s e q u i t u r




		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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	Meditations on Power, Old and Freshly by Allan Kozinn, The New York Times 05/22/2003 Besides its more conventional concerts of new music, the inventive Sequitur ensemble periodically assembles cabaret songs, with newly commissioned pieces set alongside established standards. So far, the programs have been thematic, with an edge of political satire that makes them closer in spirit to the Berlin cabarets of the 1920's than to light modern American entertainments. The subject (and the title) of the program Sequitur presented at Joe's Pub on Sunday evening was Power, and beyond its conceptual link with the prewar Berlin cabaret style, there was an envoy from that era, "Song of the Big Shot," by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht. A couple of collaborations between Weill and Maxwell Anderson, from Weill's American period, were included as well, as was "Joe Worker," a fascinating piece of early-20th-century agitprop by Marc Blitzstein. But the program, performed in alternation by Richard Lalli and Mary Nessinger, had a sense of humor that helped it surf over the bitter edges. To a great extent, that humor came in the songs commissioned for the occasion. Frances Thorne contributed an urbane setting of the various definitions of power, and its derivatives, found in the Random House Dictionary. Robert Maggio's setting of Tony Hoagland's "Ecology," a look at the cynicism of power, evoked both Weill and the more parodistic songs of Ray Davies, the principal songwriter in the Kinks. Victoria Bond provided her own text for "Power Play," an amusing song about asserting oneself at the gym. Elana Kats-Chernin's "Next, Please" evoked the tyrannical power of mechanization, and more conventional tyrannies were touched on in Robert Carl's "Sting of Command," about hierarchies, and William Rhoads's "Big Bang," which offered a vision of sexuality drawn from the book of Genesis, the Marquis de Sade and the poet William Lawrence. But perhaps the most weirdly chilling of the new works was Stephen Coxe's "Steps," a setting of a cryptic 1963 letter from Lee Harvey Oswald. Scattered among these were older songs. Francine Trester's "Meeting at 11," about being caught in traffic, and John La Chiusa's "Senator's Mistress" seemed suited to the evening's theme, as did a pair of Cole Porter songs, the macabre "Miss Otis Regrets" and "Give Him the Ooo-La-La." Even Gershwin's "Fascinating Rhythm" and Johnny Mercer's "That Old Black Magic," for example, could be bent to the purpose (the power of rhythm, the power of love), although it was a stretch. Mr. Lalli and Ms. Nessinger are personable interpreters who invest songs with the right character and spirit. The standards were supported ably by Gary Chapman; the new pieces, which tended to have more harmonically biting, texturally richer accompaniments, were supported by an ensemble that included Sara Laimon, pianist; Andrea Schultz, violinist; Michael Lowenstern, clarinetist; and Jeremy McCoy, bassist.

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