Today’s video premiere features percussionist Diego Espinosa Cruz Gonzalez performing how many bodies have we to pass through, a work he co-composed with Zosha Di Castri for her upcoming debut portrait album Tachitipo.
Tachitipo includes performances of Zosha’s chamber and solo works by Ekmeles, Talea Ensemble, JACK Quartet, the International Contemporary Ensemble, Yarn/Wire, and pianist Julia Den Boer, plus this special bonus video track.
Here’s what Zosha had to say about how many bodies have we to pass through:
Co-composed over two intensive workshops, two years apart (in New York and Paris), this piece began from a humble suitcase packed with hand percussion from around the world. Skirting traditional notation for a “storyboard score” and close collaboration, how many bodies have we to pass through maps physical gestures across instrumental surfaces by modifying and combining hand percussion to create a multiplicity of simultaneous voices performable by a single musician. Using clamps, foam, combs, and other implements to cross-connect surfaces, Diego’s tactile and highly kinetic dance invites you to peer in, as if witnessing an intimate ritual. This piece is dedicated to the victims of the 2017 Mexican earthquake, which occurred during the initial creative phase of this work.
Tachitipo is out on New Focus Recordings November 15, 2019, but you can pre-order the album here.
About Zosha Di Castri
Zosha Di Castri is a Canadian composer, pianist, and sound artist living in New York. Her work – which has been performed in Canada, the US, South America, Asia, and Europe – extends beyond purely concert music, including projects with electronics, sound arts, and collaborations with video and dance. She recently completed Hunger for the Montreal Symphony Orchestra with improvised drummer, designed to accompany Peter Foldes’ 1973 silent film by the same name. She also wrote Long Is the Journey, Short Is the Memory for orchestra and chorus, which opened the first night of the 2019 BBC Proms, featuring the BBC Symphony, the BBC Singers, and conductor Karina Canellakis at Royal Albert Hall. Other large-scale projects include a 25-min piece for soprano, recorded narrator and orchestra entitled Dear Life (based on a short-story by Alice Munro), and an evening-length new music theatre piece, Phonobellow (co-written with David Adamcyk) for ICE with performances in New York and Montreal.
Her orchestral compositions have been commissioned by John Adams, the San Francisco Symphony, New World Symphony, Esprit Orchestra, the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, and the BBC, and have been featured by the Tokyo Symphony, Amazonas Philharmonic, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra, among others. Zosha has made appearances with the Chicago Symphony, the L.A. Philharmonic, the New York Philharmonic and the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players in their chamber music series. She has worked with many leading new music groups, including Talea Ensemble, Wet Ink, Ekmeles, Yarn/Wire, the NEM, Ensemble Cairn, and JACK Quartet. Upcoming projects include a Koussevitzky commission from the Library of Congress for percussionist Steve Schick and ICE, and a commission for the Grossman Ensemble in Chicago. Zosha is currently the Francis Goelet Assistant Professor of Music at Columbia.
About Diego Espinosa Cruz Gonzalez
International multi-percussionist/sound artist Diego Espinosa Cruz González is dedicated to expanding the boundaries of contemporary performance through sound exploration. He collaborates with composers, artists, choreographers, and technicians to develop new pieces, instruments, and techniques enhancing innovative ways of expression and knowledge. His work cuts across hardcore contemporary music, political sound art, improvisation, performance art, rock, and theater music/acting. Espinosa has performed in 40 countries across all continents collaborating with musicians such as Pierre Boulez, John Zorn, Steve Reich, Kaija Saariaho, Philip Glass, John Luther Adams, Steven Schick, Peter Eötvös, Willie Winant, Matmos, Tarek Atoui, David Toop, Frank Ollu, and visual artists like Abraham Cruz Villegas, and Rirkrit Tiravanija.
Diego has played as a soloist in venues like the Royal Albert Hall (BBC Proms with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales), Concertgebouw (NL), Melbourne Recital Center, Tate Modern, Deutche Oper (Berlin), Centre Georges Pompidou, China National Theater, Tivoli Vredenburg (NL), Muziekgebouw (NL), The Kitchen (NY), Huddersfield, Sala Nezahualcoyotl (MX), Philharmonie (Cologne), and Art Basel Miami. Espinosa has received the Performance Grand Prize – Tokyo Experimental Festival Vol. 8, 2nd Prize at The International Gaudeamus Interpreters Competition (‘09), 3rd Prize at the International Percussion Competition (‘05), the Deutschen Schallplattenkritik for the CD Insomnio (‘12), and was nominated for the International Classical Music Awards 2017 with the recording Tongues of Fire. He was a member of Slagwerk Den Haag, Insomnio Ensemble, Amsterdam Percussion Group, and played for Asko-Schönberg Ensemble, BIT20, and Nieuw Ensemble. Espinosa holds a Doctorate from McGill University and a Masters degree from the Royal Conservatory. Currently he is a professor at Mexico’s National University, as well as a member of Liminar Ensemble and the theater company Todas las Fiestas de Mañana. Diego’s recordings can be found on Mode Records, Tzadik, Cantaloupe, Col legno, EMF, ENCORA, NMC, Karnatic Lab, Artek, EtCetera, Cero, Iradia, Unsounds, Tochnit Aleph, Navona Records, and New Focus Recordings.
