We feel as though we have adventurous musical tastes but we are probably just as stuck in our ways as the next guy. I know we are lucky to have the Eastman School of Music in our community and their student run program of modern music, called Ossia, is sensational. Tonight’s performance included five wildly different compositions all expertly performed. And just look at how young these students are. They are seen here performing Gyorgy Ligeti’s “Ten Pieces for Wind Quartet,” my favorite piece of the evening. Peggi’s favorite piece was sung by an operatic, solo soprano.
The most radical piece was Stockhausen’s “Mikrophonie I,” in which two people played a tam tam. Two people played microphones, one on each side of the tam tam, and two people, off stage, ran the filters for the microphones.
They struck and scratched the tam tam with an assortment of things you might find in your kitchen or storage closet and the ever moving, hand-held mics were panned hard left and right. The filtered sound was amplified and sent to the giant speakers that are above the two double door exits. The wide stereo experience was like something off of Led Zeppelin II.
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