ROCHESTER, NY – The prominent composer John Adams, whose orchestral works make him the most frequently performed living American composer, will pay a visit to the Eastman School of Music from March 17-19. In addition to working with composition students and presenting a master class at the School, he will attend rehearsals and a concert presented by Eastman’s new music ensemble, Musica Nova, conducted by Brad Lubman. The performance is at 8 p.m. Monday, March 19, in Kilbourn Hall (26 Gibbs St.) and is free and open to the public.
The program features Adams’ Chamber Symphony, Shaker Loops, and China Gates for solo piano (featuring Eastman student Thomas Rosenkranz), as well as Studies 2 and 9 by Conlon Nancarrow. Chamber Symphony, for which Adams won the 1994 Royal Philharmonic Society Music Award for best chamber composition, is scored for 15 instruments. It combines the expressionism of Schoenberg with the frenzy of cartoon soundtrack music. Shaker Loops, described as a work full of "rapturous lyricism" and as having "high-octane energy," was composed in the fall of 1978 using fragments from a string quartet, Wavemaker, written earlier in that year.
Adams’ compositions encompass numerous genres, bringing a sense of the theatrical and the vernacular to his distinctive sound. They have been called a postmodern mixture of minimalism with expressive tonal elements reminiscent of late romanticism and early modernism.
Adams studied at Harvard and now is based in the San Francisco Bay area. He has taught at the San Francisco Conservatory and was the composer-in-residence for the San Francisco Symphony from 1979-1985. His most recent composition, El Niño, a full-evening dramatic oratorio on the theme of the Nativity, was premiered in December by the London Voices and the Hallé Orchestra in Paris.
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Note to editors: A color photograph and complete bio of John Adams is available.