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Cellos Add Wordless But Lyrical Voices
by Allan Kozinn, New York Times 03/04/2008
Stylistic Wanderings and Flirtations With Multimedia And Jazz
by Allan Kozinn, New York Times 04/18/2007
Earthy Cuban Sounds, Rendered With An Urban Complexity
by Allan Kozinn, New York Times 01/10/2007
A Menu Of Familiar Signposts And A One-Woman Opera
by Anne Midgette, New York Times 04/02/2005
American Piano of the 1940s
by Jack Sullivan, American Record Guide 01/01/2005
Sequitur-Concertos
BBC Music Magazine 04/01/2004
Sequitur-Concertos
by Ian Quinn, American Record Guide 01/31/2004
Sequitur-Concertos
by Ken Smith, Gramaphone Magazine 01/01/2004
Sequitur-Concertos
by Steve Smith, Time Out New York 11/20/2003
Eclecticism and Humor in Works by Lewis Spratlan
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 11/14/2003
Meditations on Power, Old and Freshly
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 05/22/2003
Sequitur's new-music cabarets offer contemporary classics with theatrical flair
by Brian WIse, Time Out New York 05/15/2003
Music In Review: Sequitur
by Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times 05/24/2002
A High-Energy Romp Through The Raucous 1940's
by Anne Midgette, New York Times 10/27/2001
Seasons of Squawks on the Crows' Calendar
by Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times 03/01/2001
Two Flutists Explore the 20th-Century Repertory
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 10/28/2000
Concert Connects New With Newer
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 04/28/2000
Poetry as the Setting for Meditations on a Child's Death
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 11/16/1999
The Sound of the City
by Robert Hilferty, The Village Voice 01/26/1999
Music: Classical and New
by Rose Martelli, newyork.citysearch.com 01/18/1999
New Songs Spring Forth In a Lively Mixture
by Paul Griffiths, The New York Times 01/13/1999
A Cozy Cabaret Of Comical Sultriness
by Justin Davidson, New York Newsday 01/12/1999
Sequitur: George Crumb Concert
by Kenneth Goldsmith, New York Press 11/18/1998
Clash Of The Titans: Two Legendary Composers are Feted
by Ken Smith, Time Out New York 10/22/1998
Sequitur: Kaye Playhouse Concert
by Mark W. Greenfest, The New Music Connoisseur 05/18/1997
New Works Teeming With Fauna
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 02/22/1997
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New Works Teeming With Fauna
by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 02/22/1997
Sequitur, a new-music ensemble that made its debut on Wednesday evening at Merkin Concert Hall, has a penchant for works with a theatrical element. Its directors, Harold Meltzer and David Amato, have an ambitious plan that includes commissioning works that integrate music with text, theater and dance, and although the inaugural program included no commissioned works, it gave an impression of what the musicians have in mind.
The program began with Luciano Berio's "Opus Number Zoo," a wind quintet with a text by Rhoda Levine, in which barnyard animals observe human foibles. The music, composed in 1951 and revised in 1970, is charming by Mr. Berio's standards; its dissonances and spiky rhythms are playful and picturesque rather than abstract.
The quintet, which included Patti Monson, flutist, Jennifer Slowik, oboist, Kristina Belisle, clarinetist, Jill Bobo, hornist and Martin Kuuskmann, bassoonist, played the music with flair and put considerable energy into their recitations of the text.
Ms. Monson later gave an evocative account of another work with an, animal theme, Shirish Korde's "Tenderness of Cranes" (1991), an involved solo flute work that mixes the bent notes and airy tone of the shakuhachi with the broader coloristic vocabulary of contemporary flute technique. Tan Dun's "Eight Colors" (1988) for string quartet similarly straddled East and West. By drawing on both traditional sounds from Chinese opera and extended string playing techniques, Mr. Dun created a remarkable texture that often had the otherworldly quality of electronic music.
The Magellan String Quartet gave a vital reading of Mr. Dun's work and also played David Lang's "Music for Gracious Living" (1993, revised 1996). This parody of the explanatory music-appreciation recordings of the 1950's imposes a narrative by Deborah Artman on a puckish, Minimalist quartet. Ms. Artman's text, delivered with a fine balance of frustration and willful disengagement by Charles McIver, captures the futility of seeking a story line in abstract music by having the narrator try several plot possibilities before deciding that the music was meant to convey the details of his risotto recipe.
Frederic Rzewski's "Jefferson" (1970) unwittingly made a similar point. A well-meaning and deeply felt work composed after the Kent State shootings, "Jefferson" is a setting of the Declaration of Independence. But its declamatory vocal line, sung ably by Douglas Webster, was far less interesting than the shimmering, slowly unfolding piano score, played by Lisa Moore. The text, exalted though it is, ultimately seemed an encumbrance.
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