As this season was drawing to an end, the Metropolitan Museum was announcing the next, a couple of weeks ago, in the beautiful Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium. Curated by Limor Tomer, this new season will feature some edgy shows, some new music performed on historical instruments from the Sau Wing Lam Collection, and a year-long partnership with Paul D. Miller, aka DJ Spooky.
DJ Spooky – Photo by Mike Figgis
The crunchiest chunk in this new season at the Met Museum is—without a doubt—the year-long partnership with DJ Spooky. More than a residence, Paul D. Miller will actually “remix” the museum, interact with the collections, and apply his musicality to the entire space. For the first partnership with a composer in its history, the Met will present 5 live performances, lectures, workshops, and an iPad Mixing Piece based on audience participation and using DJ Spooky’s app (for Make Music New York 2013).
One of the axes of this new season is the interaction between music and the collections. A good example of this is a two-weekend marathon of the complete Beethoven string quartets performed by the Endellion String Quartet, in parallel with lectures about his Beethoven’s romantic contemporaries, including Delacroix and Friedrich (February 15-17, and February 22-24).
Another is the unique opportunity to hear music—old and new—performed on period instruments: from December to May the Salomé Chamber Orchestra will perform Bach (Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 3, 5 and 6 and Concerto in D Major, BWV 164), Vivaldi and Piazzola (The Eight Seasons, February 2), Lear Auerbach (Dialogues on Stabat Mater, April 12), and a bunch of crazy virtuosic stuff (Paganini, Kreisler, Sarasate, et al. performed by Philippe Quint, Chee-Yun and David Aaron on May 4).
Salomé Chamber Orchestra, the world’s only all-vampire chamber orchestra – Photo by Akos Simon
It also turns out that the Met Museum will be a haven of good taste this holiday season when all we hear around the city is Diddy – Dirty Money remixes of Jingle Bells. Indeed, Christopher Taylor will be performing Messiaen‘s Vingt regards sur l’enfant-Jésus on December 11, JACK Quartet will rock some Dufay and premiere a new work by Toby Twining on December 16, and The Crossing will perform David Lang’s Little Match Girl Passion and other works on December 23 (6:30 pm and 8:30 pm). Is the Met setting a new holiday standard by playing Lang’s Pulitzer-winning passion?
JACK Quartet – Photo by Henrik Olund
Between November 30 and December 2, the Met will offer a breath-taking, 70-minute version of Peony Pavillion, the 16th-century Kunqu opera masterpiece. Directed by Tan Dun, the performance will take place in the Chinese Scholar Garden for an audience of 50 only, although the premiere will also be live-streamed in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium for a considerably reduced fee.
CONTACT!, the New York Phil’s New Music Series continues at the Met with a concert on December 21 featuring premieres and a commission by Andy Akiho, Andrew Norman, Jude Vaclavik, and Drukman. The second concert of series will be on April 5 with music by Unsuk Chin, Poul Ruders, Anders Hillborg, and Yann Robin.
Finally, and forgive me if this is not technically new classical music, fifty artists will re-interpret Andy Warhol’s sensibility. Highlights include his famous Screen Tests accompanied by a live composed score by Dean and Britta (October 6), and Patti Smith’s tenth Met Museum performance: a tribute to Warhol and the music scene of the 1970s (September 28).
Patti Smith – Photo by Edward Mapplethorpe
More info is available at http://www.metmuseum.org and, as always, being a member will get you an exclusive access to certain shows.
