See what's coming up this season in our other concert series:
Rhythm of the World
Bill Cahn –
The Birds
Bill Cahn –
Kebjar-Bali
Franz Schubert –
Symphony no. 9, "The Great"
What is being said about NEXUS?
“…terrific showmen.” Boston
“an exhilarating adventure” Hamburg, Germany
“stunning… astonishing” San Francisco
“utterly spellbinding” Montreal
“Nexus remains one of the great percussion groups in the world” American Record Guide
“picturesque… extraordinary” Financial Times
“unbelievable… rich… beyond my words” Tokyo
“phenomenal virtuosity” Finland
“magnificently in command” London, England
“exotic… hypnotic… strangely beautiful, lushly erotic… wellnigh ideal.” Louisville, KY
“A new addition to my list of the topten CDs of all time… outstanding… simply the best” Percussive Notes
“What did it sound like? Ravishing” Cincinnati
“mesmerizing… superbly musical.” Washington
See what the buzz is about as Canada's premiere percussion ensemble, NEXUS, joins the WSO for a stunning concert filled with scintillating rhythms and textures!
Saturday, October 3, 2009 at 8:00 p.m.
Chrysler Theatre
Instrumentally Speaking – pre-concert talk at 7:00 p.m. inside the Chrysler Theatre
John Morris Russell, Conductor
NEXUS
Bob Becker • Bill Cahn • Robin Engelman • Russell Hartenberger • Garry Kvistad
William Cahn
B. 1946, Philadelphia
Approx. 9 minutes.
Originaly composed in 1979 for NEXUS unaccompanied, The Birds was orchestrated in 1983. The solo parts are scored for harmonicas, cymbals, gongs, rattles, shakers, pianoforte and dozens of bird calls collected from all over the world. Included among the calls are various types of nighingale, dove, turkey, duck, goose, loon and quail instruments (whistles, reed-calls and scrapers). There are two primary musical elements in the composition. The first is a simple C-minor cadence played by the orchestra which suggests the solemnity of the symphonic music of European romanticism. The second element consist of an overlying montage of distinctly non-symphonic sounds—sometimes beautiful, sometimes raucous and absurd—made by the bird calls. It is in the interplay of these two musical extremes—the profound and the frivolous—that the piece seeks to stimulate both contemplation and humour.
Percussion Solo Instrumentation:
Player 1: Harmonica in C; Crotales in A flat - C; High Bird Call; High Whistle Call; Japanese Binsizara; Twirlytone (rotating small organ pipes); Large Wood Block; Metal Castanets; Dove Call; Predator Call; Goose Call; Tone Tube; Loon Call.
Player 2: Harmonica in G; Crotales in C - G - A flat - C; High Bird Call; Metal Maraca; Squirrel Call; Two Temple Blocks; Gobbler (Turkey) Call; Brazilian Wheel Bird Whistle; Crow Call; Duck Call; Tone Tube; Loon Call.
Player 3: Harmonica in E flat; Crotales in E flat - D; Suspended Glockenspiel (or Mark Tree); High Bird Call; Sliding Pitch Pipe; Small Maraca; Ratchet; Owl Call; Crow Call; Coon Call.
Player 4: Slide Whistle; Crotale in F; Two Suspended Chinese Cymbals; Gong in C; Tam Tam; High Bird Call; Small Slapstick; Squirrel Call; Turkey Caller; Toy Cat Call; Partirdge Call; Duck Call; Tone Tube;
Player 5: Slide Whistle; Grand Pianoforte; Stone Wind Chimes; High Bird Call; Pitch Pipe; Two Rutes; Ratchet; Turkey Caller; Toy Lamb Call; Crow Call; Goose Call; Large Slapstick; Loon Call.
William Cahn
Approx. 10 minutes.
Kebjar-Bali (pronounced keb-yar bah-li) was premiered in 1982 at the tenth anniversary concerto of NEXUS at the St. Lawrence Centre in Toronto, and the orchestral version was premiered by the Rochester Chamber Orchestra that same year. The composition is based on the traditional music of Bali, which is normally performed by a Gamelan orchestra composed of as many as 25 musicians playing on various tuned gongs, drums, cymbals, xylophones, metalophones and other percussion instruments along with flutes and a few string instruments. In Kebjar-Bali NEXUS utilizes a number of tuned gongs from southeast Asia and standard western mallet percussion insruments—marimbas, a vibraphone, and two sets of songbells (alto glockenspiels). The term "Kebjar" refers to a twentieth-century Balinese musical style. The word literaly means "to burst in to flame", and this is represented in the music by highly technical and rhythmically intricate pasages which are interspered with sections in a more stately style.
Solo Percussion Instruments:
- Chinese Drum (DR)
- Brazilian Metal Rattle
- Thai Gong in G-natural
- Mark Tree (suspended graduated metal tubes
- Burmese Gong in C sharp
- Burmese Gong in F sharp
- Medium-Large Chinese Opera Gong (descending glissando)
- Thai Gong in F-natural
- Chinese Wood Block
- Eight Indonesian Water Buffalo Bells in A sharp, B, C, D sharp, E, F, G, A
- Eight Kulintang (button gongs) in F sharp, A sharp, C, F, G sharp, B, C sharp, D
- Three small Burmese Gongs pitched in A sharp, C, E
- Two pair of Balinese Ching-Ching Cymbals (mounted on a stand with one cymbal from each pair resting loosely on the other for a 'buzzing' effect)
PEARL percussion instruments and ADAMS marimbas used by NEXUS courtesy of Pearl Corporation and Adams Musical Instruments.
NEXUS Canadian Representation: Peggy Feltmate, 44 Normandy Boulevard, Toronto, Ontario M4L 3K2 - Canada, Tel: 416 699-9818
NEXUS has received the support of the Canada Council, the Ontario Art Council, the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, and the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship, Culture and Recreation.
NEXUS
The first, entirely improvised NEXUS concert in 1971 marked the formation of a group that would touch & entertain people of all levels of musical learning, in all genres of percussion music. Bob Becker, Bill Cahn, Robin Engelman, Russell Hartenberger & Garry Kvistad are virtuosos alone, & bring elements of their knowledge & character to a distinct & powerful whole. They stand out in the contemporary music scene for the innovation & diversity of their programs, their impressive history of collaborations & commissions, their revival of 1920's novelty ragtime xylophone music, & their influential improvisatory ideas. NEXUS' firm commitment to music education & a steady output of quality CD recordings & compositions by its members continues to enhance the role of percussion in the 21st century.
NEXUS' music, with its widespread appeal, has taken the group on tours of Australia, New Zealand, Asia, Brazil, Scandinavia, Europe, & regularly to the United States & Canada. NEXUS is proud to have been the first Western percussion group to perform in the People's Republic of China. They have also enjoyed participating at international music festivals such as the Adelaide, Holland, Budapest Spring, Singapore Arts, Tanglewood, Ravinia, & Blossom Music Festivals, as well as the BBC Proms in London, Music Today & Music Joy festivals in Tokyo, & many World Drum Festivals. NEXUS is the recipient of the Banff Centre for the Arts National Award & the Toronto Arts Award. NEXUS was inducted into the Percussive Arts Society Hall of Fame in 1999, just before celebrating their 30th anniversary season.
Especially renowned for their improvisational skills, NEXUS was called upon to create the musical score for the National Film Board's "Inside Time", which won the 2008 Yorkton Golden Sheaf award for best social/political documentary & the 2008 Robert Brooks award for cinematography. TV & radio broadcasters such as the CBS TV, PBS, & CBC have regularly featured this leading percussion ensemble. NEXUS also created the chilling score for the Academy Award-winning feature-length documentary "The Man Who Skied Down Everest". NEXUS' list of high-profile collaborations includes the Kronos Quartet, the Canadian Brass, & clarinetist Richard Stoltzman.
Toru Takemitsu, a great friend to NEXUS, composed one of their signature pieces, "From me flows what you call Time". This work, written with each NEXUS member's personality in mind, was premiered for Carnegie Hall's centennial celebration in 1990 with Seiji Ozawa conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra (recorded on Sony with the Pacific Symphony). In 2005, Pulitzer Prize winning composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich composed "Rituals" for NEXUS & Chamber Orchestra. New Music Box calls it "one of Zwilich’s most exciting compositions to date…[a] blockbuster piece!” The recording features NEXUS & the IRIS Orchestra.
Compelled to share their insatiable curiosity, knowledge & passion, NEXUS has contributed greatly to musical education with symphonic & solo programs for family audiences from "The Story of Percussion in the Orchestra" to their concert, "An African Celebration". Last November they presented three wonderfully-received student concerts with the Toronto Symphony, hailed by educators as "the best concert in years". Internationally, NEXUS has participated in high school, college & university residencies giving master classes, workshops & concerts. NEXUS members consistently write compositions that become core repertoire for percussion ensembles.
Recent NEXUS events include performances at the 2008 Ojai Festival in California where the L.A.Times music critic commented, "Ojai felt, for that hour, like holy ground." This followed on their 2007 Ojai performances that reviewer Charles Donelan called "thrilling" & said would "certainly stand as one of the most memorable of 2007 in any venue, anywhere". NEXUS has also recently appeared at the Colours of Music, Cool Drummings, Collingwood, Kincardine & the Ottawa Chamber Music Festivals, & at Woodstock Beat in New York. A solo CD entitled "Wings" has just been released, & their CD "out of the blue" with Fritz Hauser was released in March 2007. NEXUS' previous solo CD was the Juno-nominated "Drumtalker". In 2007 NEXUS honored John Cage at Bard College's Fisher Center in New York, giving the U.S. premiere of Dance Music for Elfrid Ide (1940), which was rediscovered in 2005. Upcoming events include a Talking Drum symposium in Toronto & the premiere of a new concerto in Texas, written for NEXUS by celebrated composer and educator Eric Ewazen.
For more on NEXUS, and to view bios of the individual memebers, please visit their website.