A Web Nexus for Contemporary Art Music
The Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music is a wide ranging web nexus for contemporary concert music. Our mission is to promote contemporary composers and their music through information, understanding and performances.
Contemporary classical/art/concert music is a living art form, fed by the creativity of composers across the country and around the globe. Finding inspiration from a multitude of sources, this music springs from a well-known and beloved past, yet travels new avenues and explores amazingly diverse sound worlds. There are more composers writing music now than there ever have been in the history of the world, and our goal is to help you connect with them and enjoy their art.
Featured Items and Upcoming Events
Ferde Grofé
Sunrise/Grand Canyon Suite (1931)
sandijay4; photography by Jay Goode ~ ~ check out our video archive post your comments at PytheasTalk
Ruckas
Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore Cnty, USA
Founded in 2000 to promote the performance of
contemporary chamber music, Ruckus, UMBC’s resident professional
contemporary music ensemble, plays important roles both on and off
campus. "With all of UMBC’s music faculty sharing a research interest
in contemporary music, the Ruckus ensemble provides an important public
face for UMBC's reputation for cutting-edge research," said Linda
Dusman, professor and chair of the Department of Music. "The ensemble
also serves as an important outreach tool and contributes to the
cultural life of UMBC and the Baltimore-Washington region" . . .
Learn More
Arvo Pärt
Composer Portrait
Throughout Arvo Pärt's
career, he has demonstrated a voracious musical curiosity and daring
experimental spirit that has allowed him to move beyond a secure place
as Estonia's premiere composer to become perhaps the best known choral
and sacred music scorist of his time. Thirty years of musical
experimentation with influences as wide ranging as Russian
neo-classicism, Western modernism, Schoenbergian dedecaphony,
minimalism, polytonality, Gregorian chant and collage have led him to
the creation of a distinctively sparse technique he calls
"tintinnabulation." This method, which takes its name from the Latin
word for bells, places unusual emphasis on individual notes and makes
extensive use of silence. "I have discovered that it is enough when a
single note is beautifully played, " says Pärt.
"This one note ... or a moment of silence, comforts me.... I build with
the most primitive materials - with the triad, with one specific
tonality. The three notes of a triad are like bells. And that is why I
call it tintinnabulation"
. . .
Learn
More
visit Arvo Pärt at Pytheas ...
Festival ARS Electronica
Linz, Austria/Sept 2 - 11, 2010
Ars Electronica
made its debut on September 18, 1979. This festival of art, technology
and society spotlighted the emerging Digital Revolution.For more than
three decades now, this world-renowned event has provided an annual
setting for artistic and scientific encounters with social and cultural
phenomena that are the upshot of technological change. Symposia,
exhibitions, performances and interventions carry these inquiries
beyond the confines of conventional conference spaces and cultural
venues and take them out into the public sphere and throughout the
cityscape. In this process of pervading public spaces and staging
festival activities in interesting and appropriate physical settings, Ars Electronica
has consistently displayed extraordinary imaginativeness. From the
harbor to the mines, from factories to outlying monasteries, unusual
locations have repeatedly served as sites of performances and
interventions, and have, in turn, been reinterpreted by them . . .
Learn More
John Cage
In a Landscape (1948)
Luciane Cardassi, piano ~ ~ check out our video archive post your comments at PytheasTalk
Americana as Muse: Questions & Answers with Michael Daugherty
MySpace.com Blogs
Visiting NYC for rehearsals, Michael Daugherty
stopped by the Boosey & Hawkes office to talk with us about the
premiere of his most recent work, Letters from Lincoln, and some
insight into the inspiration behind his compositions. Boosey & Hawkes: Tell
us about your muse. Adams and Copland have certainly found inspiration
in Americana but you've created quite a different niche as a "maverick
icon maker," as the Guardian calls it. Where does this come from? Michael Daugherty: Well
as a composer, I’m concerned about the technical issues, but also the
emotional issues are very important to me. So when I talk about
icons or using icons like Abraham Lincoln or Route 66, those have
emotional connotations which then give me an emotional benchmark as I’m
composing; I think it gives a layer to the music that makes it
interesting for a listener, whether they know what the icon is or not. B&H: About the imagery involved in so many of your works: do you often work with real pictures and visuals while you're composing? MD: Yeah,
sure. When I was composing Letters from Lincoln I actually had images
of Abraham Lincoln by my desk. I think images are really important to
me because it is a way for me to become inspired emotionally about a
piece. It is hard to explain how these images are translated into
music, but it just provides a springboard for me to become
creative . . .
Learn
More
visit Michael Daugherty at Pytheas ...
Composers of the Month
Sound Advice
Capriccio Records

Isang Yun
Chamber Music
- Hubert Culot/MusicWeb International
Learn More
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Pytheas EarfulsEach week we recommend
listening experiences
made possible by the web's
many streaming audio sites.
Click, listen, explore, and enjoy...
This week's featured pieces:
Francis Poulenc
Les Chemins de l’Amour (1940)
Cindy McTee
Soundings (1995)
David Morneau
Hesitation (2008)
Streaming Audio? click Listen
Pytheas Sightings
New Music on Film
Alfred Newman's score for
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
Danses Pytheuses
New Music for Dance
Aaron Copland
Appalachian Spring (1944)
Choreography by
Martha Graham
Sound Art
Electroacoustic Music
Richard Maxfield
Sine Music
(A Swarm Of Butterfiles
Encountered Over
The Ocean) (1959)
Bang, Clang and Beat
New Music for Percussion
Morton Feldman
The King of Denmark (1964)
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Contemporary Composers
Contemporary Composers ... Cont'd
Composers in Selected States
Composer Collectives
Film Composers
Dance Composers
Electroacoustic Music
New Music for Percussion
Composers Speak on the Web
New Music Ensembles
New Music Festivals
Contemporary Music Centers
New Music Websites
Publishers
Award Winning Music
* * * Cool New Music Videos * * *
Streaming Audio
Streaming Audio Archive
New Music Recordings
New Music Video Archive
New Music Film Archive
New Music Dance Archive
New Music Thoughts & Ideas
New Music Concepts & Terms
New Music for Kids
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