Andrew Cyr and David Bruce talk over the score on stage for “The Firework Maker’s Daughter.”
Get an insider’s view of performances that are now in full swing for David Bruce’s “The Firework Maker’s Daughter” at The New Victory Theater.
One of New York's scrappiest contemporary music groups is turning to opera. Beginning Friday and running through May 12 at the New Victory Theater on 42nd Street, the Metropolis Ensemble will accompany "The Firework-Maker's Daughter," a new opera by David Bruce, the promising 2012-2013 composer-in-residence at London's Royal Opera House.
Bob Keyes of the Portland Press Herald profiled artistic director Andrew Cyr and the banner year for the Metropolis Ensemble community, particularly regarding the album recordings: Avner Dorman’s Concertos (a 2010 Grammy nominee), Vivian Fung’s Dreamscapes (a recent Juno award winner), and the forthcoming album of Timothy Andres.
“Andrew Cyr admits, it feels really good to be right. The Fort Kent native and Bates College graduate began the Manhattan-based Metropolis Ensemble seven years ago for the single purpose of giving young classical music composers a chance to be heard. So far, it’s worked out well… People can connect the dots. It’s a small sample, but so far the Metropolis is two for two when it comes to launching the careers of composers whose music it records.”
Classical Composition of the Year for “Violin Concerto” commissioned, performed, and recorded by Metropolis Ensemble
The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) announced today that Edmonton-born composer Vivian Fung’s Violin Concerto is the winner of the 2013 Juno Award for “Classical Composition of the Year.”
The concerto was released on the new studio album Dreamscapes featuring soloist Kristin Lee and “played with precision and heart by the Metropolis Ensemble” (NPR). Dreamscapes is the first release on the Naxos Canadian Classics label. Vivian Fung’s Violin Concerto and Piano Concerto were both commissioned by Metropolis Ensemble and recorded at Tanglewood in 2011.
Many thanks are in order for the entire team, board of directors, and most especially Paul and Libby De Rosa for their vision and generosity in supporting the commissioning of the Violin Concerto as well as the recording of this album; Kristin Lee, solo violinist; our engineer/producer Tim Martyn at Phoenix Audio; all the Metropolis Ensemble artists appearing on the album; and Raymond Bisha and the Naxos label.
Metropolis Artists appearing on Dreamscapes:
Lance Suzuki, Flute; James Austin Smith, Oboe; Carlos Cordeiro, Clarinet; Adrian Morejon, Bassoon; Danielle Rose Kuhlmann, Horn; Paul Murphy, Trumpet; Britton Matthews, Percussion; Sean Statser, Percussion; Bridget Kibbey, Harp; Violin: Owen Dalby, Amalia Hall, Sheryl Hwangbo, Emilie-Anne Gendron, Siwoo Kim, Kristin Lee, Sean Lee (Concertmaster), Miho Saegusa, Emily Smith, Elly Suh, Emma Sutton, Tema Watstein; Viola: Dave Auerbach, Phil Kramp, Eric Nowlin; Cello: Na-Young Baek, Ashley Bathgate, Hiro Matsuo; Bass:Rachel Calin
Andrew Cyr, Artistic Director/Conductor
Listen to the album and explore more about Vivian Fung.
[caption id=“attachment_1164” align=“alignright” width=“300”] Caroline Shaw[/caption]
Caroline Shaw, composer and member of the Metropolis community, is the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Music recipient for her a cappella composition “Partita for 8 Voices.” She also has the distinction of being the youngest to ever receive the music Pulitzer. Her album, released on New Amsterdam Records in October 2012, features the vocal group Roomful of Teeth and was inspired by “Wall Drawing 305” by the American minimalist artist Sol LeWitt.
The award citation praised “Partita” as “a highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects.” Since the announcement on April 15, Caroline has received high praise from the press, including feature stories in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and NPR interviews.
Caroline gave insight to her writing process: “Partita is a simple piece, born of a love of surface and structure, of the human voice, of dancing and tired ligaments, of music, and of our basic desire to draw a line from one point to another.” She told NPR, “sometimes it comes from having a sound in your head that you really want to hear, that you’ve never heard before, and struggling to make that sound happen in any way you can.”
Metropolis Ensemble commissioned Caroline in the Music for Voice concert in 2012 and is a 2012-13 participating composer in our Youth Works education program at The Teak Fellowship in New York City.
Congrats to Caroline! Listen to the album now on iTunes.
The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) announced today that Edmonton-born composer Vivian Fung’s Violin Concerto is the winner of the 2013 Juno Award for “Classical Composition of the Year.”
[caption id=“attachment_1154” align=“alignnone” width=“500”] Soprano Mary Bevan (Lila) performs with James Laing (Hamlet) in The Firework Maker’s Daughter. Photo courtesy of Robert Workman.[/caption] The press are lavishing praise on David Bruce’s new opera, The Firework Maker’s Daughter, in a production created by The Opera Group and Opera North. The family-friendly show based on the novel by Philip Pullman is currently on tour in the UK and comes to New York in collaboration with Metropolis Ensemble this May. The Telegraph’s Michael White marvels that the new production is “a relentless spectacle” that left him smiling:
“At last: a first-rank children’s opera, all the better for its low-tech magic… the most utterly endearing, joyous and delightful show I’ve seen in ages… it has the makings of a real hot-ticket. During May it turns up in Bury St Edmunds, Buxton, Oxford and Newcastle. And if you can’t make any of those but have some air miles, it’s also playing in New York. Go.” Read more…
Alfred Hickling calls David Bruce “a composer who enjoys playing with fire” in this week’s performance at Hull Truck theatre in Kingston.
“Bruce’s vividly coloured chamber score skims the Pacific rim for influences, combining gamelan crashes and plunky pentatonics with the incongruous wheeze of an accordion to create a beguiling, imaginary hybrid of Indo-European folk music. The cast are all engaging comic performers as well as fine singers: Mary Bevan’s Lila has a gung-ho tendency to leap before she looks; Andrew Slater is delightful as the hapless Rambashi, whose career plans as a pirate and caterer come to nought; James Laing’s ethereal countertenor seems curiously suited to the plight of a pining white elephant.” Read more…
Ron Simpson for
says “The Firework Maker’s Daughter is a wonderful entertainment: how often can we say that of a new opera?”
“It’s full of magic and themes of growing up and responsibility, with plenty of ingeniously improvised spectacle, but there are abundant unforced laughs… David Bruce’s score is a constant delight, from a cappella anthems to exotic percussion effects. He borrows freely from many sources, with a generic Orientalism showing especially in the writing for flute, and tunefulness keeps breaking in.” Read more…
Samira Ahmed on
, a radio program on BBC World Service, sat down with David Bruce and librettist Glyn Maxwell to discuss sparks, fantasy, opera clichés, and painting fireworks with music.
(Interview begins at the 10-minute mark.) Ruth Puckering for
raves: “It’s a visual feast of shapes, colour, light and sound as the singing, music, acting and storytelling all wind seamlessly together around a cast who are uniformly excellent.”
[caption id=“attachment_1142” align=“alignnone” width=“500”] Khmer Arts Ensemble performing “A Bend in the River.” Photo by John Shapiro.[/caption]
Metropolis Ensemble is pleased to announce a co-commissioning partnership with Cambodian Living Arts as part of Season of Cambodia to develop a new work by Cambodian composer Him Sophy. Nearly four decades after the fall of Phnom Penh to the Khmer Rouge, no major symphonic work has emerged in Cambodia to address the traumas of the late 1970s. Cambodian composer and Khmer Rouge survivor Him Sophy is composing music for Paṃsukūla that combines a Western symphony orchestra and chorus with Khmer instrumentalists and vocalists. The libretto of this new requiem is structured on a Cambodian Buddhist liturgy for healing the sick and offering merit to the dead, known in Pali as pamsukula (pronounced in Khmer as bangsokol) and is written by Buddhist scholar, Trent Walker.
On April 15, 16, and 17, as part of Season of Cambodia, Metropolis Ensemble will bring together six Cambodian instrumentalists and singers to develop methods for uniting traditional Cambodian musical and ceremonial forms with a Western chamber orchestra and chorus. An invitation-only work-in-progress presentation will take place on April 17. Kindly RSVP by April 8 (support@seasonofcambodia.org or 855-762-2013).
Go behind-the-scenes with Andrew Cyr, artistic director of Metropolis Ensemble, John Burt, co-founder of Cambodian Living Arts, and Cambodian composer Him Sophy.
[caption id=“attachment_1138” align=“alignright” width=“200”] Composer Him Sophy[/caption]
Him Sophy is professor of music at the Royal University of Fine Arts and the Royal Academy of Cambodia, and an instructor at the Northbridge School. Born into a musical family in Prey Veng province, Cambodia, Sophy has studied in Phnom Penh and Moscow and was a visiting artist in the United States during 2001-02. He has written many compositions for chamber, orchestral, film, and musical settings, including the acclaimed rock opera Where Elephants Weep, premiere 2008. His most recent commissions include a premiere in March 2011 at the Auckland Arts Festival and the score for Khmer Arts new dance production “A Bend in the River” at the Joyce Theater, April 2013 as part of Season of Cambodia.
Sophy’s new work, Paṃsukūla, adopts the Western tradition of a Christian requiem mass for the predominantly Buddhist Cambodian context. The libretto of this new requiem is structured on a Cambodian Buddhist liturgy for healing the sick and offering merit to the dead, known in Pali as paṃsukūla. This ritual is rich in symbolic meaning and is performed at Cambodian healing ceremonies, funerals, and memorial services. Given the enduring importance of performing arts in Cambodian culture, music is a singularly powerful vehicle for this healing.
Season of Cambodia lights up New York City’s cultural landscape in April and May 2013, with more than 125 artists from Cambodia for a major celebration of Cambodian arts, culture, and humanities. Distinctive works from master and emerging artists and scholars — in ritual, music, visual arts, performance, dance, shadow puppetry, film, and academic forums — will be presented by 30 of New York’s most renowned arts and educational institutions, marking an unprecedented city-wide partnership initiative to celebrate one of the world’s most vibrant and evocative cultures. Season of Cambodia is an initiative of Cambodian Living Arts.
Cambodian Living Arts (CLA) is a Phnom Penh-based NGO with non-profit status in the United States, founded in 1998 by artist and Khmer Rouge survivor Arn Chorn-Pond to preserve Cambodia’s traditional art forms. CLA began a new commissions program in 2003 to inspire a new generation of artists, composers, playwrights and choreographers to create new work.
Metropolis Ensemble is a professional chamber orchestra and ensemble dedicated to making classical music in its most contemporary forms. Led by Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr, Metropolis Ensemble gathers today’s most outstanding emerging composers and young artists to produce unique, innovative concert experiences. Founded in 2006, Metropolis Ensemble has commissioned over 85 works of music from a dynamic mix of emerging composers and has been presented by The Wordless Music Series, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute, (Le) Poisson Rouge, and Celebrate Brooklyn!, BAM, and The New Victory Theater. Learn more…
Generous support for Metropolis Ensemble is provided by the American Chai Trust and Michael Cohn. Lead institutional support for Season of Cambodia comes from Ford Foundation, Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, and The Rockefeller Foundation.
When Timo Andres made his debut full-length recording for Nonesuch in 2009, with the two-piano set Shy and Mighty, most of the talk focused on how it seemed to announce a genuine young composer of interest. Less mentioned was Andres’s own monstrous technique, yet Andres is not so much a great composer with sufficient piano skills as a pure double threat. That’s going to be harder to ignore, starting with Home Stretch: For this follow-up, Andres has taken on Mozart’s “Coronation” piano concerto, along with a few new compositions of his own. Well: Make that one brand-new composition, and two halvsies.
For example, Andres’s “Coronation” is a “co-composition,” which takes the infamously unfinished left-hand piano part of Wolfgang’s and completes it with a 21st-century American, post-minimalist flair. Andres humbly calls his rumbling additions (mostly found in the left-hand part) a “bastardization” of the Mozart style, but more often than not, his crunchy dissonances and harmonic detours bear some relationship to the master’s roadmap. And the performance, undertaken with the Metropolis ensemble, has a flowing, unified feel. It’s the rare “based on” item that feels impishly creative while remaining sufficiently reverent.
The other two “originals” on this program are strong, too. “Home Stretch,” though it shows up on this album as one long track, is a piano concerto in three movements that’s worth its deliberate pacing. And “Paraphrase on Themes of Brian Eno” works as a counterpart to Andres’s “completed” Mozart concert. Once again, Andres’s touch steers clear of basking in easy familiarity; his final setting of the Eno song “By This River” is recognizable, but hardly derivative.
The only thing working against this album-as-an-album is that it perhaps doesn’t “flow” in an ideal way; you might be better served by taking each of these divergently structured pieces separately, at different sittings. But, as jaded recital audiences in New York have found whenever the pianist stuns both with his own pieces as well as with repertoire as familiar as Schumann and Chopin, it may only be because Andres is an artist with more talents than a single album’s sequencing can contain.
Seth Colter Walls
The two concertos were recorded at Tanglewood’s Seiji Ozawa Hall by Charlie Post and Tim Martyn with a “you-are-there” feeling.
The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) announced this morning that Edmonton-born composer Vivian Fung’s Violin Concerto is nominated for the 2013 Juno Award in the category of “Classical Composition of the Year.”
The concerto was released on the new studio album Dreamscapes featuring soloist Kristin Lee and “played with precision and heart by the Metropolis Ensemble” (NPR). The recording is receiving critical acclaim for its “welcome lyricism and grace” (SF Chronicle) and “intimate, often pensive, but frequently playful sound world” (Philadelphia Inquirer).
“Complete shock and elation!” exclaimed Ms. Fung on hearing the news of the Juno nod. “What an honor to be nominated next to such esteemed and admired Canadian composers. However, the award is symbolic for the entire team of people who worked so hard to make this CD happen.”
Kristin Lee echoed this enthusiasm: “I am absolutely thrilled to hear this incredible news! I feel truly honored to have been a part of this experience.”
Dreamscapes is the first release on the brand new Naxos Canadian Classics label that will feature 6-8 composers from across Canada annually. “It is a terrific roster of composers with whom to be nominated,” said Raymond Bisha of Naxos. “Clearly this nomination is the result of everyone’s hard work and inspiration and congratulations all around are deserved.”
All three of the works on the new recording have drawn their inspiration from Ms. Fung’s travels to Bali. Both the Violin Concerto and Piano Concerto were commissioned by Metropolis Ensemble and recorded at Seiji Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood in 2011.
“I couldn’t be happier — we’ve covering all bases now between the Grammys and Juno Awards!” remarked Andrew Cyr, artistic director and conductor of Metropolis Ensemble. “This is a truly special nomination which honors Vivian’s vision and the internationally recognized award brings to the spotlight the artistry of our players, soloist Kristin Lee, and our engineering team led by Tim Martyn, who all worked so hard to match Vivian’s inspiration. I also wish to thank Paul and Elizabeth De Rosa for providing the critical support to for Metropolis Ensemble to commission and record this work.”
The 2013 Juno Awards will be presented on April 21 on CTV with host Michael Buble. Dreamscapes is now available on iTunes and Amazon. Show your support for Vivian Fung and Metropolis Ensemble’s album and request Violin Concerto to be played on your local radio station today!
The opening Violin Concerto is a good introduction to Fung, offering an immediate vista of her understated but brilliant orchestration and her technically demanding but musically riveting writing for the violin.
This, easily, one of the most unusual piano concertos you will ever hear but, I think, the strongest work in this collection and completely fascinating. The fact that she is, clearly, a very creative and skilled composer is all I need to recommend this without hesitation.
Vivian Fung’s Dreamscapes is a cutting-edge album in the best sense, an invigorating indication of where we are in classical music.
Exciting, skilfully put together music with many exoticisms.
Metropolis Ensemble, led by Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr, is delighted to announce its collaboration with The Opera Group and Opera North: “The Firework Maker’s Daughter” a new opera by David Bruce and Glyn Maxwell based on the enchanting novel by acclaimed author Philip Pullman. The family-friendly production will be presented May 3-12, 2013 at The New Victory Theater in New York City. This captivating opera tells the story of one girl’s quest to become a firework maker. Determined to master Crackle Dragons, Leaping Monkeys and Golden Sneezes, Lila tests her talents and gambles her good fortune as she parlays with pirates, grapples with ghosts and faces off with a ferocious fire-fiend. “The Firework Maker’s Daughter” features an internationally-inspired score by David Bruce and a witty libretto by Glyn Maxwell and a cast of five artists who enliven shadow puppets from Cambridge, England’s Indefinite Articles. Metropolis artists, including nine players, will perform this chamber opera in two acts, set in a fantastical land where animals talk, goddesses reign and imps dwell. Philip Pullman is the author of several best-selling books, most notably the fantasy trilogy “His Dark Materials,” including Northern Lights which was adapted for film in 2007 as “The Golden Compass” starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig. He published “The Firework Maker’s Daughter” in 1996, incorporating his love for the inventive names of pyrotechnics like incandescent fountain and scarlet volcano. In an interview with Scholastic, he said the idea for the book “came from my childhood when we used to have fireworks every year on Guy Fawkes Night… And I’d never lost that love of fireworks, so I thought it would be nice to do a story all about them.” Mr. Pullman suggests that theater is most valuable to us because it invites us to pretend together and that, by joining in, we make the journey something we share. The author provides audiences one undeniably adventuresome opportunity to do so, as his novel jumps from page to stage in this full-blown puppet opera. From aspiring adolescent firework makers who contend with pirate crews to an entrepreneurial albino elephant, nothing is too much for the imagination and it’s all a delectable dose of exactly what Mr. Pullman prescribes:
“Children need to go to the theater as much as they need to run about in the fresh air. They need to hear real music played by real musicians on real instruments as much as they need food and drink. They need to read and listen to proper stories as much as they need to be loved and cared for… If you deprive them of art and music and story and theater, they perish on the inside.”
Composer David Bruce is a native of Stamford, Connecticut who grew up in England and has a growing reputation on both sides of the Atlantic. Metropolis Ensemble has collaborated on multiple projects with Mr. Bruce, including
and most recently
He received his third Carnegie Hall commission
Steampunk
last year, and new commissions from The Silk Road Ensemble and the London Philharmonic in 2012. Mr. Bruce recalls his own connection to the stage and the creation of this new opera:
“Since my own childhood I have thought of the theatre as a colourful place of magic and fantasy and as I’ve grown older I am still attracted to those same aspects - for me there is not really a difference between children’s theatre and adult theatre - as I see it, it’s all ‘play’ and we are all children… In the theatre we allow ourselves to wonder - to question 'what if’ - and the question can sometimes be absurd or comical in nature, but other times be something much more profound. In a largely secular society, the theatre is one of the few places where we can still ask ourselves the big questions, and still feel wonder in all its aspects. My instinct as an artist is to set those big questions in a context that allows us to laugh, smile and relax.”
“The Firework Maker’s Daughter” makes its world premiere at Hull Truck in Yorkshire on March 23, 2013 and tours the UK at Linbury Studio and Royal Opera House in April, before coming to America and The New Victory Theater in May. Located in the heart of Times Square and 42nd Street, this historic jewel box theater (the oldest operating in New York City) is tricked out especially for families.
for children 8+ and imaginations of all ages!
Co-produced by
and Opera North in association with ROH2 and Watford Palace Theatre. Co-commissioned by The Opera Group and ROH2. Orchestral Partner: Metropolis Ensemble. Art credit for The New Victory Theater: Tom Slaughter
“What sets Fung apart is her ability to take over the subconscious of the listener, to build a world so captivating that even the strangest of transitions happen seamlessly. “
“The year-old Violin Concerto that leads off the disc boasts a certain winsome charm, especially in the fluid performance of soloist Kristin Lee.”
“Played with precision and heart by the Metropolis Ensemble” -National Public RadioDreamscapes, the new Naxos album from Metropolis Ensemble featuring the works of Vivian Fung, is receiving high praise in the media. Here is a roundup of the reviews and commentary on the recording. NPR’s Bob McQuiston lauds the new album on the Deceptive Cadence blog:
“The new album Dreamscapes… features works by one of today’s most eclectic composers, Canadian-born Vivian Fung. John Cage fans will love her solo pieces for prepared piano, while traditionalists should find intriguing the concertos for violin and piano… Violinist Kristin Lee’s performance is not only technically brilliant but her sensitive phrasing and pacing endow the music with both an emotional and intellectual appeal… Pianist Conor Hanick’s performance is laudable for its agility… Both soloists receive magnificent support from conductor Andrew Cyr and the Brooklyn-based Metropolis Ensemble, whose members not only turn in virtuosic performances, but follow their extracurricular instructions to the letter. Also, the recording engineers get a big gold star for a spectacular sounding disc.”
Both local classical stations in New York City have included the new album in recent broadcasts. John Schaefer featured the recordings with its “clear inspiration or influence from Indonesian gamelan music” on
.
And Olivia Giovetti introduced the album on
with the following review:
Two concertos dominate Dreamscapes, Vivian Fung’s new album on Naxos’s Canadian Classics series, and both demonstrate Fung’s prepossessing predilection for cross-cultural conversations. Her own Violin Concerto was written with a symbiosis similar to that of Salonen and Josefowicz’s, responding to Fung’s time spent in Bali with violinist Kristin Lee (the violin often resembles the Balinese gamelan). The Metropolis Ensemble, under Andrew Cyr, gave Fung’s Violin Concerto its world premiere last year and returns here for the recording, which also features Fung’s Piano Concerto, “Dreamscapes.” The study of contrasts is apt for an instrument that can juggle two musical lines at once, and here that honor falls to Q2 Music’s own Conor Hanick.“
Joshua Kosman from the
hails the album and its "welcome lyricism and grace.”
“The scales and rhythms of Balinese and Javanese gamelan suffuse the three pieces represented here… Yet the further Fung strays from that stylistic foundation, the more fascinating and rewarding her music becomes… The year-old Violin Concerto that leads off the disc boasts a certain winsome charm, especially in the fluid performance of soloist Kristin Lee… the final Piano Concerto, in a powerhouse rendition featuring soloist Conor Hanick. Here at last is music of dramatic urgency and depth, in which Fung draws on ideas from gamelan while also adding plenty of her own original material – clangorous, dissonant harmonies, off-kilter rhythms and a sense of wild unpredictability.”
David Patrick Stearns from the
suggests that with the
Violin Concerto
, "Fung is in her own more intimate, often pensive, but frequently playful sound world, which indeed lives up to the album’s title… At every point in the disc, Fung has a strong sense of thematic control and structural overview that suggests more great things to come.” David Olds from
praises the release saying “the disc lives up to my expectations.”
“All three of the works presented here are based on gamelan motifs and melodies giving the disc a wonderful continuity… Like a number of composers before her Fung has taken inspiration from her own travels to Indonesia and truly made this music her own.”