Josh Modney Performs at Spectrum NYC

by Ted Gordon on Jan. 14, 2016, 11:10 a.m.

Josh Modney is one of the leading interpreters of contemporary music for the violin, and there is certainly not a lack of music for him to play. As the executive director of the Wet Ink Ensemble, a member of the Mivos Quartet, and a frequent performer with the International Contemporary Ensemble, Modney's calendar is packed with premieres and performances. So it's a rare treat to see him perform a solo recital, with some help from fellow Wet Ink instrumentalists, at Spectrum NYC, on New York's Lower East Side. 

On Saturday, January 16th, Modney will perform six works featuring the violin, including pieces by PSNY Composers Mario Diaz de Leon, Kate Soper, and Scott Wollschleger. Diaz de Leon's piece, ii.23, is scored for viola and electronics, and the score calls for extra subwoofers to make the bass felt in the space. Check out a clip: 

Modney will also be performing Kate Soper's Cipher, a work Soper commissioned for him, along with the composer herself. One of Soper's signature works, Cipher explores the limits of language, sound, and performance in the intimate connection between instrument and voice. Check out a video of the pair performing Cipher below. 

Again picking up the viola, Modney will also perform Scott Wollschleger's Soft Aberration No. 2, for viola and piano, alongside pianist and fellow composer and Wet Ink member Eric Wubbels. Wollschleger's work evokes what he calls a "broken echo" between instruments—a fine pairing with Soper's work—exploring the shared sensibilities of sight and sound experience between two performers. Check out an excerpt below: 

Kate Soper Closes 2015's Resonant Bodies Festival with Members of Wet Ink

by Ted Gordon on Sept. 11, 2015, 11:43 a.m.

Since its founding in 2013, The Resonant Bodies Festival has been the premiere venue for the performance of new vocal works in New York. Tonight at Roulette, the festival concludes with a trio of vocalists performing repertoire from around the world, and across the spectrum of contemporary compositional styles. Our very own PSNY composer Kate Soper is featured in tonight's performance, closing out the festival with selections from Ipsa-Dixit (2010-2015), a musical theater piece that "explores the treachery of language". Accompanied by members of the Wet Ink Ensemble—Erin Lesser, flute; Josh Modney, violin; Ian Antonio, percussion—Soper's work uses texts from sources as varied as Plato, Lydia Davis, Wittgenstein, and Freud. Two sections from Ipsa-Dixit are available from PSNY, both duets between voice and another instrument: Cipher, for voice and violin, and Only the Words Themselves Mean What They Say, for voice and flute. 

For a preview of tonight's festival-closer, check out Soper performing Only the Words Themselves Mean What They Say with Erin Lesser at EMPAC: 

Kate Soper: Only the Words Themselves Mean What They Say from Kate Soper on Vimeo.

Katharina Rosenberger Earns Praise for "Texturen"

by Ted Gordon on Nov. 27, 2012, 1:55 p.m.

Katharina Rosenberger's latest album, "Texturen," performed by Wet Ink and released by Hat Hut, has just won the 2012 Deutsche Schallplattenkritik Preis (German Record Critics Prize)! We extend our warmest congratulations to Katharina, though we can't say we're surprised. Helmut Rohm, of the awarding jury, described her album thusly:

"Sinister force-fields rumble in Katharina Rosenberger's finely-worked 'Texturen'. Here blooms the poetry of magic sounds, overwhelmed by the tingling thrill of the numinous. The presence of the musical performers potentiates the tiniest spark of noise, and its echo of alien worlds: a psychedelic trip through a multimedia event space."

More Swiss press has heaped praise on the album, which features fellow PSNY composers Alex Mincek and Kate Soper as performers. For those in New York, be sure to attend the performance of "torsion", recorded on the album, on December 17th at the Austrian Cultural Forum performed by pianist Taka Kigawa. 

Katharina is hard at work on the culmination of her three-year project, "Viva Voce", an interactive sound and visual installation, which will premiere at the Human Resources gallery in Los Angeles in January. See a preview of what this project will look like here.

Texturen, for solo piano, is the central piece on Katharina's acclaimed album and will soon be available to purchase here on PSNY -- stay tuned for more information!