Josh Modney in the PSNY Greenroom

by Ted Gordon on May 16, 2016, 10:21 a.m.

The PSNY Greenroom is where we ask today's top artists and ensembles to share the music that they're most excited about—the works they keep coming back to, that form their core repertory. Present Music, the Talea Ensemble, and the JACK Quartet have all shared their stories in the Greenroom, giving you a rare backstage glimpse of the music that fuels their innovative, passionate, and groundbreaking performances.

(photo: Josh Modney; credit: Edgar Hartung, edited by Michiko Saiki) 

We're thrilled to feature one of the hardest working people in New Music for a new Greenroom edition: the violinist, violist, and improviser, Josh Modney. As the executive director of the Wet Ink Ensemble, Modney manages one of the most vital new music ensembles in New York; Modney also is a member of the Mivos Quartet, and has performed extensively with the International Contemporary Ensemble. Collaborations with composers such as Kate Soper, Alex Mincek, Scott Wollschleger, and Mario Diaz de Leon, have led to powerful new works that exist equally as much in performance as they do on the page. And performance is what Modney does best, in every sense of the word. 

So what does Modney think about when he's in the greenroom, about to go on stage and perform? Head over to the Greenroom to see the full story of Modney's favorites on PSNY. Or, if you're in New York, be sure to stop by St. Peter's Church on June 10th, when the Wet Ink Ensemble will perform Erin Gee's Mouthpiece X, featuring fellow PSNY composer Kate Soper as solo vocalist.

Modney's PSNY Greenroom "Picks" include Alex Mincek's Color-Form-Line, Kate Soper's Cipher, Scott Wollschleger's Soft Aberration no. 2, Erin Gee's Mouthpiece: Segment of the 4th Letter, and Mario Diaz de Leon's Trembling Time II. Watch an excerpt of the Wet Ink Ensemble performing Mincek's Color-Form-Line, and visit Modney's Greenroom spotlight for more on his "picks". 

Alex Mincek: "On The Outside, Looking Out"

by Ted Gordon on May 13, 2016, 9:46 a.m.

PSNY Composer Alex Mincek has recently been featured by the journal Music & Literature. Writer George Grella moves seamlessly from Mincek's Pendulum series to his relationship with jazz to his admiration of fellow PSNY composer Alvin Singleton.  Grella recalls his first encounter with Mincek's music—a performance of Pendulum VII at Zankel Hall. After beginning with a "skronking" saxophone, 

"[T]hen, like a pendulum, the piece swung into a different, but related, structural concept. The level of activity remained the same, but the sense of time and motion was entirely different. The music was like a frothing suspension, holding still via sustained pitches, but simmering through tremolos, rebowings, flutter-tonguing. There was the feeling that the music contained some sort of strange, awesome power."

(excerpt: Alex Mincek String Quartet No. 3 lift–tilt–filter–split)

(Other works in the Pendulum series available on PSNY include Pendulum III, for alto saxophone and piano, and Pendulum VI: Trigger for piano four-hands and two percussionists.)

Be sure to check out the full feature at Music & Literature!

String Theories features Mincek, Soper and Cerrone

by Ted Gordon on March 23, 2016, 11:17 a.m.

The String Orchestra of Brooklyn celebrates its fifth annual String Theories festival with three concerts at Roulette. From March 22nd to the 24th, the SoB will perform several world premieres, along with recent works from some of the most exciting composers of our time. 

On March 23rd, Alex Mincek's Ebb and Flow will begin the program—a piece commissioned by the String Orchestra of Brooklyn for their inaugural String Theories festival in 2011. The festival continues on March 24th with Kate Soper's Cipher for voice and violin, along with Christopher Cerrone's The Pieces That Fell To Earth, commissioned by the LA Philharmonic and premiering on the East coast for the first time. The program also includes music by Julia Wolfe and Alex Weiser. 

As a preview, check out Cerrone's 2013 commission from the String Orchestra of Brooklyn, High Windows: