Michael Pisaro, (b. 1961, Buffalo, New York), is a world-renowned composer and guitarist currently teaching at Cal Arts. He received a Grant-to-Artists award by The Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and has had works performed in notable festivals in Denmark, Hong Kong, Germany, Austria, England, France, Spain, Brazil, Switzerland, and throughout the United States. He is a member of the Wandelweiser Group, an international group of composers and performers that publishes and records experimental music. Building off of John Cage’s legacy, the group explores the use of silence and indeterminacy, challenging conventional ideas about music making.
Rather than taking the conventional view of the composer as a creator, Pisaro instead defines a composer as “somebody who changes the sonic situation.” Silence, for Pisaro, is not the absence of sound, because, as he puts it, “sound is going on all the time.” Since we already “live in an orchestral environment,” Pisaro asks himself not “what will I create,” but rather “how will I change the environment.”
Different weather is divided into five different skies, each suggesting different weather conditions. While most of the skies indicate precise pitches and timings, the second is more open. In addition to flute, strings, and electronics, the piece calls for a performer who utilizes unconventional instruments (such as rice, a fan, a radio, etc.) to perform different activities in each sky.
In rapport abstrait, two guitarists using ebows must literally build a rapport with one another in order to coordinate their parts, despite a lack of metric notation and having to read from two separate parts (no full score exists). While they initially use a watch, in the end, the two are forced to rely on internal counting alone.
Pisaro’s harmony series uses an anthological collection of poetry by numerous 20th-century authors. The poems, however, are not actually set to music, but rather translated as music. Providing only descriptions of duration, number of performers, number of tones, and whether those tones are long or short/different or the same, Pisaro nonetheless preserves the mood and form of the poems in these translations.
--Joshua Musikanto
Rather than taking the conventional view of the composer as a creator, Pisaro instead defines a composer as “somebody who changes the sonic situation.” Silence, for Pisaro, is not the absence of sound, because, as he puts it, “sound is going on all the time.” Since we already “live in an orchestral environment,” Pisaro asks himself not “what will I create,” but rather “how will I change the environment.”
Different weather is divided into five different skies, each suggesting different weather conditions. While most of the skies indicate precise pitches and timings, the second is more open. In addition to flute, strings, and electronics, the piece calls for a performer who utilizes unconventional instruments (such as rice, a fan, a radio, etc.) to perform different activities in each sky.
In rapport abstrait, two guitarists using ebows must literally build a rapport with one another in order to coordinate their parts, despite a lack of metric notation and having to read from two separate parts (no full score exists). While they initially use a watch, in the end, the two are forced to rely on internal counting alone.
Pisaro’s harmony series uses an anthological collection of poetry by numerous 20th-century authors. The poems, however, are not actually set to music, but rather translated as music. Providing only descriptions of duration, number of performers, number of tones, and whether those tones are long or short/different or the same, Pisaro nonetheless preserves the mood and form of the poems in these translations.
--Joshua Musikanto
113 COMPOSERS COLLECTIVE
MICHAEL PISARO RESIDENCY
March 22, 2016
2-4 p.m. masterclass • Free
7:30 p.m. concert • $15
Studio Z: 275 East Fourth Street, Suite 200, St. Paul
Tickets/Details
113 Composers Collective presents a concert of works by composer Michael Pisaro featuring members of Strains New Music Ensemble and 113.
A free masterclass will be held Tuesday, March 22, 2 p.m. before the concert at Studio Z.
A public seminar will be held Monday, March 21st at the University of Minnesota School of Music, Ferguson Hall, room 280 at 3:30 p.m.
2-4 p.m. masterclass • Free
7:30 p.m. concert • $15
Studio Z: 275 East Fourth Street, Suite 200, St. Paul
Tickets/Details
113 Composers Collective presents a concert of works by composer Michael Pisaro featuring members of Strains New Music Ensemble and 113.
A free masterclass will be held Tuesday, March 22, 2 p.m. before the concert at Studio Z.
A public seminar will be held Monday, March 21st at the University of Minnesota School of Music, Ferguson Hall, room 280 at 3:30 p.m.
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