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June in Buffalo Features the Music of Fred Lerdahl

May. 30, 2012

June in Buffalo Features the Music of Fred Lerdahl

Fred Lerdahl is celebrated this month with several performances of his music at the June in Buffalo festival, where he will be in residence as a Senior Faculty member. Hosted from June 4 through 10 at the University of Buffalo in upstate New York, the festival this year features performances of three major Lerdahl works: Imbrications by Ensemble Interface conducted by Scott Voyles on June 6; Time after Time with the New York New Music Ensemble on June 7; and a performance of Cross-Currents on June 10 with the Buffalo Philharmonic conducted by JoAnn Falletta. 

Composed in 2001 in honor of composer Andrew Imbrie’s 80th birthday, Imbrications is scored for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, percussion, and piano. The work, though petite in form, thrives on its endearing character and determined movement. 

Time after Time, also scored for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, percussion and piano, was composed in 2000 and premiered that year by the Washington Square Contemporary Music Society and Collage, conducted by Paul Hostetter. This piece, in two movements, demonstrates Lerdahl’s unique and masterful ability to homogenize instrumental timbres into exquisite and meaningful gestures. 

Cross-Currents, for full orchestra, is Lerdahl’s oldest and largest scale work to be featured during the June in Buffalo festival. Composed in 1987 with the support of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, this one movement work received its premiere two years later by the Seattle Symphony under the direction of Gerard Schwartz.

Lerdahl provides the following description of this work:

Cross-Currents evolves in interlocking, contrasting sections. Each section grows by a process of expanding variations, starting with a simple event and progressively elaborating into a complexity that exhausts itself as other material begins...Stylistic currents clash and mix, without the obviousness of quotation, and lend the music an expressive range beyond its formal precision.

All three performances take place under the roof of the University of Buffalo’s Lippes Concert Hall. In addition to these performances, Fred Lerdahl will be presenting as part of the festival’s free daily lecture series on Tuesday, June 5 at 10AM in the University’s Baird Recital Hall. 

For more information on Fred Lerdahl, visit www.schott-music.com and www.fredlerdahl.com.

Details on the June in Buffalo concerts can be found at www.music21c.org.

Fred Lerdahl
Imbrications (2001)
for ensemble
fl.cl.vn.vc.perc.pno
3’

Time after Time (2000)
for chamber ensemble
fl.cl.vn.vc.perc(glsp, vib, mar, tub bells, temple bowl, cym, tam-t, wdbl, dr, log dr).pno
19’ 

Cross-Currents (1987)
for orchestra
3(3.pic).3.3.3-4.2.2.btbn.1-timp.4perc(glsp, vib, xyl, mar, tub bells, 3cym, tam-t, 6tom-t, piccolo tymphanum)-hp.pno-str
10’

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