So Percussion, Princeton University’s new Edward T. Cone Performers-in-Residence, is set to offer the first of two free concerts this season.
The performance is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Sept. 12 at the university’s Richardson Auditorium in Alexander Hall. Tickets are free, however require reservations.
The program features works by Steve Reich, John Cage and rock band The National guitarist Bryce Dessner, as well as their own compositions.
Speaking about the program, the group said: “Our first major concert as Performers-in-Residence at Princeton provides a tour through several of the main strands of our work: percussion chamber music classics, new repertoire from today’s most exciting composers, and our own compositions.”
When the founding members of So Percussion convened as graduate students at the Yale School of Music, their initial goal was to present a repertoire of pieces by 20th century luminaries such as John Cage, Steve Reich and Iannis Xenakis. An encounter with David Lang, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and co-founder of New York’s Bang on a Can organization, yielded their first commissioned piece: the 36-minute, three-movement the so-called laws of nature.
Since that first major new work, the group has commissioned some of the greatest American composers of our time to build a new repertoire, including Princeton’s own Steve Mackey and Paul Lansky, as well as Reich and Martin Bresnick.
In 2014, So Percussion was named Princeton University’s Edward T. Cone Performers-in-Residence beginning in the 2014-15 academic year. Replacing the Brentano String Quartet, who served as Performers-in-Residence since 1999, So Percussion will teach graduate and undergraduate students, workshop, rehearse and perform new works by student and faculty composers, coach chamber music, give master classes and present two concerts from their touring repertoire each academic year.
More information is online at princeton.edu/music.
