pulse”: Dave Johnson, Eric Saoud, Ken Passmore and Marc Smarelli… Read more »
We are excited to share with you a brand new website, www.DRUMMINGat50.com, that NEXUS has created in partnership with Sō Percussion, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Steve Reich’s monumental work “Drumming”. Russell Hartenberger, Ray Dillard, and Alex Kessaris have been working for months to bring this to its fruition. A full performance of the piece,… Read more »
NEXUS Playing Cage’s Dance Music for Elfrid Credit: Donald Dietz, courtesy of The John Cage Trust Long ago I knew that music would be my future. I knew then that percussion specifically would be my passion. This all started in the fourth grade when I joined the school band. Through the years I’ve come to… Read more »
With the 21C Music Festival about to begin (January 16-20), we are so lucky to be based in Toronto where we can take in its awesome line-up featuring the great Terry Riley and our friends and fellow-percussionists, Sō Percussion.
Here in Canada, we celebrate Thanksgiving on Monday, October 8. What more fitting time to give a BIG THANK YOU to all of you who contributed to our Kickstarter Campaign for Drumming At 50. September was definitely exciting – if a bit nerve-wracking! We were fund-raising for our Video Recording with Sō Percussion and friends… Read more »
Epic. Exhilarating. Revolutionary. Iconic. Words that describe Steve Reich’s monumental DRUMMING. Russell Hartenberger had a thought. And now that thought has evolved into an exciting project, backed 100% by Steve Reich: We have joined with the wonderful Sō Percussion to create a videography of DRUMMING in celebration of the piece’s 50th Anniversary!
If you’ve followed us on Facebook, you’ll know it’s been a busy and varied summer. Bill has been involved in Eastman’s Summer Horizons with young music students in his wonderful program “Creative Music Making”. We will be presenting that program at Ithaca College in early September, so stay tuned, as it will be open to… Read more »
NEXUS Percussion recently record with So Percussion, but Josh’s other group, NYU Steel, is a longtime performer at my biennial Drum Boogie Festival in Woodstock, NY. I had a blast talking with Josh about music in this two-part podcast, part of which featured a fun tour of my studio at Woodstock Chimes headquarters. Check it… Read more »
Thanks to Lauren Vogel Weiss for her article on our busy spring in the PAS Rhythm/Scene newsletter, June issue. She covered our performance with guest Frank Cassara with the Northern Dutchess Symphony Orchestra at the Culinary Institute of American under the baton of Kathleen Beckman; our Princeton University appearance with SōPercussion celebrating Steve Reich with… Read more »
It’s been a busy month in Lake Wobegon – I mean Woodstock. Our group NEXUS performed several times and recorded three pieces of Steve Reich’s music with the members of So Percussion and other amazing musicians. One of the sessions was a four-camera video recording at Princeton University of Reich’s Drumming, which is over an… Read more »
Never rains but it pours! April is full, Full, FULL! This coming weekend the vans get loaded with instruments, and NEXUS heads to Garry’s studio to meet up with So Percussion and a stellar group of guests. Yup, it’s studio time with some heavy duty rehearsing for a super-project that we can’t wait to tell… Read more »
