MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTORS
Welcome to MATA’s 14th annual Festival!
18 works | 9 countries | 10 world and US premieres
“The abiding coolness that is MATA...” (Alex Ross)
MATA prides itself in uncovering the most adventurous and exciting music from emerging talent around the world, and we are thrilled to present this year’s line-up of extraordinary composers and breath-taking performers. As New York Magazine pointed out just this week, we “aren’t your grandmother’s....anything”.“...the city's leading showcase for vital new music by emerging composers“ (New Yorker) is the only American festival consisting of music by young composers from around the globe, and MATA’s international draw is reflected this year in ten world and US premieres, curated from an astonishing pool of approximately 500 composers (no longer a record, as we received more than 620 for 2013!).In addition to the opening night salon at Paula Cooper Gallery (4/17) in Chelsea, and three evenings of premieres at the newly-re-opened Roulette in downtown Brooklyn (after years of being in Manhattan - we’re back!), we’ve expanded the festival to include three workshops open to the public (just RSVP to info@matafestival.org) hosted by new music diva Susan Narucki, downtown guru Christopher McIntyre, Frank J. Oteri (NewMusicBox), John Nuechterlein (president and CEO of American Composers Forum), Scott Winship (New Music USA) and Bill Holab (master engraver).
MATA is also very excited to once again work with WQXR/Q2, our official online partner. Q2 will be broadcasting live on 4/19 and 4/20, with special hosts Nadia Sirota and Mary Rowell, and taping the entire festival for future release online at www.wqxr.org/q2.And now, onto the music. 2012 marks perhaps the most daring, innovative year in MATA’s history, including a face off between two blow-your-jerkins-off quartets: the “howlingly beautiful” (New Yorker) JACK Quartet and Quartet New Generation, the Berlin-based recorder (yes, we said recorder) quartet, an ensemble making waves on all sides of the Atlantic.They present music fresh off the printer written especially for them, including two MATA commissions from Rome Prize and 2012 Guggenheim recipient Huck Hodge, and Shanghai-based sensation Qin Yi.
Thanks to those brave, generous souls who contributed to the MATA Commissioning Campaign who made these and Francesco Filidei’s spectacular masterwork for SIGNAL (April 20th) possible.April 19th continues where we left off at last year’s festival, with Responsible Parties II: Composers/Performers Today, includes a world premiere by Matt Marks - a sneak-preview of his much-anticipated Little Death, Vol. 2 with Mellissa Hughes; Black or White, a world premiere video by composer/artist Jacob Cooper based on the late Michael Jackson (each night of the festival begins with a video installation by Cooper); the hypnotic mechanical music for sheet metal by the Argentine Cecilia Lopez; and much more!
On April 20th: Signs and Signals, Brad Lubman and his new music band SIGNAL close out this year’s festival with special guest Kathleen Supové (wrangling a “real” piano against a player piano in Ivan Ferrer-Orozco’s salsa-tinged Traces IV), Eva Alkula, Finland’s premier kantele player (what’s a kantele? Stick around and find out!), and four astonishing string players performing Eric Wubbels fiendish Viola Quartet.We have both served as MATA directors for a couple of years now - exciting times to be finding and promoting the best new music around. We could not be more proud of this year’s Festival and we couldn’t have done it without a great team (at the forefront, Technical Director Garth MacAleavy, and our indispensable Manager of Operations and Development, Alex Weiser) and a brilliant community who cares about music as much as we do.
We hope that this is only the beginning of your relationship with these composers and their music. Take a moment to speak with the many musicians who are in attendance this week, and please continue to follow their work beyond this week’s festival. We certainly will.Thank you for being an important part of the MATA community and enjoy the 2012 Festival!
Sincerely, Yotam Haber and David T. Little