American Ensemble May-June 2012 - Due East Ensemble May-June 2012.pdf · string Brazilian...
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I n 2001, Greg Beyer was pursuing his dissertation at Manhattan School of Music, studying the berimbau, a single- string Brazilian percussion instrument. He was looking for a collaborator to play An Apotheosis of Archaeopteryx, a 1979 Lejaren Hiller piccolo/berimbau duet. He had heard flutist Erin Lesser performing at school, but first he put her through a test, making her clap in 5 against a 6/8 rhythm. “I think I passed…” Lesser says now. “With flying colors,” Beyer says. The partnership took off from there. They called themselves Due East, invoking their East Coast roots, while punning on the Italian word for “two.” They sought out pieces they could play together, like Lou Harrison’s First Concerto for Flute and Percussion and Harvey Sollberger’s Sun- flowers. They expanded their repertoire by asking composers to write for them. And they formalized their personal relationship when they got married in 2008. Their connection with some composers is so tight that the word “partnership” defi- nitely applies there, as well. “Our collabo- rations with composers become friendships that yield multiple projects,” says Beyer. Brazilian composer Alexandre Lunsqui, for instance, has been working with the duo ever since 2001, when Beyer played the premiere of Iris at MSM; the next year he wrote Iris for Due East, and in 2013 the collaboration will yield a double concerto for Due East and wind ensemble. When seeking out composers, Beyer and Lesser follow no particular agenda. “Rather than gravitating toward a certain style, we’re drawn to people who have a compelling musical voice,” says Lesser. They came across John Supko at a 2005 Princeton Composers’ Ensemble concert; Beyer was playing percussion, and the program included Supko’s hypnotic This Window Makes Me Feel, scored for mezzo-soprano, keyboards, percussion and electronics. “It was so beau- tiful, and so different from the kinds of music I had been hearing of late,” Lesser says. “We got talking to John, telling him how much we loved the piece—and asking if maybe someday it could have a flute part.” “I resisted for a long time,” Supko says. “It’s a very difficult thing to add an instrument to a piece you’ve already composed.” After various experiments, including assigning the wind line to a piccolo, he recomposed the piece with the flute as “connective tissue” between the percussion and the vocal line. In the meantime, Supko and Due East had already collaborated on the 35-minute Littoral, mixing recorded sounds with flute and percussion. The piece was a deliberate attempt to expand the scope of the flute/percussion repertoire. “The pieces we’d been playing were always the standard new-music eight- to ten-minute length,” says Lesser. “When we were in residence at Yellow Barn, we’d invariably find ourselves in the first half of the program, then we’d sit in the audience for the monumental string quartets and piano quintets in the second half. I thought ‘I want to play on the second half!’ So we talked to John about how to take things further, and it became this 35-minute, surround-sound immersive experience.” The two pieces can be heard on Due East’s recent CD Drawn Only Once— the Music of John Supko. As disparate as Beyer and Lesser’s instru- ments may seem, the two musicians have always found themselves working toward common musical goals. “Erin is so attuned to rhythmic components,” Beyer says, citing David Maki’s Ilta, a 2008 piece written for Due East that calls on the flutist to play a rack of gongs with one hand while playing the flute with the other. In Lesser’s words: “We’re united by our love of contemporary music, of chamber music, and of collaborating with each other and the composers we work with.” Qwww.dueeast.net AmericanEnsemble Partnership Unlimited Due East: Greg Beyer and Erin Lesser 13
Transcript of American Ensemble May-June 2012 - Due East Ensemble May-June 2012.pdf · string Brazilian...
In 2001, Greg Beyer was pursuing his dissertation at Manhattan School of Music, studying the berimbau, a single-string Brazilian percussion instrument.
He was looking for a collaborator to play An Apotheosis of Archaeopteryx, a 1979 Lejaren Hiller piccolo/berimbau duet. He had heard flutist Erin Lesser performing at school, but first he put her through a test, making her clap in 5 against a 6/8 rhythm.
“I think I passed…” Lesser says now.“With flying colors,” Beyer says. The partnership took off from there.
They called themselves Due East, invoking their East Coast roots, while punning on the Italian word for “two.” They sought out pieces they could play together, like Lou Harrison’s First Concerto for Flute and Percussion and Harvey Sollberger’s Sun-flowers. They expanded their repertoire by asking composers to write for them. And they formalized their personal relationship when they got married in 2008.
Their connection with some composers is so tight that the word “partnership” defi-nitely applies there, as well. “Our collabo-rations with composers become friendships that yield multiple projects,” says Beyer. Brazilian composer Alexandre Lunsqui, for instance, has been working with the duo ever since 2001, when Beyer played the premiere of Iris at MSM; the next year he
wrote Iris for Due East, and in 2013 the collaboration will yield a double concerto for Due East and wind ensemble.
When seeking out composers, Beyer and Lesser follow no particular agenda. “Rather than gravitating toward a certain style, we’re drawn to people who have a compelling musical voice,” says Lesser. They came across John Supko at a 2005 Princeton Composers’ Ensemble concert; Beyer was playing percussion, and the program included Supko’s hypnotic This Window Makes Me Feel, scored for mezzo-soprano, keyboards, percussion and electronics. “It was so beau-tiful, and so different from the kinds of music I had been hearing of late,” Lesser says. “We got talking to John, telling him how much we loved the piece—and asking if maybe someday it could have a flute part.”
“I resisted for a long time,” Supko says. “It’s a very difficult thing to add an instrument to a piece you’ve already composed.” After various experiments, including assigning the wind line to a piccolo, he recomposed the piece with the flute as “connective tissue” between the percussion and the vocal line.
In the meantime, Supko and Due East had already collaborated on the 35-minute
Littoral, mixing recorded sounds with flute and percussion. The piece was a deliberate attempt to expand the scope of the
flute/percussion repertoire. “The pieces we’d been playing were always the standard new-music eight- to ten-minute length,” says Lesser. “When we were in residence at Yellow Barn, we’d invariably find ourselves in the first half of the program, then we’d sit in the audience for the monumental string quartets and piano quintets in the second half. I thought ‘I want to play on the second half!’ So we talked to John about how to take things further, and it became this 35-minute, surround-sound immersive experience.” The two pieces can be heard on Due East’s recent CD Drawn Only Once—the Music of John Supko.
As disparate as Beyer and Lesser’s instru-ments may seem, the two musicians have always found themselves working toward common musical goals. “Erin is so attuned to rhythmic components,” Beyer says, citing David Maki’s Ilta, a 2008 piece written for Due East that calls on the flutist to play a rack of gongs with one hand while playing the flute with the other.
In Lesser’s words: “We’re united by our love of contemporary music, of chamber music, and of collaborating with each other and the composers we work with.” www.dueeast.net
AmericanEnsemble
Partnership Unlimited
Due East: Greg Beyer and Erin Lesser
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