Fall 2017
Poster for Music in Polycultural America - Music in My Detroit: 1940s–1960s
Music in My Detroit: 1940s–1960s
with Mark Slobin
Mark Slobin is professor of music emeritus at Wesleyan University and series editor of Oxford University Press' American Musicspheres series. He has written extensively on American ethnic and world music cultures, including such formative works as Subcultural Sounds: Micromusics of the West, Tenement Songs: The Popular Music
of the Jewish Immigrants, and Fiddler on the Move: Exploring the Klezmer World. His current project focuses on the home-grown musicians who bucked a repressive and sometimes violent social atmosphere to create great music, from jazz to ethnic to Motown, in mid-century Detroit.
Wednesday, October 18, 2017
2:15 p.m.
Tanger Auditorium, Brooklyn College Library
Free and open to the public.
Poster for Music in Polycultural America - The Power and Glory of Steel Pan
The Power and Glory of Steel Pan
with Kendall Williams
Brooklyn-born Kendall Williams is one of New York's most respected steel pan arrangers and players. In recent years he has served as the Panorama arranger for Brooklyn's Crossfire and CASYM steel orchestras. Williams holds a master of music in theory and composition from New York University, where he studied with Julia Wolfe, Michael Gordon, and Josh Quillen. He is currently working on a Ph.D. in composition at Princeton University. Drawing on multiple influences, he writes music for steel pan and percussion ensembles. Williams will speak on his experiences as an arranger and composer, demonstrating the possibilities of steel pan in a variety of calypso, jazz, classical, and new music settings.
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
11 a.m.
Tanger Auditorium, Library
Legacies of Pauline Oliveros: A Symposium
On the first anniversary of her passing, we celebrate the life and music of one of America's most influential composers and artistic visionaries.
Friday, November 3–Saturday, November 4, 2017
Various Locations
Poster for Music in Polycultural America - Panic in Mexico City: Atrás del Cosmos, Free Improvisation, and Experimental Theater, 1964–1983
Panic in Mexico City: Atrás del Cosmos, Free Improvisation, and Experimental Theater, 1964–1983
with Tamar Barzel
Tamar Barzel is currently assistant research scholar at New York University Division of Libraries. Her talk will concern the ensemble Atrás del Cosmos (Behind the Cosmos), which a Mexico City–based music critic described in 1977 as "the purest expression of our present moment." A pioneering free improvisation collective, Atrás del Cosmos occupies a singular place in the history of music in Mexico. Using archival photographs and rare audio recordings, this presentation will trace the story of this remarkable ensemble, which emerged during a period of political and creative upheaval in 20th-century Mexico City.
Monday, November 13, 2017
2:15 p.m.
Tanger Auditorium, Library
Free and open to the public.
