Dear Friends,

Happy Fall! In this strange period of too much humidity and too much twitter, I’m pleased to share my 2018–19 season. We begin in media res, since September is almost over, but going forward, here are some of the highlights:

— This November, the LA Phil gives the world premiere of The Insects Became Magnetic, a new work for orchestra and electronics under the baton of Roderick Cox as part of their centennial season.

— In December through February, I’ll be curating a three concert series for the Metropolis Ensemble in New York entitled “Reiterations.” It features the Argus Quartet, percussionist Andy Meyerson (of The Living Earth Show), and Sandbox Percussion and Elspeth Davis. They’ll be performing works of mine alongside a whole slew of friends and colleagues. You can read all about it here.

— In March, I’m so excited to present orchestrated excerpts of my new opera, In a Grove (with librettist Stephanie Fleischmann) at the Morgan Library in NYC.

— In May, the Chicago Civic Orchestra of the Chicago Symphony will premiere a new percussion quartet concerto with conductor Ken-David Masur. In this case, the quartet happens to be third time (!) collaborators and close friends, Third Coast Percussion. Later in July, I’m excited to return to Britt Festival to hear Teddy Abrams conduct the same work. These three amazing organizations came together to commission the piece.

—Also in May, Latitude 49 is finalizing the details of a show entitled Love Wounds. The evening features four of my works (including a brand new piece and a newly orchestrated version of my opera, All Wounds Bleed) staged as a seamless evening in collaboration with Chicago Fringe Opera. The fun starts at the Chicago Cultural Center on May 16 and will run through the end of the month.

—And finally in August, we’ll have a whole new album of Cerrone recorded and performed by the intrepid wild Up, conductor Chris Rountree, and featuring a whole slew of singers out on New Amsterdam Records. You’ll be hearing more about this soon as well.

Some other highlights include a weeklong residency/portrait concert with chatterbird in Nashville TN; the European premiere of my orchestra piece, Will There Be Singing at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, Italy; The Pieces That Fall to Earth‘s Canadian premiere with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra; performances with the Santa Fe Pro Musica; and a show at Wave Hill, my favorite place in the Bronx. You can see the whole season here.

Last but not least, don’t forget to check out a few recent projects of mine from last season. This past May, Jennifer Koh and Detroit Symphony premiered my violin concerto, “Breaks and Breaks” in three performances. You can watch their brilliant performance on youtube! And the fabulous Sandbox Percussion, Elspeth Davis, and Four/Ten Media worked tirelessly to make a video of my big piece, Goldbeater’s Skin.

Ok, that’s a lot. If you’re still with me, thanks for reading.
Chris