Tavener's Towards Silence Brainwave
Thursday April 23, 2009 @ 8:00 PM
SOLD OUT
6:30 pre-performance discussion with David Krasnow and P. Murali Doraiswamy, MD*
8:00 p.m. reading and music performance
9:00 – 11:00 p.m. reception*
$95* includes priority seating, pre-performance discussion at 6:30 p.m., and post-performance reception;
$40 reading and concert only at 8:00 p.m.
Members $85.50 / $36.00
Featuring:
The Medici String Quartet
The Attacca Quartet
The Corigliano Quartet
The Jasper String Quartet
Raphael Mostel, Tibetan singing bowl
And with readings from the Vedanta by Paul Blackthorn, Nicole Ansari, Erin Gann, Traciana Graves Walker Jones, Sean T. Krishnan, Florenzia Lozano, Leigh Wade Directed by Nicole Ansari
Pre-performance conversation wth P. Murali Doriaswamy, MD and radio host David Krasnow
P. Murali Doraiswamy, MD is a professor and chief of the biological psychiatry division at Duke University. He is a leading researcher in the field of brain aging and mental wellness and serves as senior fellow at Duke’s Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development.
David Krasnow is senior editor of Studio 360, public radio's Peabody Award-winning national program on arts and culture, produced by Public Radio International and WNYC. He previously worked in print as an editor and writer covering music, visual art and design, land use, and the politics of health care.
Designed specifically for performance along the Rubin Museum of Art’s dramatic spiral staircase, and scored for four string quartets and Tibetan singing bowl, Sir John Tavener’s Towards Silence is a musical meditation on death and the four states of consciousness (atma): waking, dream, deep sleep, and that which is beyond existence. The work, inspired by French metaphysicist René Guénon’s Man and His Becoming According to the Vedanta, offers a direct reflection on many of the themes evident in the museum’s galleries. The musicians, the readers as well as the audience members are positioned on each of the gallery floors, allowing the audience the unconventional experience of listening to music on a vertical axis. This commission by the Rubin Museum of Art and the Music Mind Spirit Trust (UK) is made possible in part by a grant from the Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund. The British premiere, on July 6, is to be held at Winchester Cathedral as part of the Winchester Festival of Art and Mind. Music concerts at RMA are supported by a grant from the Carlo and Micól Schejola Foundation. Presented with the World Science Festival
To learn More, Click Here
Sir John Tavener
http://www.chesternovello.com/default.aspx?TabId=2431&State_2905=2&ComposerId_2905=1567
John Tavener first came to public attention in 1968 with the premiere of his oratorio, The Whale, at the inaugural concert of the London Sinfonietta. The Beatles subsequently recorded the work on their Apple label. In 1997, his choral composition, Song for Athene, was performed at the funeral ceremony of Princess Diana. Tavener’s early compositions include Thérèse (1973), commissioned by the Royal Opera House, and A Gentle Spirit (1977), after the short story by Dostoyevsky. Other prominent works are The Akathist of Thanksgiving, written in celebration of the millennium of the Russian Orthodox Church, and The Protecting Veil, first performed by the London Symphony Orchestra in 1989. Tavener’s more recent music, which evidences wide registral spaces and diatonic tonality, has been described as austere, but powerful. Although the composer converted to the Orthodox Church in 1977, he views all religions as equally valid. He has often shared the view that today’s over-intellectualized society places undue emphasis on issues that feed the ego, such as money and achievement. This, in turn, distances individuals from who or what they really are.
For an interview with Paul Robertston of the Medici Quartet and the composer see: http://www.towardssilence.org.uk
