OC

N E.
Nurtured by mutual support and driven by youthful
idealism, they refused to let financial or logistical barriers
dampen their plans....

The ONCE phenomenon testifies to the productive and

energizing power of community—the interactions and cross-
influences of the artists who created it, and the reactions of
the patrons who attended its productions.
A 50th Anniversary Celebration of
Ann Arbor’s ONCE Festival
November 2–6, 2010
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

2 Introductions ONCE. MORE.
4 The Creativity of Community Symposium
by Mark Clague 28 Symposium Schedule
8 ONCE. MORE. 29 Symposium Biographies
How It Came To Be…
by Michael Daugherty The Penny Stamps Distinguished
10 Welcome Speaker Series
by Daniel Herwitz 32 The John Cage Trust
Indeterminacy
Exhibitions
12 Curator’s Statement Closing Receptions +
by Amanda Krugliak Celebrations
12 ONCE. MORE. 36 Celebration of the John Cage and
An Exhibition ONCE. MORE. Exhibitions
14 Why Cage? 36 Outlier: Hauntings of the Avant Garde
By Daniel Herwitz
16 John Cage’s ONCE. MORE.
Lecture on the Weather (1976) ONCE NOW
38 Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma,
Brown Bag Lecture Roger Reynolds, + Donald Scavarda
18 The Book as Such in the Russian Recent music + films from the
Avant-Garde ONCE Festival composers
by Nancy Perloff 40 Composer Biographies
44 Artist + Ensemble Biographies
Rackham Lobby Installation
18 Specious Present Performing Arts Technology
25th Anniversary Celebration
ONCE. MORE. 48 Welcome
ONCE THEN by Mary Simoni
20 Robert Ashley, George Cacioppo, 50 25th Anniversary Celebration Schedule
Gordon Mumma, Roger Reynolds, 52 25th Anniversary Concert
+ Donald Scavarda
Music + films from the historic Collaborators, Thank Yous,
ONCE Festivals + Credits
55 Funding Partners
55 Collaborators
55 Sources + Further Reading
 3

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

L–R: Mary Ashley, Annette Tsao, Robert Ashley (1963).
4 The Creativity of Community: “Once” signals intensity, a singularity of purpose. Never
a thing, once is always in action: a fleeting opportunity
yet the festivals grew. The fourth was the largest at
eight performances, while the last, held on the roof of
Ann Arbor, the University of to be seized in time and witnessed. Once is energy, Ann Arbor’s Thompson Street parking garage (and thus
Michigan, and the ONCE excitement, ambition, possibility, community. Every art, providing for the sale of more tickets), even returned a
Phenomenon, 1961–68 in its broadest sense, aspires to once. Performance small profit to the DAC. Programs for a total of 29 festi-
catalyzes intent to transform time into communication: val events list some 170 works by 92 composers. Guest
while materials may be reused—performer, audience, artists included John Cage, Eric Dolphy, Morton Feld-
by Mark Clague, PhD and context are always in motion, always changing, man, Lukas Foss, Alvin Lucier, Pauline Oliveros, David
associate professor of musicology, and thus artistic expression occurs in precisely the Tudor, LaMonte Young, and others. By any measure,
University of Michigan same way only once. Yet art is often frittered away as ONCE was monumental. Reviews appeared in the
timeless rather than timely. Static, hung on a wall or local press, as well as in the Musical Quarterly, Boston
embalmed in history, its process unappreciated, it fails Globe, Toronto Star, and Preuves (Paris). Dozens of
to communicate even once. When composers Robert guest appearances took ONCE artists to Detroit, New
Ashley, George Cacioppo, Gordon Mumma, Roger York, San Diego, Los Angeles, Paris, Rome, Tokyo,
Reynolds, Donald Scavarda, and their colleagues an- and beyond, to perform under rubrics including ONCE
nounced ONCE—they trumpeted the raw ambition to Friends, ONCE a Month, ONCE Removed, ONCE-Off,
create sounds that were original, certainly, but that also and ONCE Echoes. Related initiatives by ONCE artists,
engaged, sparked debate, and echoed into the future. especially Ashley and Mumma, such as the Collabora-
Thus, some five decades later, their creativity is heard tive Studio for Electronic Music, the Truck Ensemble,
“ONCE. MORE.”—not as nostalgia but as ongoing ex- New Music for Pianos, and the Sonic Arts Group (later
ploration. The periods in the name signal once again Union), carried Ann Arbor’s experimental music, film,
their interest in expression over continuity. and theater far and wide, only increasing the impact
The first ONCE Festival of avant-garde perfor- and reputation of ONCE. Similar festivals arose in Seattle,
mance comprised four concerts on successive week- Toronto, and Tucson, while in 1963 the Ann Arbor Film
ends—February 24–25 and March 3–4, 1961—in Festival arose from its cinematic efforts. ONCE art-
Ann Arbor’s Unitarian Church (now the Vitosha Guest ists even recreated Milton Cohen’s Space Theatre at
Haus at 1917 Washtenaw). Concerts alternated be- the 1964 Venice Biennale, and the festival propelled
tween guest artists typically from Europe or New York several participants to careers outside of Ann Arbor:
and recitals by the host composers. The opening con- Reynolds to the CROSS TALK presentations in Tokyo
cert featured members of Pierre Boulez’s “Domaine and then to UC San Diego, Mumma to the Merce
musical” ensemble from Paris with composer Luciano Cunningham Dance Company in New York (and later to
Berio and multi-vocalist Cathy Berberian. Pianist Paul UC Santa Cruz), and Ashley to Mills College in Oakland.
Jacobs presented music by Schoenberg, Webern, The primary driving force of ONCE, however, was
Krenek, Messiaen, Boulez, and Stockhausen on the not fame (and certainly not fortune), but the deep de-
third concert, while concerts two and four included sire of its composers to hear their music. Many ONCE
chamber works by Ashley, Cacioppo, Mumma, Reyn- composers were also fine musicians; their passion for
olds, and Scavarda, along with then-graduate students new music and dedication to excellence in its per-
Sherman Van Solkema and Bruce Wise. Ashley also formance was clearly infectious, attracting dozens of
contributed an electronic accompaniment to George volunteer instrumentalists and even administrative
Manupelli’s film The Bottleman. The concerts sold to talents eager to share in their work. Yet the momen-
capacity and Ann Arbor’s Dramatic Arts Center (DAC), tum of the festivals also inspired creativity: Scavarda
which sponsored the event, covered a deficit of only notes, “Suddenly we could write anything we wanted
about $125 on a total budget of $1300 (ca. $9000 in and have it heard.”1 Although deliberately cutting
2010 dollars). edge, ONCE was not doctrinaire. Performances em-
Even before the first festival closed, its success braced a wide range of materials (found sound, text,
inspired talk of a second. All told, there would be six film, multiphonics, non-metrical time), methods (seri-
ONCE festivals over the course of five years (1961–65), alism, graphic notation, indeterminacy, improvisation,
while the ONCE Group, a theatrical troupe led by Rob- electronic synthesis, tape manipulation, audience
ert and Mary Ashley, remained active through 1968. involvement, theater), and aesthetics (modernism,
Critics moaned “Once is enough” and “Once too often,” expressionism, collage, happenings). ONCE compos-

1 Miller, 87 .
PHOTOS: Makepeace Tsao

From top-left to bottom-right: Alvin Lucier (conductor, Brandeis University Chamber Chorus) (1964); Bonnie Jean Cross (1963); Gordon Mumma (1963); Robert Ashley (1964); Milton Cohen in the Space Theatre loft (1964); unknown performer (1965);
Larry Leitch (ONCE pianist) and Max Neuhaus (guest percussionist) (1965); Anne Opie Wehrer (1963); L–R: Alex Hay, Harold Borkin, Steve Paxton at the VFW Hall (Hay and Paxton, members of Judson Dance Theater) (1964).
 ers shared a common goal, but never a single artistic sions, the Minnesota-born Finney brought a new level sic that sponsored events off campus. This group later

PHOTOS: Makepeace Tsao

6 manifesto. For Mumma the festival was radical; for of professionalism to the program and connected the influenced the creation of the Dramatic Arts Center,
Scavarda it was simply pragmatic. university to European musical currents. His personal which would sponsor ONCE. “Finney was a remarkable
INTRODUCTIONS

Progressive politics saturated the university’s social interests included Bartók, Stravinsky, and American man,” notes Reynolds. “There’s probably no composi-
milieu in the 1960s. Students for a Democratic Soci- folk music, and while sensitive to his students’ need tion teacher in American music history who has dealt
ety (SDS) held its first meeting in Ann Arbor in 1960 to develop an individual voice, Finney championed with as large and as diverse a group of successful com-
and on October 14 of that same year President John traditional harmonic and contrapuntal skills as well as posers as he.”
F. Kennedy proposed the Peace Corps from the steps immaculate habits of notation. His energy and expec- The 1950s were a period of rapid growth and in-
of the Michigan Union. Yet many ONCE compositions tations inspired, while his critiques could be devastat- tellectual excitement at the University of Michigan, in
were focused explorations of musical materials and ing: “Finney was incapable of being indirect,” recalls which enrollment, driven by the G.I. Bill, increased
procedures; they assert a right to individual creative Reynolds, “he said what he felt and thought without and the faculty expanded. Research funding grew
radicalism without additional reference to contempo- any filter, and, of course, this rubbed a lot of people the and, as the Cold War deepened, many placed hope
rary events. Politics motivates the art of ONCE directly wrong way or even injured them.” in the nation’s scientific and technological prowess.
only in certain instances (e.g., Reynolds’ A Portrait of U-M scientists successfully tested Salk’s polio vaccine
Vanzetti) but often appears obliquely (e.g., Ashley’s in (1955) and operated the “Phoenix” nuclear reactor
memoriam…). As Ashley remembers, “Everybody was (1957–2003). Cross-disciplinary interchange was vig-
into those ideas by default because they were all around orous and as a result science, architecture, engineer-
you. But the ONCE Group, by some tacit agreement, we ing, and mathematics would deeply influence several
never did anything political; it seemed in bad taste be- ONCE composers. Ashley was initially enrolled through
cause you’d be preaching to the congregation.”2 Nev- the Speech Research Institute, and, after Finney
ertheless, political overtones can be heard frequently in threw the manuscript to one of Mumma’s composi-
the music of ONCE, possibly because such issues were tions out the eighth-floor window of his Burton Me-
so much a part of the era’s socio-cultural discourse. morial Tower office, the young composer transferred
The spark that ignited ONCE is often attributed to to the literature department, later working in a seis-
a car ride back to Ann Arbor from Stratford, Ontario, mology lab and all the while constructing electronic
where Ashley, Cacioppo, Mumma, and Reynolds had sound equipment for his home studio. Reynolds was
attended the International Conference of Composers not initially trained as a musician at all, but completed
(August 7–14, 1960). Intended to foster exchange a bachelor’s degree in engineering before returning to
among the world’s leading modern composers, the U-M to earn a master’s in composition in 1961. Col-
symposium welcomed participants from 20 countries. laboration was modeled as well. From 1958, Mumma
These musical pioneers included Berio (Italy), Henri and Ashley created live sonic accompaniments using
Dutilleux (France), Josef Tal (Israel), and Elizabeth Yet Finney laid many of the entrepreneurial foun- prepared tapes plus improvised live sound for U-M
Maconchy (England), as well as Ernst Krenek, Otto dations for ONCE. He organized the campus’ original art professor Milton Cohen’s Space Theatre. Subtitled
Luening, George Rochberg, Vladimir Ussachevsky, “Composers’ Forum,” for which student composers re- “Manifestations in Light and Sound,” these avant-
and the 75-year-old Edgard Varèse—all then living in cruited and rehearsed performers to present their work garde light shows also featured creative contributions
the US. While symposium concerts were open to the to the community each semester. He invited prominent by Manupelli and Harold Borkin, then a graduate stu-
public, papers and discussions were not, and thus composers such as Ralph Vaughan Williams, Luigi Dal- dent in U-M’s architecture program. Increasing from
Ann Arbor’s contingent left frustrated after having lapiccola, Walter Piston, and Karlheinz Stockhausen to invitation-only affairs to twice-weekly public events,
managed to speak with only a handful of their famous speak on campus. (Stockhausen, in fact, lectured the the Space Theatre fostered Ann Arbor’s audience for
colleagues. They concluded that they could do a bet- young composers to assume responsibility for perfor- experimental art.
ter job on their own. mances of their own works.3) Finney also fostered peer- ONCE composers also learned important lessons
Yet attributing ONCE to a single inspiration ignores to-peer collaboration by hosting a four-hour discussion in publicity and marketing. Written and premièred at
other influences. The festival grew from a confluence seminar each week: “I…felt that composers learned Tanglewood in 1959, Scavarda’s Groups for Piano ex-
of opportunities, the first of which occurred in 1949 as much from their peers as from their teachers….” plores the question of how concise a piece of music
with the hiring of composer Ross Lee Finney (1906– writes Finney in his autobiography. “My object was to might be (its five movements require just 55 seconds
97) as a tenured professor at U–M’s School of Music organize a peer group that would function outside of to play). Performed the following spring for the Mid-
(as it was then known) and the subsequent creation of the classroom as well as in it.”4 Finney’s efforts encour- west Composers Symposium at the University of Il-
its graduate program in composition. Having studied aged the formation of the Interarts Union, an extracur- linois, Groups again sparked heated debate about the
with Alban Berg, Nadia Boulanger, and Roger Ses- ricular student group combining art, theater, and mu- nature of music. Its success taught ONCE artists the

2 Unless noted, all quotes are from personal interviews by the author with the 3 Miller, 28.
composer. 4 Finney, 160.
value of controversy, and Groups was subsequently with literature and philosophy. His campus lecture, “Is writes Mumma, “there was a nearly unanimous boycott
featured on the first ONCE composers program. For Modern Music Growing Old?” offered an emphatic ref- of the concerts by the School of Music faculty…on the 7
festival two, controversy struck over the artistic viabili- utation to Theodor Adorno’s Dissonanzen (1956), while grounds that such activities were everything from

INTRODUCTIONS
ty of LaMonte Young and Terry Jennings’ performance ranging broadly from Aristotle and Charles Burney to immoral to academically and culturally disreputable.”6
and again provided ONCE with national attention. the poets Paul Valéry and Wallace Stevens. Ultimately Although individual works by ONCE composers have
Most famously, the group’s 1964 publicity poster fea- Gerhard’s message affirmed individual exploration. been performed by School of Music faculty and the
turing political activist Martina Algire reclining nude “The contemporary confusion in the field of music…” school’s Contemporary Directions Ensemble offered a
on the counter of a local diner favored by music stu- Gerhard said, “is rather what one would expect from a memorial concert for George Cacioppo in April 1985,
dents—Red’s Rite Spot—produced another beneficial social body deep in ferment and teeming with creative ONCE. MORE. represents the first comprehensive cel-
fracas, although it offended some in the DAC. In the energy. It would seem a poor show if an epoch does ebration of ONCE and its alumni by the University.
end, however, such scandals were less tactics than not… develop its ‘contemporary’ ideas fully in all di- For Reynolds, the ultimate message of ONCE is sim-
endemic to the ONCE enterprise. As Mumma notes, rections, to the utmost limits of contradiction. Even by ple: “If you don’t like the way things are, do something
“Anything or everything we did was controversial for linguistic implication, contradictions evidently belong to change the situation.” Indeed ONCE should inspire
someone.” together…. We move in all directions at once, and in students today, especially as the Internet makes self-
The rigor Finney’s teaching inculcated among each to the fullness of our bent.”5 (The same May as promotion only more accessible. In the 1960s, ONCE
ONCE composers was ultimately released by his win- Gerhard’s lecture, composer John Cage and pianist composers depended on the organizational skills of
ter 1960 sabbatical replacement—Catalan modernist David Tudor, as well as Berio, visited Ann Arbor, further a small coterie of non-musician supporters including
composer Roberto Gerhard (1896–1970). Steeped whetting Ann Arbor’s appetite for the avant garde and Mary Ashley, Harold Borkin, Cynthia Liddell, George
in Spanish nationalism but later studying extensively inspiring the soon-to-be ONCE composers to seize the Manupelli, plus Anne and Joseph Wehrer, who mailed
with Arnold Schoenberg, Gerhard taught a seminar means for their own artistic expression.) On campus countless letters, reserved venues, set up chairs, and
at U-M in serial techniques that sparked excitement. for only a term and free of institutional entanglements, contributed their own creative energies. Yet while the
“Gerhard had never taught before he came to Ann Gerhard liberated the creative energies of those around Internet facilitates, it also encourages competition; in
Arbor,” Reynolds recalls. “He was very intense and in- him. A crucial event in the planning for ONCE took 1961 by contrast, ONCE entered a veritable vacuum
tellectual, but extremely retiring and without pretens- place when eight of Gerhard’s seminar participants as little avant-garde musical activity happened outside
es.” Gerhard offered an affirming voice and graciously took inventory of their compositions to see if there were of New York and the Cage/Tudor tours, giving ONCE
supported student initiatives. “He never missed a sufficient works to merit a public performance. events immediate prominence.
Space Theatre performance,” recalls Ashley. Mumma Accounts of the School of Music’s relationship to For Mumma, ONCE continues to offer advice to art-
likewise was inspired: “Gerard was wide open and ONCE vary widely, maybe not surprisingly given the ists today: “Limit your habits,” “define innovative goals
positive about innovation.” university’s decentralized authority located in indi- and build your discipline to achieve them,” and “work
Although he emphasized method, Gerhard vidual faculty. While the ONCE composers had each together generously while developing the best of your
challenged his students to extend tradition in new studied at the university’s School of Music, the festivals individuality.” Mumma’s last bit of advice hints at what
directions while modeling a broad engagement were independent events wholly organized, supported, is potentially the most important legacy of ONCE—its
and housed by the local community. ONCE was not a example of the power of an arts community. The fes-
rejection of the establishment as much as an exten- tivals ended because DAC funding dried up, not be-
sion of ongoing creative work. Most of its composers cause artistic cooperation failed. ONCE was made pos-
were alumni, and thus the festivals created vital perfor- sible by a radical alliance of imagination that mustered
mance opportunities now that university programs were collaboration in the service of artistic expression—a
no longer open to them. Many younger music faculty, conspiracy for creativity that runs counter to the West-
such as theorist Wallace Berry, composer Paul Cooper, ern ideology of the lone artist working in isolation. The
and musicologist Wiley Hitchcock, were interested in increasing tendency of ONCE towards theater reflects
ONCE, and the campus radio station WUOM (where this same communal understanding of creativity. Fur-
Cacioppo worked) recorded each concert. Likewise, ther, ONCE benefited from the social and creative
Finney attended the first festival and contributed by environment of its hometown, and, in turn, increased
convincing band director William Revelli to loan some and perpetuated those values of association, diversity,
of the school’s percussion instruments to the event. tolerance, ambition, and innovation that continue to
The school’s talented pool of instrumentalists was also make Ann Arbor a dynamic place. Thus, ONCE affirms
essential. Yet, especially as the festivals grew, their no- a three-dimensional community model of art requir-
toriety overshadowed official university activities. In re- ing collaboration among creators, supporters, and an
sponse, the School of Music organized its own contem- engaged audience. Reynolds sums up the result suc-
porary music events and for “the 1964 ONCE Festival,” cinctly: “Common interests have uncommon power.”
Udo Casemets, rehearsing at WUOM studio, Ann Arbor (1965).
5 Gerhard, 206. 6 Mumma, 390.
 ONCE. MORE. In 1991, coordinating the travel arrangements for the compos-

PHOTO: Donald Scavarda

when I joined the composition faculty at the
8 University of Michigan School of Music, I remember tell- ers as well as media and exhibition logistics.
How It Came To Be… ing composer György Ligeti the good news that I was Next, Michael Kondziolka, director of program-
moving to Ann Arbor. During the years I studied with him ming at the University Musical Society (UMS), joined
in Hamburg, Germany, he had already mentioned Ann the cause. He lent his expertise and UMS resources to
by Michael Daugherty,
Arbor: “That was where the ONCE Festival happened… help produce the concerts and tie everything together.
co-director ONCE. MORE.,
very famous!” In 2002, at the Venice Biennale, I met UMS’s amazing staff has done a fantastic job, including
professor of composition,
composer Mauricio Kagel who, like Ligeti, was one of Eu- Programming Manager Mark Jacobson who assembled
University of Michigan School of Music,
rope’s most eminent 20th-century modernist compos- and co-edited this ONCE. MORE. Festival Guide, and
Theatre & Dance
ers. When I mentioned to him that I lived in Ann Arbor, Sara Billmann and Jim Leija who coordinated media
he had a similar reaction: “Oh, the ONCE Festival!” support for the celebration.
It was then and there that I decided it would be a great Mary Simoni, then director of Performing Arts Tech-
idea to (once again) celebrate the ONCE Festival, and the nology (PAT) at the University of Michigan, signed on
pioneering contributions of the five composers who mas- to serve as co-director of ONCE. MORE. Mary offered
terminded it: Robert Ashley, George Cacioppo, Gordon important technology support and assistance from PAT
Mumma, Roger Reynolds, and Donald Scavarda. for the ONCE concerts. In addition, it was decided to
But where to begin? I knew the music of Ashley: I heard organize a 25th Anniversary PAT Concert to round off
him perform his opera Perfect Lives at Centre Georges the weeklong festivities. Roger Arnett, performing arts
Pompidou when I was a student in Paris in 1980. I was sound and recording engineer, agreed to do the hard
acquainted with Mumma’s and Scavarda’s music from the work of putting the technology together for all three
New World Records compilation Music from the ONCE concerts: no easy task!
Festival: 1961–1966. But I did not know any of them per- U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance faculty Chris-
sonally. George Cacioppo had passed away in 1984. topher James Lees, lecturer of conducting; Andrew
Fortunately, I had studied composition with Roger Bishop,  assistant professor of jazz and contemporary
Reynolds at Yale in 1982 and stayed in touch with him improvisation; and Amy Porter, professor of flute; kindly
over the years, hearing his music performed at IRCAM agreed to help assemble the musicians to perform in the
in Paris and seeing him years later in San Diego, where ONCE THEN and ONCE NOW concerts. Music librar-
he still teaches at UC San Diego. In 2008, I approached ian Kristen Castellana offered her impeccable assistance
Reynolds with the idea of a ONCE celebration in Ann to procure the scores and parts for the concerts.
Arbor. It was his brilliant suggestion to organize two con- University of Michigan musicologist Mark Clague
certs: ONCE THEN, featuring historic works from the graciously agreed to write the ONCE. MORE. festival
original ONCE Festival of the 1960s, and ONCE NOW, guide opening essay.
featuring recent music by the four living composers. Special thanks to faculty and student performers
Reynolds reached out to Ashley, Mumma, and at the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance for the
Scavarda for repertoire suggestions; all agreed to participate many hours of hard work and rehearsals it has taken
and return to Ann Arbor for the celebration. It was Scavarda to prepare the extremely demanding and rewarding
who suggested we wait until 2010, to properly celebrate the music for these concerts. The George Cacioppo
50th Anniversary of the ONCE group (1960–2010). Memorial Fund of at the U-M School of Music, Theatre &
But to put all this together I needed help! Dance helped to defray some of the concert expenses.
I first approached Daniel Herwitz, director of the Finally, my deep gratitude goes to composer Paul
Institute for the Humanities, and he immediately ex- Dooley, DMA candidate in composition at the Universi-
pressed his enthusiasm. In addition to the two con- ty of Michigan. Paul worked tirelessly at all hours of the
certs, he proposed a symposium and exhibition about day and night to help me answer and sort through hun-
the ONCE Festival, hosted by the Institute, which also dreds of ONCE-related emails during the past year.
provided significant financial support to bring the At last after years of planning, November 2010
ONCE composers to Ann Arbor. The staff of the In- is here and it is now time for us to experience in
stitute, including Fellows Coordinator Doretha Coval, Ann Arbor the magic of the music of Robert Ashley,
Communications Coordinator Stephanie Harrell, and George Cacioppo, Gordon Mumma, Roger Reynolds,
Curator Amanda Krugliak, have done a wonderful job and Donald Scavarda ONCE. MORE.
Gathering of students of Roberto Gerhard, Ann Arbor, 1960. (bottom, L–R): Leslie
Bassett, Ralph Bassett (son); (second row, sitting): Roger Reynolds, Roberto
Gerhard; (third row, squatting): Robert Ashley, Sherman Van Solkema, David Bates,
(sitting) Leopoldina Gerhard, Anita Denniston Bassett; (standing at back): George
Cacioppo, Ed Coleman, Tom Schudel.
9

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

 WELCOME It is a privilege to reconvene a festival that became

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

10 ONCE, once upon a time in the 1960s, when the avant-
garde could stake terrain between music, poetry, and
by Daniel Herwitz, director, the flow of sound in gestures so fresh and experimen-
University of Michigan Institute for tal that the composers were invited to occupy a kind
the Humanities of Salon des Refusés down the street from the official
University of Michigan campus, where they had all
studied. Their relentless, irrepressible energy is hard to
recapture in these, our more market-driven, neo-liberal
times, and experimentation has perhaps shifted into
more technological domains, given that they performed
what they performed before computers were widely
available, the Internet was invented, and digital realities
became that. The recovery of the power in their sounds
is a pleasure and also a task, perhaps a moral task if
one is humanist about it, subscribing to the belief that
nothing human is ever finally too foreign to regain, in
some creative way or other.
Now, a half century after these inventions were pro-
duced, is the time for an Institute for the Humanities
to regain them, but certainly not alone, certainly not
without the partnerships built with the U-M School of
Music, Theatre & Dance and the University Musical
Society, with composers like Michael Daugherty and
impresarios like Kenneth Fischer. The Institute for the
Humanities strives to build these kinds of sustaining
partnerships because without them ONCE could not
turn into ONCE. MORE. And when ONCE does turn
into ONCE. MORE., as it will in the first week of Novem-
ber 2010, the question will not simply be how to think
about what was, and how to hear it again and perhaps
even better, certainly differently. The question will also
be: What kind of new meaning is to be found in this en-
livening music 50 years later? How does time loop back
onto this music in a way that proves its purpose? These
events will occasion responses to these questions. I for
one cannot wait to see what happens to happen.
The Institute for the Humanities is delighted to
add a John Cage installation into the mix, in its gal-
lery, since Cage, although somewhat peripheral to the
original ONCE festival, is everywhere entwined with the
history of experimental music that happened before,
during, and after it. We are even more delighted that
the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has generously sup-
ported the ONCE. MORE. festival.
This catalogue is a mere guide and primer for the
occasion. It is the occasion that matters. Go for it.
11

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3 Milton Cohen and Space Theatre, Ann Arbor.
 ONCE. MORE. In the Institute for the Humanities Gallery, John Cage’s

IMAGE: courtesy of the John Cage Trust

12 multi-media stage work Lecture on the Weather, based
An Exhibition on the texts of Henry David Thoreau, brings together
speech, music, film, lighting, and a weather sound-
Monday, September 20– scape to form a softly political piece as relevant today
Thursday, November 4, 2010 as the year it was written.
U-M Institute for the Humanities In the Institute’s Osterman Common Room, original
Osterman Common Room programs, manuscripts, and photographs document
202 South Thayer Street the influential avant-garde ONCE Festival held annu-
Ann Arbor ally in the early- to mid-1960s in Ann Arbor and at-
tended by Cage. A now-and-then exposition, it reprises
the phenomenon of the event, the brazen energy of

John Cage’s Lecture on the new-music scene from the era, and honors the tal-
ents of the ONCE founding composers Robert Ashley,
the Weather (1976) George Cacioppo, Gordon Mumma, Roger Reynolds,
and Donald Scavarda.
Monday, September 20– Cage and the ONCE composers ran parallel, over-
Thursday, November 4, 2010 lapped, and intersected professionally and personally
U-M Institute for the Humanities Gallery in their inquiries and collaborative efforts. Deeply pas-
202 South Thayer Street, Room 1010 sionate about musical experimentation and the con-
Ann Arbor cept of indeterminacy, the constant for Cage and the
ONCE composers was ultimately their persistence and
their commitment to their work.
Cage spoke of time as horizontal rather than verti-
Free and open to the public. cal: “The past is not a fact but simply a big field that
8:00 am–5:00 pm, Mondays–Fridays has a great deal of activity in it.” These exhibitions in
duet continue the conversation in time both real and
imagined, without the notations of a clear beginning or
end, recognizing that it is the ongoing question rather
than certainty that leads to discovery.

—Amanda Krugliak, arts curator, University of

Michigan Institute for the Humanities
 13

Cover page of John Cage’s Lecture on the Weather, ©Henmar Press, Inc.
14 Why Cage? John Cage attended the ONCE Festival as a cheerful
avant-garde friend. But more than that he was among
Cage’s aims were being put into practice in the
1950s and 1960s when America ached for such relief.
the once primogenitors. Cage’s experiments in the Having endured decades of Great Depression, Great
by Daniel Herwitz, director, 1950s included the introduction of chance operations War, and the repetition of war since, living daily life on a
University of Michigan Institute for into musical composition and performance, the blur- chess board of potential cold war annihilation, his was
the Humanities ring of the distinction between music and sound per a moment when America was in need of relief from the
se (whatever sounds happen to happen at a particular manic state of its febrile temperature. The most radi-
time), and the turning of performance into theater or cal of his works, 4.33 directs the pianist towards four
spectacle. All of these were of importance to the ONCE minutes and 33 seconds of non-playing. This so-called
Festival. Wishing to put a full stop to two centuries of silent work is about placing the entire institution of mu-
common practice and modernist musical traditions, sic in relief: score, instrument, performer, concert hall,
Cage replaced control over sound (the essence of the audience. It was first performed in Woodstock in 1952,
musical score), expressivity (the communication of the a location about as far from New York and as rural as
soul), and the cult of genius with a structured roll of the Jackson Pollock’s Montauk of the same time period,
dice that would get the listener off these fixations (as where the painter went to escape the pressures of the
he believed them to be) and restore the listener to a city and his own alcoholic deterioration and where in
celebration of the flow of contingency. the solitude of his barn he achieved his artistic break-
The cult of (musical) genius seemed to Cage a through. Pollock ended up drunk and dead in an auto
delusion of unbridled superiority over sound, wherein accident; Cage was more cheerful, and practical. He
the composer forges music as if a Wagnerian sword took the route of producing an art that would improve
symbolically unleashed upon life. This big connection life rather than escape from it into autonomous tran-
between culture and politics linked the cult of musical scendental genius, about which Cage was skeptical
control to larger systems of Euro-American expansion as to whether it was not the same pattern of obses-
central to colonialism, nationalism, and modernity. Its sive conquest, control, achievement that had wracked
practitioner in music was above all Richard Wagner, modern life to its anguished core.
although Cage had it in for Beethoven. Cage’s musical Both Pollock and Cage were in 20th-century terms
experiments were meant to inaugurate a new practice about as far from the center of things as Walden Pond
of listening that would counter the forging of the musi- from Concord town. Henry David Thoreau went to
cal sword on the anvil of composition by suspending Walden to find the solitude necessary for him to take
the composer’s own tastes and voice in a structured the measure of his own soul, and of that human en-
environment of chance and contingency. By creating terprise called living, and in the silence of that place
musical works which integrated compositional choice found the ability to think. His two years at Walden were
with whatever happens to happen in the world at the an “experiment” which easily could have failed. “I went
moment of their performance, Cage felt he was replac- to Walden to discover if life was mean and if so to pub-
ing directed listening (listening through a composition licize that fact,” Thoreau writes in the opening beats of
to its directed endpoint in a way that focuses on expres- his masterpiece, revealing all his sense of uncertainty,
sion and related intensities) with a meditative rhythm of experiment, risk, and resolution. That Walden was
contingency. The key was to structure the work so that a success, both in the act of the experiment and in
contingency rolled out in forms of repetition prevent- its completion through the seven hard years of com-
ing mere chaos from being unleashed. Scale proved posing the book, is an achievement that could in no
critical: gradually the listener slows down, drops the way have been predictable in advance, above all by
impatience with waiting for modulation, development Thoreau himself. Cage’s experiments in sound have
section, recapitulation, and fugue, and begins to get proved equally aspirational, and equally fortuitous. His
inside the peculiar rhythm of what is happening. Mean- idea is practical and utopian by equal measure. Think-
ing is not imposed on sound but instead an emptying ing changes when an experiment in living is put into
of meaning takes place within the flow of sound. This place which carries the risk of unpredictable failure
leaves one with one’s feet a little off the ground, in a but whose wager is that the scale of the event/experi-
strange inexplicable place, Cage the Zen student would ment is life changing for the mind’s capacity to limn
say. It is a place neither of transcendence nor of imma- the world without and within. Cage’s meditative prac-
nence but of immersion and suspension of hierarchical tice was put in place at the moment (the 1960s) when
values, so he believed. Thoreau returned to America after years of neglect to
 and disunity—a performed human and choral multiplic-
PHOTO: Alix Jeffry, 1968

ity refusing hierarchy and hanging together in ways that 15

place received practices of voice-leading, phrase struc-

EXHIBITIONS
ture, and musical through-composition on their head.
It is too simple to say either that these voices are,
or are not, communicating. They happen to happen at
the same time, like the weather in various parts of the
world. But perhaps this is mere contingency. On the
other hand various inflections of response, each voice
to the other, cannot help but happen in the course of
performance, implying partial conversation. This piece,
begun in group consensus with everyone then free
to engage as they do, cannot help but appear as an
image of the ideal origin and practice of governance:
governance in an agreement that regulates and makes
possible freedom. The piece is an image of equality
that is however decidedly anti-national, since it is a cel-
ebration of voices which refuse to match up except in
their derivation from the source texts of Thoreau and
his vision of an America spiritualized by differences,
refusals, and harmonies achieved through things both
willed and sudden/unpredictable. National narratives
are forms of control placed on time, rewritings of the
past in the name of group and state empowerment.
L–R: David Behrman, David Tudor, John Cage, Gordon Mumma, and Eric Salzman (1968).
This piece aims to free time from such bicentennial
inhabit the unlikely position of rock star. Such iconic This bicentennial address to America at its great mo- straight-jackets, and in doing so to free America from
celebrity would have made him shudder. But there was ment of self-adulating nationalism says nothing is more its inheritance of manifest destiny. Time is given back
reason for it. His different drummer was demanded by American than the retreat from the America of the city, to people who frame its length and are free to variously
an America on the edge of annihilation and also sub- the monument, the fireworks, the bulkhead, the settler inhabit it/make it happen.
urban conformity. Thoreau’s greatest student was per- claim of sovereignty over land and native, the politics You don’t need a weatherman to know which way
haps John Cage, American transcendentalist after the of Cold War domination, to a place a few miles lateral this kind of wind blows. One should be less clear about
fact, for whom, as he put it in the forward to his Lecture where through experiment life can be experienced oth- the world and one’s place in it after thinking through
on the Weather, the work he wrote for the American erwise and thinking can become new. the terms of this peculiar lecture on the weather. One
Bicentennial in 1976: Later in his career he will compose his works in the thing is clear: it aspires to a future of toleration instead
“It may seem to some that through the use of form of a mesostic, a poetic form invented by Cage which of one of marking its trees and forests like a certain
chance operations I run counter to the spirit of Thoreau subjects materials from source texts to a computer gen- kind of male animal.
(and ’76, and revolution for that matter). The fifth para- erated program of chance operations, mixing words into Cage’s intervention in the future of humanity is now
graph of Walden speaks against blind obedience to a seemingly random order and spewing them out in the part of our past. And yet, it strangely remains vibrant.
blundering oracle. However, chance operations are not form of a single, long, vertical string. The Lecture on the What he called tolerance and respect within nature,
mysterious sources of ‘the right answers.’ [i.e. oracu- Weather relies on chance operations for the choice of what he called meditation and the openness to working
lar]. They are a means of locating a single one among a text fragments which are taken from the works of Henry with things as they happen within the flow of time and
multiplicity of answers, and at the same time, of freeing David Thoreau. These fragments are read out, that is, materiality, we would now call sustainability. His Lecture
the ego from its taste and memory, its concern for profit performed by 12 speaker-vocalists and/or instrumen- on the Weather, which took the temperature of America
and power, of silencing the ego so that the rest of the talists, each of whom relies on an independent sound at a moment of its most vivid nationalism, is even more
world has a chance to enter into the ego’s own experi- system distinguishing them from the others. The per- apt at a moment of global warming. Its aim of cooling
ence whether that be outside or inside.” formers first reach consensus about the total length of down the temperature of Beethoven, Wagner, Schoe-
The Institute for the Humanities has chosen John the work. Once time length has been established each is nberg, not to mention George Washington, should be
Cage’s Lecture on the Weather for its sound installa- free to perform within that unit of time at a rate of speed outsourced to China where energy is being eaten alive
tion because this work is the clearest example of Cage’s of their choosing, also pausing when they like. to produce a ruination of landscape as buildings arise
utopian desire to free the mind to think and accept oth- The result is a polyphonic choral address to America with the speed of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. We are driv-
erness, be it in sound, in text, or in nature and people. poised between contingency and anarchy, concordance ing ourselves crazy….once more, once again.
 John Cage’s Zen Buddhist practices to composition and performance, recordings, performances, workshops, festivals, and

PHOTOS: (Below) Donald Dietz, courtesy of the John Cage Trust; (Opposite) Makepeace Tsao
16 Cage succeeded in bringing both authentic spiritual ideas more. The John Cage Trust is now a resident organi-
Lecture on the Weather (1976) and a liberating attitude of play to the enterprise of West- zation at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY,
EXHIBITIONS

ern art. His aesthetic of chance produced a unique body where all of its materials are housed and maintained.
In some respects, Lecture on the Weather is an atypi- of what might be called “once-only” works, any two per- The John Cage Trust at Bard College provides access to
cal work for Cage in its overtly political tone. It came formances of which can never be quite the same. In an these holdings through courses, workshops, and con-
about as a commission from the Canadian Broadcast- effort to reduce the subjective element in composition, he certs, and continues to develop new programs around
ing Corporation, in 1975, who wanted a work “in ob- developed methods of selecting the components of his this extraordinary resource. Dr. Kuhn, in addition to
servance of America’s bicentennial.” Cage chose to pieces by chance, early on through the tossing of coins or maintaining and operating the John Cage Trust at Bard
create a piece that would engage as performers 12 dice and later through the use of random number genera- College, holds the position of John Cage Professor of
expatriate American men who had settled in Cana- tors on the computer, and especially IC (1984), designed Performance Arts at Bard College.
da during and shortly after the Vietnam War. As you and written in the C language by Cage’s programmer-
hear in his preface, which begins any performance, assistant, Andrew Culver, to simulate the coin oracle of
Cage used this work as an opportunity to articulate the I Ching. Cage’s use of the computer was creative and
procedural, and resulted in a system of what can easily be UMS presents
his dissatisfaction with American government. His
observations are noteworthy, both for the sentiments seen as total serialism, in which all elements pertaining to Merce Cunningham Dance Company
expressed—prescient and still timely, from our cur- pitch, noise, duration, relative loudness, tempi, harmony,
etc., could be determined by referring to previously drawn
The Legacy Tour
rent perspective—but also that he said them out loud.
correlated charts. Thus, Cage’s mature works did not
By the end of his life, Cage didn’t really favor “critical” Friday, February 18, 2011
response, preferring instead “composition.” If you originate in psychology, motive, drama, or literature, but, Saturday, February 19, 2011
don’t like something, the “proper” response, in his rather, were just sounds, free of judgments about whether Power Center, Ann Arbor
view, would be to make something better. they are musical or not, free of fixed relations, free of
 But Cage’s preface to Lecture on the Weather is not memory and taste. His most enduring, indeed notorious, When the always forward-thinking Merce Cunningham
the only place a political statement is being made. What composition, influenced by Robert Rauschenberg’s all- passed away in July 2009 at the age of 90, he left
Cage also did, here and elsewhere, was to embed politi- black and all-white paintings, is the radically tacet 4’33” behind a plan for the dissolution of his dance company
cal ideas into the very forms and practices of his compo- (1952). Encouraging the ultimate freedom in musical ex- and the preservation of his works: a two-year legacy
sition. Lecture on the Weather, like virtually all of Cage’s pression, the three movements of 4’33” are indicated by tour that would end on December 31, 2011 with a
works from the 1950s forward, was conceived through the pianist’s opening and closing of the piano key cover, performance in New York City. UMS presents two
a variety of chance means, and it comprises a delicate during which no sounds are intentionally produced. It was seminal Cunningham works on consecutive evenings
balance between what he called law elements and free- first performed by the extraordinarily gifted pianist and in February 2011: Squaregame (1976) and Split Sides
dom elements—that is, law elements where he felt they long-time Cage associate, David Tudor, at Maverick Hall (2003). Please visit www.ums.org for further information
were needed, freedom elements everywhere else. in Woodstock, NY, on August 29, 1952. and event tickets.
For a multimedia slideshow and
performance of the “Preface” to
Lecture on the Weather as read When John Cage died, in August of 1992, his significant
by John Cage, please visit www. holdings passed to his longtime friend and collabora-
photoshow.com/watch/ru3tm8MZ tor, the dancer and choreographer Merce Cunning-
or scan the QR code (left) with your ham. The John Cage Trust was legally formed shortly
mobile device. thereafter, with a board of directors consisting of Cun-
ningham, Anne d’Harnoncourt (director of the Phila-
delphia Museum of Art), David Vaughan (archivist at
the Cunningham Dance Foundation), and Laura Kuhn
John Cage (1912–1992) was a singularly inventive, (who had been Cage’s assistant since 1986), who
highly influential, and much beloved American com- continues to serve as its founding executive director.
poser, writer, philosopher, and visual artist. Beginning The primary functions of the Trust are to maintain a
around 1950, and throughout the passing years, he de- sizable archive and to monitor and administer rights
parted from the pragmatism of precise musical notation and licenses to Cage’s published and unpublished
and circumscribed ways of performance. His principal work. In both ways, the John Cage Trust creates and
contribution to the history of music is his systematic es- encourages educational experiences, enhances public
tablishment of the principle of indeterminacy: by adapting access, and enlivens global awareness through new
Merce Cunningham, performing in John Cage’s Lecture on the Weather,
Bard College (2007).
17

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3 Pop Art Lecture (November 1963).
 Brown Bag Lecture: Since the 1970s,

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

scholarship on the historical avant- past and future, sacred and secular, rural and urban.
18 gardes has extended well beyond painting to encompass This analysis will place these tensions and the role of
The Book as Such in the the illustrated book and other forms of print media. the avant-garde book as a vessel of sound within the
Russian Avant-Garde Yet modernist studies still pay little attention to the context of the crisis enveloping Russia between the
collaborative books of the Russian Futurists—poets 1905 Revolution and the Bolshevik takeover of 1917.
Alexei Kruchenykh and Velimir Khlebnikov and artists
Visiting Fellow Nancy Perloff,
Mikhail Larionov, Natalia Goncharova, Olga Rozanova,
curator of modern and
and Kazimir Malevich. It is Nancy Perloff’s contention
contemporary collections, Please refer to page 30 for a biography of
that these pocket-sized, hand-lithographed books, with
Getty Research Institute Nancy Perloff.
their transrational language of zaum or “beyonsense”
and their neo-primitive, Cubo-Futurist, and Rayist im-
Tuesday, November 2, 2010 at 12 noon
agery, are crucial to our understanding not only of the
U-M Institute for the Humanities
Russian avant-garde, but of modernism more broadly.
202 South Thayer Street, Room 2022
Zaum was both archaic incantation and Futurist neolo-
Ann Arbor
gism and marked the beginning of sound poetry. Poets
and artists juxtaposed sound with word and image, and
Free and open to the public.
used humor and parody to explore tensions between

Specious Present Specious Present  is an interactive algorithmic sound

and video installation created specifically for the ONCE.
MORE. festival. The piece celebrates the anniversaries
A Rackham Installation of the ONCE Festival and the U-M Performing Arts
Technology program with an exploration of the concept
of the passage of time from both aesthetic and histori-
by Alex Drosen and
cal perspectives. The piece manipulates and distorts
Matthew Rose
timing and duration with its structure and content.
Informed by the original ONCE composers,  Specious
Specious Present  Present  takes a historical look at the techniques and
attitudes of these innovative  electronic composers.
–noun. Simultaneously, the piece takes advantage of new
technology, using interactive digital systems to influ-
a short time span in which change and ence sound and image in real-time.
duration are directly experienced.

Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday

November 2, 4, and 6, 2010
Pre- and post-concerts
Rackham Auditorium Inner-Lobby Restrooms
915 East Washington Street
Ann Arbor
20 ONCE. MORE.
ONCE THEN

Michael Daugherty and
Mary Simoni Music + films from the historic ONCE Festivals
Co-Directors
Roger Reynolds Mosaic (1962) for flute and piano
Faculty Artists of the University of Michigan Ms. Porter, Mr. Ellis
School of Music, Theatre & Dance, Creative
Arts Orchestra, and Digital Music Ensemble
Robert Ashley in memoriam… Crazy Horse (symphony) (1963) for 32 instruments
Christopher Albrecht, Trumpet
Chad Burrow, Clarinet Creative Arts Orchestra
Michael Daugherty, Piano Mark Kirschenmann, Director
John Ellis, Piano
Daniel Gilbert, Clarinet
Joseph Gramley, Percussion Gordon Mumma Large Size Mograph 1962 (1962) for solo piano
Pia Greiner, Cello Mr. Ellis, Piano
David Jackson, Trombone
Fritz Kaenzig, Tuba
Nancy Ambrose King, Oboe Donald Scavarda Groups for Piano (1959)
Cary Kocher, Percussion
Mr. Ellis, Piano
Kristin Kuster, Piano
Samuel Livingston, Percussion
Jeffrey Lyman, Bassoon
Intermission
Ryan Mackstaller, Guitar
Stacie Mickens, French Horn
Seth Allyn Morris, Flutes
Ashley in memoriam… Esteban Gómez (quartet) (1963)
Amy Porter, Flutes
Linnea Powell, Viola Digital Music Ensemble
Theresa Prokes, Violin Stephen Rush, Director
George Shirley, Narrator
Adam Unsworth, French Horn
Scavarda FilmSCORE for Two Pianists (1962)
Roger Arnett, Technical Director Mr. Daugherty, Ms. Kuster
Paul Dooley, Technical Assistant

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 at 8:00 pm Scavarda GREYS, A FilmSCORE (1963) silent version
Rackham Auditorium
915 East Washington Street
Visuals by Scavarda/ GREYS (1963) stereo electronic music for Donald Scavarda’s FilmSCORE
Ann Arbor
Electronic music
by Mumma

132nd Annual UMS Season

ONCE. MORE.

The photographing or sound and video

recording of this concert or possession of any
device for such recording is prohibited.
 21

ONCE. MORE. ONCE THEN / TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2

George Cacioppo Cassiopeia (1962)
Mr. Daugherty

Mumma Sinfonia (1958–60) 12 instruments and magnetic tape

Ms. Porter, Ms. King, Mr. Lyman, Mr. Jackson, Mr. Kaenzig, Mr. Mackstaller,
Mr. Ellis, Mr. Gramley, Ms. Prokes, Ms. Powell, Ms. Greiner
Christopher James Lees, Conductor

Intermission

Scavarda Matrix for Clarinetist (1962)

Mr. Gilbert

Reynolds A Portrait of Vanzetti (1962–63) for narrator, instruments, and stereophonic

electro-acoustic sound
(Text edited by the composer from the letters of Bartolomeo Vanzetti)
Mr. Shirley, Ms. Porter, Mr. Morris, Mr. Burrow, Mr. Unsworth, Ms. Mickens,
Mr. Albrecht, Mr. Jackson, Mr. Gramley, Mr. Kocher, Mr. Livingston
Mr. Lees, Conductor

Special thanks to all of the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance faculty artists for their
ongoing commitment of time and energy to this special performance.

In the interests of saving both dollars and the environment, please either retain this festival
guide and return with it when you attend other festival events or return it to your usher
when leaving the venue.
22

Robert Ashley’s score for in memoriam… Esteban Gómez (quartet) (1963).

 Mosaic (1962) for flute and piano tled Mographs. The activities of each Mograph were able. This sonority will provide, for the individual per-
IMAGE: courtesy of Robert Ashley

Roger Reynolds derived from seismograph-recorded P-wave and formers, a tonal reference for the various sound activi- 23
Born July 18, 1934 in Detroit, Michigan S-wave patterns of earthquakes and underground ties that constitute the performance.

ONCE. MORE. ONCE THEN / TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2

nuclear explosions. I was intrigued with the relation- Whenever any performer is playing his contribution
Mosaic for flute (piccolo) and piano is subdivided into ship similarities between the time-travel patterns of to the reference sonority, time (duration) is unmea-
12 sections, and temporal proportion is established P and S waves and the sound-reflection character- sured (free) for him.
here by small number groupings (2 7s=14, 3 8s=24, istics of musical performance-spaces. The title-pun Whenever any performer is playing through the
5 4s=20, etc.) which are arranged so as to result in a should be accessible. (16) measured pulses of a quadrant, he must deviate
gradual expansion of sub-section duration (24”, ...48”, continuously, but as gradually as possible, from his
...100”, 132”). Here, a new level of attention is paid to Program note by Gordon Mumma. contribution to the reference sonority.
instrumental “color” and the shaping influence of tex- The performance begins with the reference sonor-
ture. There are—it is hardly surprising—12 categories ity. At any time, then, individual performers may play
of musical articulation specified in the sketches, rang- Groups for Piano (1959) through any (starting) quadrant. Subsequently, they
ing from trills and repeated notes, to pitch glissandi Donald Scavarda will continue reading circularly, alternating unmea-
and percussive sounds such as key clicks. Born 1928 in Iron Mountain, Michigan sured periods of their contribution to the reference
sonority with measured periods of assigned deviations.
Program note by Roger Reynolds. Scavarda composed Groups for Piano at Tanglewood Whenever any performer first becomes aware of
in 1959. In this work he poses the question: How a deviant element (other than his own) in the refer-
short can a piece be and still be perceived as com- ence sonority, his pattern of assigned sound elements
in memoriam… Crazy Horse (symphony) (1963) plete and coherent? The five groups have durations (quadrants) shifts circularly so that the mode of devia-
for 32 instruments respectively of 7, 8, 10, 8, and 7 seconds with speci- tion he recognizes is assigned to the quadrant opposite
Robert Ashley fied silences between them. Total duration is 55 sec- that in which he is playing or will play next. (As the
Born March 28, 1930 in Ann Arbor, Michigan onds. To create a sense of spatial depth every note pattern of quadrants remains constant, thus, all quad-
is given its own specific dynamic, frequently with rants will be re-designated.) The pattern of quadrant
in memoriam . . . Crazy Horse (symphony) is one of a dramatic contrasts. designations remains in its changed position until the
group of four pieces (a quartet, a trio concerto, a sym- Leon Kirchner, with whom Scavarda studied performer has played through the succeeding (newly
phony, and an opera) that I hoped were pure and ac- at Tanglewood, invited Paul Jacobs to première designated) quadrant, after which it is subject again to
curate abstractions of those musical forms as I under- Groups at a Composers Forum. The piece created transposition through the appearance of deviant ele-
stood them from the European tradition. (Each of these a storm of controversy and dominated the audience ments in the sonority.
forms was given the name of a “New World” hero from discussion.
different times in our history, because it seemed from Program note by Robert Ashley.
my reading of European musical history and American Program note by Donald Scavarda.
social history that there was a remarkably curious co-
incidence between the emergence of a musical form 1
Timbre refers to tonal color changes effected through
in Europe with the emergence of a very “similar” social in memoriam… Esteban Gómez (quartet) (1963) the use of mutes, filters, bow movement, etc.
idea represented by the American hero. It was as if the Ashley 2
Density refers to the mixing of tonal ingredients, as in
same “idea” happened on both continents at the same flutter-tongue, double-stops, mixed vocal and instru-
time, but had to be represented differently in the two The graph is read circularly (see opposite, page 22). mental sound, etc.
places, because the form of the idea had to come from Each dot represents a constant unit of time that is de-
what was available to be changed: in Europe, in music; termined privately by each performer. This unit should
in America, in social organization.) be a natural pulse that does not tend to subdivide in FilmSCORE for Two Pianists (1962)
the performer’s mind. GREYS, A FilmSCORE (1963) silent version
Program note by Robert Ashley. The individual performer assigns to each quadrant GREYS (1963) stereo electronic music for Donald
of the score one of the following sound elements: pitch; Scavarda’s FilmSCORE
intensity; timbre1; density2. These sound elements may Scavarda/Electronic music by Mumma
Large Size Mograph 1962 (1962) for solo piano be assigned to the quadrants in any pattern, and that
Gordon Mumma pattern—while it will “revolve” in its relationship to the In these two interdisciplinary works, Mr. Scavarda
Born March 30, 1935 in Framingham, Massachusetts score—will remain constant (in the relationship of its redefines and expands the entire concept of musical
parts) throughout the performance. notation. He explores the physical properties of film
This solo piano work is from a series of different- The ensemble should prepare a sonority within itself and produces a kind of visual music, an abstract
sized pieces for various combinations of pianos ti- which the individual instruments are not distinguish- film which simultaneously contains symbolic infor-
 mation for performers. Mr. Scavarda  transformed

PHOTO: (Left) courtesy of Donald Scavarda

24 common objects into variously colored discs which
seem to  be illuminated from within. In  FilmSCORE
ONCE. MORE. ONCE THEN / TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2

for Two Pianists  they move  at different speeds, in

every direction and through all dimensions. The cli-
mactic section contains 12 separate and indepen-
dent layers of visual information. It is a dense, com-
plex contrapuntal texture which suddenly erupts in a
frenzy of activity.
Although GREYS employs the same kind of abstract
symbols as the earlier film, the form is quite different.
It is structured as a multi-layered, single direction, con-
tinuous flux of varying densities and speeds. At its most
dense the film contains 18 layers of material.

Program note by Donald Scavarda.

Cassiopeia (1962)
George Cacioppo
Born September 24, 1927 in Monroe, Michigan
Died April 4, 1984 in Ann Arbor

Some of Cacioppo’s Pianopieces, such as Cassiopeia,

use a distinctive notational system (see facing score, L–R: Donald Scavarda and clarinet soloist John Morgan, Matrix for Clarinetist (1962).
page 25). The player may follow any given path from
one note to another. (For paths with undefined pitches, Each of the four movements is of substantially dif- ducing only single tones. In 1962, Mr. Scavarda pub-
the player chooses them.) In Cassiopeia, volume is pro- ferent character. The first movement squeezes the lished his revolutionary Matrix for Clarinetist in the Uni-
portional to the size of a black circle, note lengths to busy instruments into a two-octave range. The pointil- versity of Michigan’s Generation Magazine. The score
linear space. Convex paths indicate a slowing of tempo, list second movement spreads over five octaves. The provided special fingerings and instructions which, for
concave ones an acceleration. Asked to explain the ad- complex thematic counterpoint of the third movement the first time, enabled the clarinetist to produce mul-
vantages of this notation, Cacioppo replied that it gives evolves into a sound-specified quasi-improvisation that tiple simultaneous tones. John Morgan premièred Ma-
the performer “an opportunity for his eye to roam about absorbs into electronic music. The fourth movement trix for Clarinetist at a ONCE Friends concert in East
the score and stimulate him to find perhaps a more overlaps the third as a dramatic scene change—a Lansing, Michigan, on May 25, 1962.
unique way of realizing the notes.” He compared the quietly sustained instrumental soundscape with occa-
experience to seeing “a cloud go by or a sunset, know- sional isolated motifs. Although the Sinfonia continues Program note by Donald Scavarda.
ing that every time you see it, the experience and the to have subsequent performances, I think none has
images will be different.” matched the careful preparation and enthusiastic en-
ergy of the ONCE Festival première. A Portrait of Vanzetti (1962–63) for narrator,
Program note by Leta E. Miller, courtesy of the author. instruments, and stereophonic electro-
Program note by Gordon Mumma. acoustic sound
Reynolds
Sinfonia (1958–60) 12 instruments and
magnetic tape Matrix for Clarinetist (1962) A Portrait of Vanzetti, for chamber ensemble, narra-
Mumma Scavarda tor, and electro-acoustic sound, was my first extended
composition to combine electronic with instrumental
Following the classic four-movement template, Sinfo- Donald Scavarda is widely recognized for his early resources. (I had done Dervish, a brief work for piano
nia’s title indicates its structure and brevity, and echoes discovery and development of clarinet  multiphonics. and percussion with tape, a year before, in Ann Ar-
my classical origins. The chamber ensemble of only 12 For centuries, these magnificent sounds remained bor.) The duality present in Wedge was extended and
instruments is joined by an electronic music sequence dormant in the clarinet, their existence unknown. It radicalized now as an interplay between the thread of
in the last part of the third movement. was believed that the instrument was capable of pro- narration and the ensemble’s perspectives.
 25

George Cacioppo’s notational system for Cassiopeia (1962).

 The place of political forces in my life was sharp- Creative Arts Orchestra

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

26 ened by Köln (it was bleak: still an intermittent patch-
work of rubble and rudimentary new construction), Mark Kirschenmann,
ONCE. MORE. ONCE THEN / TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2

and I decided to set a less abstract text—though still Director

a poetic one—edited from the letters of anarchist Bar-
tolomeo Vanzetti. Violins
After a brief, assertive “Introduction,” there is a Philip Coonce
pause, and a voice begins gently, announcing its “com- Ashley Martin
mon, harmless presence,” but soon pressing the anar- Joachim Stepniewski
chist theme: “We have war because we are not suffi- Katherine Van Duisen
ciently heroic for a life which does not need war.” There Elizabeth Wright
is an episodic interaction between its first narrator Jack
O’Brien’s urgent, articulate insinuations, and the shrill, Viola
raucous, often asymmetrically stabbing but sometimes Joshua Holcomb
even velvety perspectives of the ensemble. Vanzetti’s
words claim that “anarchy is as beautiful as a woman for Bass
me…” while the instrumental interjections themselves Joseph Fee
sound anarchic: each a unique amalgam utilizing some Benjamin Linstrum
small subset of the total instrumental resource. Benjamin Rolston
A piercingly intense coda closes the piece. William Satterwhite

Program note by Roger Reynolds. Clarinets/Saxophones

Patrick Booth
Colin Johnson
Please refer to page 40 for complete Molly Jones
ONCE THEN composer and artist biographies. William Marriott
Daniel Padamos
Gabriel Saltman
Eric Schindler

Trumpet
Derek Worthington

Trombone
Vincent Chandler

Tuba
Michael Musick

Harp
Christen Tamarelli

Piano
Michael Malis
 27

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

Robert Sheff (at piano), ONCE performer, the VFW Hall (1964).
28 ONCE. MORE. Symposium Schedule
Symposium
9:00–9:15 am Refreshments

Wednesday, November 3, 2010, 9:15–9:30 am Introduction by Daniel Herwitz, director,

9:00 am–4:00 pm University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities

Rackham Amphitheatre and Assembly Hall
915 East Washington Street
Ann Arbor
Session One
Free and open to the public.
9:30–10:00 am Leta Miller, professor of music, University of California, Santa Cruz

10:00–10:30 am Nancy Perloff, curator of modern and contemporary collections,
Getty Research Institute

10:30–11:30 am Discussion and Break

11:30 am–12:00 noon Marjorie Perloff, Sadie D. Patek Professor Emerita of Humanities,
Stanford University and Florence Scott Professor Emerita, University of
Southern California

12:00 noon–12:30 pm Richard Crawford, Hans T. David Distinguished University Professor of
Musicology Emeritas, University of Michigan

12:30–1:00 pm Discussion

1:00–2:00 pm Lunch Break

Session Two

2:00–4:00 pm A Conversation with ONCE Composers Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma,

Roger Reynolds, and Donald Scavarda

facilitated by
Michael Daugherty and Daniel Herwitz
ONCE. MORE. Symposium Biographies 29

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

Richard Crawford, widely acknowledged as the most Michael Daugherty is co-director of ONCE. MORE. and Daniel Herwitz has been director of the Institute for the
eminent Americanist in the field of musicology, has professor of composition at the University of Michigan Humanities and Mary Fair Croushore Professor of the
helped to shape the scholarly directions of American School of Music, Theatre & Dance.  According to the Humanities at the University of Michigan since 2002.
musicology for more than 40 years. He retired from League of American Orchestras, Mr. Daugherty  (b. He also holds professorships in comparative literature,
teaching in 2003 but remains the Hans T. David Dis- 1954 Cedar Rapids, Iowa)  is one of the 10 most per- philosophy, and history of art in the college, and is ad-
tinguished University Professor of Musicology Emeri- formed American composers. He has been hailed by  junct professor in screen arts and culture. He holds
tus at the University of Michigan. His books include The Times  (London) as “a master icon maker” with a tenure in the School of Art & Design. Before coming
America’s Musical Life: A History, An Introduction to “maverick imagination, fearless structural sense, and to Michigan, Mr. Herwitz lived and worked in South Af-
America’s Musical Life, and The American Musical meticulous ear.” Mr. Daugherty first came to interna- rica, where he was chair in philosophy at the University
Landscape: The Business of Musicianship from Bill- tional attention when the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra of Natal (1996–2002) and director of the Center for
ings to Gershwin—one of the seminal works of Ameri- performed his Metropolis Symphony with David Zinman Knowledge and Innovation there. His book of essays,
can music history. Crawford was the first Americanist to at Carnegie Hall in 1994. After teaching composition at Race and Reconciliation (Minnesota, 2003) is the re-
serve as president of the American Musicological Soci- the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, he joined the Univer- sult of that stay, along with short stories published in
ety, where he left an indelible mark and initiated the im- sity of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance in the Michigan Quarterly Review. Mr. Herwitz has three
portant publications series Music in the United States 1991. His music has been performed by the Cleveland recent books which appeared in 2008: The Star as Icon
of America, of which he is editor-in-chief. Currently, he Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Or- (Columbia), Key Concepts in Aesthetics (Continuum),
is working on a biography of George Gershwin. chestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orches- and (edited with Ashu Varshney) Midnight’s Diaspora:
tra, Pittsburgh Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, Critical Encounters with Salman Rushdie. He holds a
BBC Symphony Orchestra, RAI Orchestra of Turin, and PhD in philosophy from the University of Chicago.
the London Symphony Orchestra. Current commissions
for the 2010/11 season include a new wind ensemble
work for the University of Michigan Symphony Band and
orchestral works for the RAI Orchestra of Torino (Italy)
and the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music (Santa
Cruz). His music is published by Peermusic Classical
and Boosey & Hawkes and can be heard on Naxos,
Argo, Nonesuch, and Equilibrium labels.
 PHOTO: courtesy of the John Cage Trust
30
ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

Leta Miller is the author of the 100-page historical es- Marjorie Perloff teaches and writes on 20th- and Nancy Perloff’s scholarship addresses the Russian
say in the booklet accompanying New World Records’ 21st-century poetry and poetics, both Anglo-American avant-garde, European modernism, and the relation-
five-CD set, Music from the ONCE Festival. She has pub- and from a Comparatist perspective, as well as on ship between sound and the visual arts. Her 2004
lished widely on mid-20th-century music, including two intermedia and the visual arts. Her first three books exhibition, “Sea Tails: A Video Collaboration,” recre-
books on composer Lou Harrison, a critical edition of dealt with individual poets—Yeats, Robert Lowell, and ated the American composer David Tudor’s only video
his works, and about two dozen articles in musicological Frank O’Hara; she then published The Poetics of Inde- work and inspired her 2004 article for Leonardo Mu-
journals and essay collections on Harrison, John Cage, terminacy: Rimbaud to Cage (1981), which led to her sic Journal. Her essay, “Sound Poetry and the Musi-
Henry Cowell, Charles Ives, and music in the San Fran- extensive exploration of avant-garde art movements in cal Avant-Garde,” appeared in fall 2009 in The Sound
cisco area. Her article “Henry Cowell and John Cage: In- The Futurist Moment: Avant-Garde, Avant-Guerre, and of Poetry / The Poetry of Sound and she published
tersections and Influences, 1933–1941” (in the Journal the Language of Rupture (1986 & 1994), and subse- “Schwitters Redesigned: A Postwar Ursonate from
of the American Musicological Society) won the 2006 quent books (13 in all), the most recent of which is the Getty Archives” in the Journal of Design History
Lowens Award from the Society for American Music for Differentials: Poetry, Poetics, Pedagogy (2005). The (June 2010). Her exhibition, “Tango with Cows: Book
the best article on an American music topic. She has Sound of Poetry / The Poetry of Sound, co-edited with Art of the Russian Avant-Garde, 1910–1917”—which
also been featured as flute soloist (on baroque and mod- Craig Dworkin, was published in 2009 and UNORIGI- travels to Northwestern University’s Block Museum in
ern flute) on more than 15 recordings. Miller has just NAL GENIUS: Poetry by Other Means in the Twenty- 2011—uses the GRI’s Russian modernist collections to
completed a book, Music and Politics in San Francisco: First Century will be published in 2010. She has been highlight the avant-garde’s transformation of the book
From the 1906 Quake to the Second World War, which a frequent reviewer for periodicals from TLS and the and experimentation with word-image-sound. Her
will be published in 2011. She is the editor of the Journal Washington Post to major scholarly journals, and has Monuments of the Future: Designs by El Lissitzky and
of the Society for American Music. lectured widely in the US and abroad. She was recently subsequent book, Situating El Lissitzky, also featured
the Weidenfeld Professor of European Literature at Ox- GRI holdings. Current projects include an essay on Na-
ford University. Perloff has held Guggenheim, NEH, talia Goncharova and continued research on the early
and Huntington fellowships; served on the advisory Russian avant-garde.
board of the Stanford Humanities Center; and has re-
cently completed her year as president of the Modern
Language Association. She is a member of the Ameri- Please refer to page 40 for biographies of the
can Academy of Arts and Sciences and recently was ONCE composers.
named honorary foreign professor at Beijing Modern
Languages University. She received an honorary de-
gree from Bard College in May 2008.
31

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3 L–R: David Tudor, John Cage (circa 1962).
 The Penny Stamps Indeterminacy tory, catalog, and place Cage’s various manuscript

PHOTOS: (Below) Betty Freeman, courtesy of the John Cage Trust; (Opposite) James Klosty, C.F. Peters Editions, Indeterminacy
32 collections, and responsive in its attempts to serve
Distinguished Speaker Series the ongoing and emerging needs of scholars, creative
John Cage first performed Indeterminacy: New Aspect
Presents of Form in Instrumental and Electronic Music as a
artists, and performers the world over by providing
information, assistance, and access to its archives,
lecture at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair. One week
which includes extensive monographs and recorded
The John Cage Trust before, he began to prepare the lecture in a Stockton
materials by and about John Cage, as well as a per-
hotel room. Remembering an earlier suggestion from
Indeterminacy his long-time collaborator David Tudor that he “...make
manent collection of Cage’s visual arts works, which
are lent to museums and galleries worldwide. And,
a talk that was nothing but stories,” Cage wrote 30,
in addition to initiating and participating in educa-
which he then read at Expo ’58, without accompani-
with Director Laura Kuhn tional settings and programs throughout the world,
ment. Sixty more stories were written the following year
and DJ Tadd Mullinix the Trust actively promotes new projects utilizing its
to fill out a 90-minute lecture Cage and Tudor were to
holdings; publications, recordings, theatrical realiza-
give at Columbia Teacher’s College, for speaker and
Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 5:10 pm tions, and new media products, often utilizing inno-
live musician. Shortly after, the two men recorded all
Michigan Theater vative technologies.
90 for what is now an enduring, historic Smithsonian/
603 East Liberty Street
Folkways recording.
Ann Arbor
Cage’s idea for Indeterminacy was simple: each
of the stories would be read aloud in the space of Laura Kuhn enjoys a lively career as a writer, perform-
Free and open to the public. er, scholar, and arts administrator. She worked during
precisely one minute: thus, if a story is long, it is read
very, very fast; if short, then very, very slowly. At the her graduate school years in the early 1980s with the
same time, Tudor would simultaneously perform a Russian-born infant terrible of American musicology,
spontaneous musical counterpoint comprising selec- Nicolas Slonimsky, becoming successor editor, upon
A program of the U–M School of Art & Design
tions from two earlier Cage compositions: Concert for his death in 1996, of his acclaimed music dictionar-
Piano and Orchestra (piano) and Fontana Mix (tape). ies Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians and
Most of the stories in  Indeterminacy  are about Cage Music Since 1900. In 1986, upon completion of her
or his friends, and almost all of them have an element MA degree from the University of California, Los An-
of puckish humor. Some have an almost magical-re- geles (her thesis a comparative study of the theoreti-
alistic theme, others are amusingly absurd, and still cal ideas of German composer Richard Wagner with
others make you laugh out loud. And while the stories the montage film theory of the Russian director Sergei
are a delight purely on their own, the added layer of Eisenstein), she also began working with the American
unexpected musical counterpoint complements in composer, visual artist, and philosopher John Cage in
ways that can’t ever be predicted.

The John Cage Trust was established in 1993 as a not-

for-profit organization with a mandate to preserve, en-
hance, and maintain the integrity of the artistic works
of the late American composer, John Cage. Its found-
ing board of trustees was comprised of four long-time
Cage associates: Merce Cunningham, artistic director,
Cunningham Dance Foundation; Anne d’Harnoncourt,
director, Philadelphia Museum of Art; David Vaughan,
archivist, Cunningham Dance Foundation; and Laura
Kuhn, who serves as its executive director. In 2008,
with the passing of d’Harnoncourt, Margarete Roeder,
Cage’s long-time gallerist, joined the ranks; in 2009,
Cunningham was replaced by Melissa Harris, long-time
editor of Aperture Magazine.
In its 17 years of existence, the John Cage Trust
has been both proactive in its work to collect, inven- Laura Kuhn and John Cage
33

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3 John Cage on Indeterminacy.

 New York on a variety of large-scale projects, includ- slated for release under the names of his other aliases:

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

34 ing his six “mesostic” lectures for Harvard University Charles Manier, influenced by groups including Talk-
as holder of the Charles Eliot Norton Chair in Poetry ing Heads, Liaisons Dangereuses, and Severed Heads;
THE PENNY STAMPS DISTINGUISHED SPEAKER SERIES / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

(published as I-VI, Harvard University Press, 1990) James T. Cotton, dance music in the styles of jackin’
and his first full-scale opera, Europeras 1 & 2, for the house and Detroit techno; Dabrye, hip-hop influenced
Frankfurt Opera. This work subsequently became the by J Dilla and other golden-era beat-makers; Tadd
subject of her 1992 doctoral dissertation from UCLA, Mullinix, experimental and braindance electronica
John Cage’s “Europeras 1 & 2”: The Musical Means that draws inspiration from artists like Aphex Twin, Au-
of Revolution. From 1991 to 1996 she served as one techre, Morton Subotnick, and post-Second World War
of 10 founding faculty members at Arizona State classical and avant-garde composers.
University West in Phoenix, where she helped to de- As Dabrye, his collaboration with the late James
velop and implement an innovative interdisciplinary Yancey (aka J Dilla) on the single “Game Over” became
arts program. Simultaneously, upon Cage’s death in a Detroit underground anthem and lead to notoriety for
1992, she worked with Cage’s long-time friends and his Dabrye project in the hip-hop world. While this proj-
associates Merce Cunningham, Anne d’Harnoncourt, ect brought light to the connection between hip-hop
and David Vaughan to found the John Cage Trust for and electronic music, it is viewed as having influenced
which she continues to serve as executive director. In a shift in electronic music from having rigid quantized
this capacity, Ms. Kuhn travels extensively, lecturing Tadd Mullinix rhythms to a loose humanized feel.
and conducting performance workshops in venues as Tadd Mullinix currently resides and works in Ann
diverse as the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, War- In 1998, after seven years of playing classical cello Arbor and performs worldwide.
saw’s Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Brussels’ and various instruments in punk bands, Tadd Mullinix
International Arts Festival. In 1999 she even prepared began to DJ in galleries and clubs while composing
a macrobiotic dinner for 80 (using Cage’s recipes) music with a personal computer and synthesizers.
to celebrate the first-ever installation of Cage’s cel- Disenchanted with reading sheet music and playing in The Penny Stamps Distinguished
ebrated Roaratorio: An Irish Circus on Finnegans ensembles, he positioned himself for a career in ar- Speaker Series
Wake at Belfast’s Queens Festival! Other projects for ranging and editing his own digital recordings. He pro-
the John Cage Trust under her direction have includ- duced music of contrasting styles and created aliases Established with the generous support of U-M School
ed a CD-ROM of sampled piano preparations from in order to distinguish his projects. Being repeatedly of Art & Design alumna Penny W. Stamps, the series
Cage’s landmark composition, Sonatas & Interludes asked why he created separate aliases and didn’t com- looks to present visionary leaders who have used their
(1946–48) for use by MIDI keyboard musicians, and bine his projects under one name, Mr. Mullinix found creative practice effectively.  It celebrates those who
the adaptation of Cage’s whimsical 1982 radio play, that there was an illusion that electronic music must have made lasting marks by transcending traditions
James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, Erik Satie: An Alpha- be too quickly evolving to refer to its own heritage. In and set a progressive, influential tone with their work.
bet, to the stage, which in 2000–2001 she directed a time where a new ease of use and accessibility to The series brings emerging and established artists/de-
in seven venues around the world, including the US, computer technology should be stoking creativity, he signers from a broad spectrum of media to conduct a
Australia, Germany, and the UK. In 1999–2000, on a had the view that electronic music, despite its young public lecture and engage with students, faculty, and
bit of a lark, she also joined the cast (as an onstage evolutionary line as a genre, was dependent on its con- the larger university and Ann Arbor communities. Un-
singing guest) of Mikel Rouse’s irreverent “talk-show” text in order to be effective or subversive. veiling the leading voices of the day to a broad audi-
opera, Dennis Cleveland, last mounted at New York’s After meeting Todd Osborn at Dubplate Pressure, a ence, the series has become a revered weekly event,
Lincoln Center in May 2002. In 2007, the John Cage record store in Ann Arbor which Osborn owned, the two serving as a forum for social dialogue, not only for the
Trust went into residential placement at Bard College started a ragga-jungle style drum ’n bass label called academic and creative community, but for the greater
in Annandale-on-Hudson New York, where Ms. Kuhn Rewind! Records. They wrote and produced nine 12- regional area.  Lectures take place on Thursday eve-
became the first John Cage Professor of Performance inch vinyl singles under the names Soundmurderer nings at the historic Michigan Theater in downtown
Arts. In celebration, she directed a fully staged ver- (Osborn) and SK-1 (Mullinix). Several years later, the Ann Arbor, are free of charge, and are open to the gen-
sion of Cage’s softly political theater piece, Lecture on drum ’n bass world witnessed a wave of ragga-jungle eral public.
the Weather, with an all-star cast that included Merce reinterpretations. Rewind! singles were repressed on
Cunningham, Jasper Johns, John Ashbery, Leon UK vinyl and reissued by Aphex Twin’s Rephlex label.
Botstein, John Ralston Saul, John Kelly, and others. Mr. Mullinix relocated to Ann Arbor and started
She is currently working with the award-winning bi- working at Dubplate Pressure, where he met Sam Val-
ographer Ken Silverman toward a collected edition of enti IV, owner of the then young Ghostly International
John Cage’s correspondence for Wesleyan University record label. To Ghostly, he signed music that would be
Press (2011).
ONCE Group at Robert Rauschenberg’s loft after Judson Dance Theater
Festival, New York, 1965. (Front, L–R): Joseph Wehrer, Robert Ashley,
unknown, George Manupelli; (second row, L–R): Yvonne Rainer, George
Kleis (leaning against palm), unknown, Gordon Mumma, unknown,
Cynthia Liddell; (third row, L–R): Jackie Leuzinger, Annina Nosei, 35
unknown; (seated in back on the right holding sandwich) Caroline Blunt;
others unknown.

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

 CLOSING RECEPTIONS + Celebration of the John Cage Outlier:

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

36
CELEBRATIONS + ONCE. MORE. Exhibitions Hauntings of the Avant Garde
Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 6:30 pm Thursday, November 4, 2010
Immediately following the Penny Stamps Immediately following ONCE NOW concert
Distinguished Speaker Series presentation of 1301 South University Avenue (former UMMA Off/Site)
The John Cage Trust: Indeterminacy Ann Arbor

U-M Institute for the Humanities $5 cover charge at the door; complimentary admis-
202 South Thayer Street sion with ONCE NOW ticket stub. Open to the public.
Ann Arbor
Imagine a room overwhelmed with sound + vision—
Free and open to the public. snatches of music, throbs + echoes, and sights unseen
until this night that somehow seem familiar. Haunted by
ONCE NOW concert performance to follow reception fever dreams of the avant-garde past, Outlier combines
at Rackham Auditorium. the heavy influence of 20th-century composition with
contemporary approaches to experimental music and
performance art in a space filled with psychedelic maj-
esty. Is it real? How will you explain it to others? How will
you explain it to yourself? Ann Arbor producer HOTT
LAVA brings a stellar cast of musicians, composers,
performance artists, and filmmakers including Laurel
Halo, Todd Osbourn, Sean Patrick, Tom Buckholz, and
Ted Kennedy to create a dynamic installation work that
will delight, provoke, and overload the senses.

A collaboration with

and First Martin & Co.

37

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3 ONCE Group performance (November 1963)
38 ONCE. MORE.
ONCE NOW
Michael Daugherty and
Mary Simoni Recent music + films from the ONCE Festival composers
Co-Directors
Robert Ashley Van Cao’s Meditation (1991) for piano
Faculty Artists of the University of Michigan Ms. Yen
School of Music, Theatre & Dance, Ann Arbor
Improvisation Collective, and ONCE Quartet
Gordon Mumma Than Particle (1985) for live-percussion with synthesized percussion
Kyle Acuncius, Percussion
Mr. Gramley
Melissa Bosma, Oboe
Jeremy Crosmer, Cello*
Michael Daugherty, Piano

Daniel Goldblum, Contrabassoon
Intermission
Woody Goss, Piano
Joseph Gramley, Percussion
Donald Scavarda CINEMATRIX (2002) a filmSCORE performed silently
Daniel Graser, Alto Saxophone
Cecilia Kang, Clarinet
Mark Kieme, Bass Clarinet
Scavarda CINEMATRIX (2002) a filmSCORE performed with multiple instrumentalists
Yi-Ting Kuo, Violin*
Ryan Mackstaller, Guitar Ann Arbor Improvisation Collective
Gordon Mumma, Piano Ms. Kang, Mr. Goldblum, Mr. Goss, Mr. Acuncius
Hoi Yue Ng, Viola* Andrew Bishop, Director
Anna Skálová, Violin*
Ming-Hsiu Yen, Piano
*denotes member of the ONCE Quartet Gordon Mumma Gambreled Tapestry (2007) for solo piano with internal electro-acoustics
Mr. Mumma
Roger Arnett, Technical Director
Paul Dooley, Technical Assistant
Scavarda Sounds for Seven (2010) for chamber ensemble
Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Rackham Auditorium Ann Arbor Improvisation Collective
915 East Washington Street Ms. Bosma, Ms. Kang, Mr. Kieme, Mr. Graser, Mr. Mackstaller, Mr. Goss
Ann Arbor Mr. Bishop, Director

Roger Reynolds Ariadne’s Thread (1994) for string quartet, computer-synthesized, and
spatialized sound
ONCE Quartet

Special thanks to all of the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance faculty artists for their
ongoing commitment of time and energy to this special performance.

In the interests of saving both dollars and the environment, please either retain this festival
132nd Annual UMS Season
guide and return with it when you attend other festival events or return it to your usher when
ONCE. MORE.
leaving the venue.

The photographing or sound and video Please join ONCE. MORE. artists immediately following tonight’s concert at Outlier:
recording of this concert or possession of any Hauntings of the Avant Garde, a festival closing reception, at 1301 South University Avenue
device for such recording is prohibited. (formerly UMMA Off/Site).
Van Cao’s Meditation (1991) for piano ments, performs from a notated score, and at times in a fixed group of overall designs. A performance rep-
Robert Ashley employs defined fields of creative improvisation. resents one of those designs selected from the group. 39
Born March 28, 1930 in Ann Arbor, Michigan The music is composed in 10 seamless, one-min- Gambreled Tapestry can also be performed with an op-

ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

ute sections joined together with transitional seams, tional electronic component, designed by the composer
A few years ago I saw a photograph in National Geo- and the overall structure has an umbrella of four sec- and applied to aggrandize the resonant characteristics
graphic magazine of an old man with long white hair tions. Part of the composer’s inspiration for this music of the sound board inside the piano. 
seated at a piano in a sunny music room with French was nourished by the sometimes wonderfully absurd The titles of Mumma’s compositions often have a
doors leading to a garden patio. This was part of an ar- sound results of digital computer FM synthesis algo- variety of meanings, descriptive or poetic, even extend-
ticle on North Vietnam today. The caption explained, rithms attempting to achieve the acoustical complexi- ing to the absurd. A tapestry is made from two sets of
cryptically, that this man, Van Cao, was a hero to the ties of real percussion sonorities. Than Particle thrives interlaced threads. The result is a warp of length with a
Vietnamese, that he had been a famous composer in on these differences. welt at the width, resulting in defined patterns. A gam-
prewar times, that he had written the national anthem As with so many technological advances, the Ya- brel is a symmetrical, two-sided sloping structure with
for North Vietnam and that now in his old age he mostly maha computer used for the first performances, with additional internal angles, often used in roof design for
sat at the piano, improvising and humming to himself. its usual software bugs, became obsolete, folkloric, and efficient use of space. In Gambreled Tapestry it is ap-
I had an intense desire to hear him play the piano and then disappeared. Thus current performances are done plied to a flexible, tapestry-like structure for the use of
hum. I found out from a friend who travels to Vietnam from a recording of the original computer sound-output. time in the musical composition.
that his piano is, perhaps, only one of two in the whole Than particles are short-lived surrogate phenom-
country and that his situation is even more unimaginable ena, allegorically analogous to a 14th-century head- Program note by Gordon Mumma.
to an American than the caption had suggested. I made bashing game that involved, typically, facial laceration
half-hearted attempts to get some American agency to and rampant wagering.
send me to Vietnam, but I could not follow through in Than Particle was composed for percussionist William Sounds for Seven (2010) for chamber ensemble
this effort. I could not allow myself, because I thought of Winant, who premièred the work, with the composer, at Scavarda
my “desire” as almost purely musical. I would go with- the Arnold Schoenberg Institute on November 7, 1985,
out any political strings attached, and of course that is for the New Music America Festival, Los Angeles. Sounds for Seven is the fourth in a series of works de-
fantasy. Certainly, Van Cao would see my visit in political signed to expand the concept of musical notation
terms. And probably he wouldn’t like my music at all, so Program note by Gordon Mumma. and  encourage greater creative participation by the
it would be hard to be honest with him. performers. The single-page score is completely ab-
 I was given a recording of some of Van Cao’s early stract. It is also in color, thus emphasizing the compos-
music. It is a collection of charming love songs in a CINEMATRIX (2002) a filmSCORE performed silently er’s intention that the performers explore the full range
French cabaret style, surprisingly what one would ex- CINEMATRIX (2002) a filmSCORE performed of instrumental timbres.
pect. I don’t want to hear the national anthem. But the with multiple instrumentalists
“image” from the photograph persists, in all of its musi- Donald Scavarda Program note by Donald Scavarda. 
cal and human mystery, and it is that image that this Born 1928 in Iron Mountain, Michigan
composition represents.
  This is the third abstract film intended for musical Ariadne’s Thread (1994) for string quartet, computer-
Program note by Robert Ashley, November 1991. interpretation. The Matrix in motion. synthesized, and spatialized sound
Roger Reynolds
Program note by Donald Scavarda. Born July 18, 1934 in Detroit, Michigan
Than Particle (1985) for live-percussion with
synthesized percussion Ariadne’s Thread  arose out of a longstanding interest
Gordon Mumma Gambreled Tapestry (2007) for solo piano with in  line, whether evoked as sound or inscribed graphi-
Born March 30, 1935 in Framingham, Massachusetts internal electro-acoustics cally by such masterful hands as those of Sengai, Klee,
Mumma or Rembrandt. Continuity, directionality, inflection, in-
Than Particle (1985) is music for electronic and acous- tensification, rarefaction, whimsy, even violence are
tical percussion. The acoustical component is per- Gambreled Tapestry (2007) for solo piano was com- subsumed in the manifestations and depictions that line
formed by a percussion virtuoso; the electronic com- posed with “construction-set” procedures, to be assem- allows.  Ariadne’s Thread  is for string quartet and also
ponent is achieved, typically, by computer synthesis. bled for performance by the pianist. Most of the sound computer-generated sound which supports, augments,
The performance score is notated with conventional resources are provided by two short musical gestures, alternates with, and occasionally replaces the instrumen-
five-line staves, one for the percussionist, the other strictly specified by music notation, which can then be talists’ efforts, expanding the range of what an unaided
for coordination with the computer-synthesized part. assembled in a limited number of combinations. The string ensemble can accomplish, and adds a choreo-
The percussionist chooses specific contrasting instru- combination limits are defined by the composer to result graphic spatialization to the music’s linear evolution.
 Elements from the myth inform the piece—the
ONCE THEN / ONCE NOW cioppo’s extraordinary creativity during that decade.

PHOTOS: (from top-left to bottom-right): Cacioppo by Donald Scavarda; Ashley by Makepeace Tsao; Ashley by Stephanie Berger; Mumma by Makepeace Tsao; Mumma by unknown; Reynolds by Donald Scavarda; Reynolds by Malcolm Crowthers; Scavarda by Barbara Scavarda; Scavarda by Barbara Scavarda
40 Minotaur’s vertiginous rage, the number seven, the During this period, everything he composed was
strategy of surreptitious substitution, and Dionysus Composer Biographies performed by devoted musicians.  Cassiopeia  (1962)
ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

“in the wings”—but, after all, it is not meant as il- became an immediate classic, partly because of its
lustration. Having composed two earlier works that Robert Ashley  (born 1930)  is known for his work in mysterious but practical map-like score. As the ONCE
address the quartet traditions, I allowed a less rea- new forms of opera. In the 1960s, Mr. Ashley organized Festivals continued, something of a fan-club of per-
soned obsessiveness to invade this one, an obses- Ann Arbor’s legendary ONCE Festival and directed the formers developed, anticipating the rehearsals of his
sion that requires a particular sort of unanimity. ONCE Group. During the 1970s, he directed the Center next piece.
Ariadne’s Thread  was written for the Arditti Quartet, for Contemporary Music at Mills College, toured with Listening through Cacioppo’s music now, many de-
and premièred by them in Messiaen Hall at Radio France the Sonic Arts Union, and produced and directed Mu- cades later, my memories still hold true. His use of instru-
on December 2, 1994. The piece was jointly commis- sic with Roots in the Aether, a 14-hour television opera/ ments (and voice) is sublime. Each individual instrument
sioned by Radio France, The Florence Gould Foundation, documentary about the work and ideas of seven Ameri- plays with indigenous sense, as though he performed it
and Les Ateliers UPIC. The computer materials were real- can composers. Mr. Ashley wrote and produced  Per- himself. The diverse ensembles of his compositions are
ized in Paris at the UPIC studios and assembled at the fect Lives,  an opera for television widely considered translucent and clear-sounding even within relatively com-
University of California, San Diego, where Timothy Labor the precursor of “music-television.” Staged versions plex sound-textures. With the “limits” of sonority inherent
was my musical assistant. (Michael Theodore was the of  Perfect Lives  and  Atalanta (Acts of God)  and the in his solo piano pieces—sounds articulated mostly from
musical assistant in the quadraphonic version.) monumental opera tetralogy Now Eleanor’s Idea have the keyboard—Cacioppo mysteriously extends the result-
toured throughout Europe, Asia, and the US. He wrote ing sound-spectrum without exaggerated physical foolish-
Program note by Roger Reynolds. and directed Balseros for Florida Grand Opera, Dust for ness. Finally, it is Cacioppo’s timeless imagination with the
première at the Kanagawa Arts Foundation in Yoko- theatrical unfolding of sonorous events and textures that
hama, and Celestial Excursions for the Berlin Festival elevates each of his compositions, all of which bear well
and Hebbel Theater Berlin. Made Out of Concrete was the passage of time.
premièred at La MaMa E.T.C. in New York in 2009, and Upon his untimely death in 1984, friends and for-
his latest opera, Quicksand, is scheduled for workshop mer students established the George Cacioppo Memo-
performances in New York during the spring of 2011. rial Fund to  promote and preserve Cacioppo’s music
and provide opportunities for student composers en-
rolled at the  University of Michigan  School of Music,
As a creative artist, George Cacioppo (1926–1984) Theatre & Dance.
was a gentle chemist. His life and work didn’t move in
straight lines from one point to another. After his early Biography by Gordon Mumma, May 2006.
compositions of the 1950s, each musical work has its
own unique identity and character. That uniqueness is
heard in his individual overlappings of sound-painting, Gordon Mumma (born 1935)  studied  horn and piano
his sense of forward motion in time, and the lyrical in Chicago and Detroit following his earliest performing
characteristics and poetic implications of each compo- activities as a choral singer. For many years was an
sition. Cacioppo was careful with the details of mixing active  hornist in orchestral and chamber music. His
things, but rhapsodic in his large-scale thinking, and diverse instrumental performances have included the
poetic in the fanciful titles for his music. musical saw, cornet, percussion, and bandoneon.
Through his life, Cacioppo was variously present; In Ann Arbor, along with Robert Ashley, Mr. Mumma
at times congenially gregarious, at other times mysteri- co-founded the Cooperative Studio for Electronic Music
ously absent or invisible. He had many devoted artist (1958–66). Also with Ashley, he collaborated in Milton
friends, particularly his occasional composition stu- Cohen’s Space Theatre (1957-64), and interacted with
dents at the University of Michigan Residential College. a group of creative individuals in art, architecture, the-
His primary money-earning profession was as a radio ater, and film. He was one of the organizers and perform-
engineer and program director for U-M’s WUOM FM. ers in the historic ONCE Festival (1961–66). It was from
Cacioppo’s imagination appeared with  Bestiary I, the mid-1950s that he developed circuit-design skills for
Eingang (1961). Thereafter he made one unique work use in his electronic and live-electronic music.
after another, some so different from the preceding From 1966 to 1974, with John Cage and David
compositions that the character of his creative conti- Tudor, Mr. Mumma was a composer-musician with the
nuity was not easily apparent. The 1960s activities of Merce Cunningham Dance Company, for  which he
the ONCE Festival were the primary impetus for Ca- composed four commissioned works, including Mesa
 41

Then + Now (from top-left to bottom-right): George Cacioppo, Robert Ashley (1963), Gordon Mumma (1964), Roger Reynolds (1963), and Donald Scavarda (1963).
 (1966) and Telepos (1971). During those years he also UCSD. Existing international relationships were now sic (2002). Writing about the première of his ILLUSION

PHOTO: (Below) Donald Scavarda

42 performed in the touring  Sonic Arts Union with Mr. woven into his southern California existence: compos- at Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles Times critic
Ashley, David Behrman, and Alvin Lucier. ers Xenakis, Cage, Takemitsu, Nancarrow, Feldman, Mark Swed described him as “an all-around sonic
ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

Gordon Mumma’s compositions have involved both and Babbitt visited; Harry Partch was already living in visionary.” The Washington Post termed the National
the electronic media and music for various ensembles San Diego. Gallery of Art’s presentation of his Sanctuary in 2007,
of acoustical instruments. Recordings of his music are The technological thread re-emerged in the late a “once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
available from Lovely Music, New World Records, and 1970s when John Chowning invited Mr. Reynolds to
Tzadik. A 2-CD set of his solo piano music was record- Stanford’s CCRMA summer courses in computer mu-
ed in 2007  by Daan Vandewalle; a co-production by sic. Shortly thereafter, Ircam offered a commission Donald Scavarda (born 1928) is a native of Iron Moun-
New World Records and HR2 Frankfurt. and extended residency. Thus began a decades-long tain, Michigan. He earned a Masters degree in musi-
From 1975 to 1994, Mr. Mumma was professor of interaction with the Parisian center—dedicated to an cal composition at the University of Michigan where he
music at the University of  California. In 2000 he integrated engagement with technological and musical studied with Ross Lee Finney. In 1953, Mr. Scavarda
received the Biennial Award of the New York City Foun- innovation. This interaction spurred the integration of received a Fulbright Scholarship for study in Ham-
dation for Contemporary Arts. Since 2002 he has lived computational faculty and resources into UCSD’s Mu- burg, Germany. One year later BMI Inc. of New York
in both British Columbia and California. sic Department. awarded him the 1953 “First Prize” for his Fantasy for
Roger Reynolds’ work has frequently addressed Violin and Orchestra.
distinctive architecture (Arata Isozaki’s Art Tower Mito, During the summer of 1960, Donald Scavarda co-
Roger Reynolds’ (born 1934) life was marked from the Louis I. Kahn’s Salk Institute, Frank Lloyd Wright’s founded the ONCE Festival of Musical Premieres and
beginning by interplay between the imagined and the Guggenheim Museum, Christian de Portzamparc’s Cité in the succeeding years produced a series of ground-
manifest. Music entered Mr. Reynolds’ life abruptly de la musique, and Frank Gehry’s Walt Disney Con- breaking works. His most recent compositions reflect
after a chance encounter with a Vladimir Horowitz re- cert Hall), and has involved collaboration with con- the influence of his work in the visual arts. He works
cording of Chopin’s A-flat Polonaise which led to piano ductors Esa-Pekka Salonen, David Robertson, Seiji and resides in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
studies. Eventually, music gave way to the pragmatic Ozawa, Ralph Shapey, Gunther Schuller, and Leonard
attractions of an engineering physics program at the Slatkin, with ensembles including Ensemble InterCon-
University of Michigan. Life as a systems development temporain,  Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne,  Ensemble
engineer in California felt incomplete, though, and he Recherche, Alarm Will Sound, Court-Circuit, The Paul
returned to Michigan to study music. Only at the “ad- Dresher Ensemble, the Group for Contemporary Music,
vanced” age of 25 did he understand that composition The New York New Music Ensemble, choreographers
would be his calling. Lucinda Childs and Bill T. Jones, and a career-long re-
Two inspirational teachers guided his studies: lationship with Irvine Arditti and his String Quartet. (Mr.
American Ross Lee Finney and Spanish expatriate Reynolds has recently completed a fourth string quar-
Roberto Gerhard. Both had studied with Second tet for this ensemble entitled not forgotten.)
Viennese masters (Berg and Schoenberg, respective- Roger Reynolds’ life has also involved collaborations
ly). Mr. Reynolds sought out creative perspectives of a with poets, among them John Ashbery (Whispers Out
less traditional sort, making contact with Varèse, Cage, of Time, a string orchestra work inspired by an Ashbery
Partch, and later Nancarrow. While still in Ann Arbor, poem which garnered him the 1989 Pulitzer Prize) and
Mr. Reynolds was a co-founder of the ONCE Group. He inventor-philosopher, Buckminster Fuller.
and his flutist partner, Karen, embarked on seven years Mr. Reynolds continues to be a sought-after men-
of European and Asian travel with Fulbright, Guggen- tor, presenting master classes at the major North
heim, and Rockefeller support. Returning to the US American universities and at prestigious international
in 1969, Mr. Reynolds assumed a tenured position centers including the National Conservatory in Beijing, L-R: Gordon Mumma with visiting composer Morton Feldman, ONCE

at the University of California, San Diego Department the Sibelius Academy, the Paris Conservatoire, and at Festival (1964).

of Music. The Reynolds have collaboratively under- Ircam, and Darmstadt.

taken a series of new music presentations including C.F. Peters, New York, publishes Roger Reynolds’
the Séances de travail at Paris’ American Students music exclusively and it is widely represented on re-
and Artists Center, CROSS TALK in Tokyo, The Pacific cord labels in North America and abroad. The Library
Ring Festival  in La Jolla,  Xenakis @ UCSD, and, in of Congress established The Roger Reynolds Special
2010, CHANGES:seasons in Washington, DC. Collection in 1998 and supports an extensive website
Immediately after settling in La Jolla, Mr. Reynolds’ detailing his work. He is the author of  Mind Models:
secured funds (in 1971) from the Rockefeller Foun- New Forms of Music Experience  (1975; second  edi-
dation to launch the Center for Music Experiment at tion, 2000 ) and  Form and Method: Composing Mu-
 43

Title page to 1963 ONCE Catalog of compositions, installations, and films.

44 ONCE THEN / ONCE NOW Andrew Bishop (director, Ann Arbor Improvisation Collective)
is a versatile multi-instrumentalist (saxophone, clarinet, flute),
as soloist, lecture-recitalist, and collaborative artist in New York
City (Weill Recital Hall, Steinway Hall), Rutgers University,
Artist + Ensemble Biographies composer, improviser, educator, and scholar comfortable in a SUNY Purchase, Notre Dame University, Montclair Museum of
wide array of musical idioms. He maintains an active national Art, the University of Helsinki, and the Sibelius Academy (Fin-
ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

and international career and serves as an assistant professor of land), and Freiburg in Breisgau (Germany). He has recorded
The Creative Arts Orchestra is one of the many courses and
jazz and contemporary improvisation at U-M where he teaches the piano music of Arthur Cunningham.
ensembles offered by the Program in Jazz and Contempo-
applied jazz saxophone, composition, and improvisation. Mr.
rary Improvisation at the U-M School of Music, Theatre &
Bishop’s two recordings as a leader, Time and Imaginary Time Daniel Gilbert (clarinet) joined the U-M faculty as associate
Dance. Utilizing strings, double-reeds, and instruments more
and the Hank Williams Project (Envoi Recordings), received professor of clarinet in 2007. Previously, he held the position of
commonly associated with improvised music, the Creative Arts
widespread critical acclaim. He leads a variety of projects in- second clarinet in the Cleveland Orchestra from 1995–2007.
Orchestra’s musical horizons encompass jazz, rock, contem-
cluding a jazz trio Bishop/Cleaver/Flood; a roots chamber en- Mr. Gilbert teaches at the State University of New York at Stony
porary concert music, and a myriad of ethnically influenced
semble, Andrew Bishop’s Hank Williams Project; a mainstream Brook and also served as the associate professor of clarinet at
music, as well as collaborations with dancers, poets, and ac-
jazz group, the Andrew Bishop Quartet; and a global blues the Oberlin Conservatory of Music from 2000–2001. A native
tors. While part of the ensemble’s programming includes com-
project called Blue Origami. As a composer and arranger, he of New York City, Mr. Gilbert received a BA from Yale University
positions of students and faculty, the 20–25 member group is
has received over 20 commissions from professional organiza- and both a MM degree and a professional studies certificate
one of the very few ensembles of its size in the world which
tions and universities. He has also received recognition and from The Juilliard School. Before joining the Cleveland Orches-
performs entirely improvised concerts, with no parameters set
awards from the American Society of Composers, Authors, tra, Mr. Gilbert was active as a freelancer in New York City, ap-
forth in advance. The group presents several concerts per year
and Publishers (ASCAP); The Chicago Symphony Orchestra; pearing regularly with groups including The Metropolitan Opera,
of this nature. The Creative Arts Orchestra has performed at
the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; and a nomination from the American Ballet Theater, New Jersey Symphony, Solisti New
New York’s Knitting Factory (with Gregg Bendian as featured
American Academy of Arts and Letters. York, the Stamford Symphony, and the New Haven Symphony,
soloist), the Detroit Jazz Festival, the International Association
where he played principal clarinet from 1992–1995. He has
of Jazz Educators Chicago conference, the Eastman School of
Melissa Bosma (oboe) is pursuing a master’s degree in oboe appeared as soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra, the Cleve-
Music, Cornell University, and Humber College.
performance with Nancy Ambrose King. She received her bach- land Heights Chamber Orchestra, the Suburban Symphony Or-
elor’s degree summa cum laude from Southern Methodist Uni- chestra, the New Haven Symphony, Solisti New York, and the
Students from music, art, engineering, and dance make up
versity where she studied with Erin Hannigan. Ms. Bosma was Aspen Mozart Orchestra. He is an active chamber musician,
the Digital Music Ensemble (DME) directed by Stephen Rush.
recently a semi-finalist for the Texas Young Artists Competition. playing regularly on the Cleveland Orchestra Chamber Series,
Students work to collaborate in the creation of new work or per-
the Cleveland Museum of Art Chamber Series, and the Oberlin
form innovative/new works from the past. The DME has given
Chad Burrow (clarinet) was appointed to the U-M faculty in 2009.  Chamber Music series. Mr. Gilbert’s master classes and recitals
works of varying content and approach, and has achieved a
He is the winner of prizes and awards from the 2001 Young Con- have received critical acclaim throughout the world.
remarkable reputation in just over a decade, performing at
cert Artist International Competition in New York City, the 2000
neighboring institutions, festivals, and abroad. The DME has
Woolsey Hall Competition, the 2000 Artist International Competi- Daniel Goldblum (contrabasson) is an undergraduate bassoon
premièred works by composers La Monte Young, John Cage,
tion, and the 1997 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. performance major at U-M. He maintains a career as an elec-
and Philip Glass, as well as performing and recording with Pau-
The former principal clarinetist of the Oklahoma City Philharmonic tric bassoon soloist and an improviser between Ann Arbor and
line Oliveros and “Blue” Gene Tyranny.
and the New Haven Symphony, Mr. Burrow was also associate Los Angeles, his home town.
professor of clarinet at the Wanda L. Bass School of Music at Okla-
homa City University. In 2007, he was also named principal clari- Joseph Gramley (percussion) is a professor of music at the
A graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy, Kyle Acuncius
net of the Quartz Mountain Music Festival, clarinetist for Camerata University of Michigan and director of the university’s famed
(percussion) received his bachelor’s degree from the Eastman
Pangaea, instructor at the Alpen Kammermusik Festival, and Art- Percussion Ensemble. Mr. Gramley’s dynamic and exciting per-
School of Music, his master’s degree from Indiana University
ist/Clinician for Buffet Crampon, USA.  Mr. Burrow appears in formances as a soloist have garnered critical acclaim and enthu-
(where he was an Associate Instructor of Percussion), and is
concerts internationally. siasm from emerging composers, percussion aficionados, and
currently pursuing a specialist’s degree in percussion as well as
first-time concert-goers alike. He is committed to bringing fresh
receiving a second master’s in chamber music literature from
Jeremy Crosmer (cello, ONCE Quartet) is a doctoral student at U-M, and inventive compositions to a broad public and often commis-
U-M. He has served as principal percussionist of the Terre
studying cello with Richard Aaron. He is also studying composition sions and premières new works. His first solo recording, Ameri-
Haute Symphony Orchestra and is currently section percus-
as a masters student under Paul Schoenfield. Mr. Crosmer is an can Deconstruction, an expert rendition of five milestone works
sionist with the Ann Arbor Symphony. Mr. Acuncius can be
avid performer of new music and has premièred over 30 works in in multi-percussion’s huge new modern repertoire, appeared in
heard on the Eastman Wind Ensemble’s release Manhattan
addition to his own compositions. Last year his work for string quar- 2000 and was reissued in 2006. His second CD, Global Percus-
Music, featuring the Canadian Brass, and also on the Inter-
tet and electronics, Chrysalis Infinitum, was premièred at U-M. sion, was released in 2005. An invitation from Yo-Yo Ma in 2000
lochen Percussion Ensemble’s self-titled album.
led Mr. Gramley to join Mr. Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble. In addi-
Please refer to page 29 for a biography of Michael Daugherty. tion to participating in the group’s extended residencies in cities
Roger Arnett (technical director) has served as the media engi-
across the globe, he has toured with Mr. Ma and the Ensemble
neer for the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance since 1978.
John Ellis (piano) is associate professor of piano and chair of throughout the world. This past season, Mr. Gramley was the
He has worked with a wide range of artists including compos-
the piano department at U-M. He is in demand, nationally and featured guest artist for both the New York and Alabama Days of
ers George Crumb and Karlheinz Stockhausen, film producer
internationally, as a master class clinician, adjudicator, and lec- Percussion sponsored by the Percussive Arts Society.
Robert Altman, conductor Leonard Bernstein, jazz legends
turer on piano pedagogy. His recent travels have taken him to
Dizzy Gillespie, Billy Taylor, and Bob James, blues singers Sip-
the University of South Florida, the Sibelius Academy in Hel- Daniel Graser (saxophone) is currently a doctoral teaching as-
pie Wallace and Leon Redbone, and Marcel Marceau.
sinki, Finland, and Hawaii. As a pianist, Mr. Ellis has performed sistant at U-M studying with Donald Sinta. Mr. Graser earned
a master’s degree from U-M and bachelor’s degrees in mu- bel Cala Records, and one with Naxos Records. She will soon (ACO) commissioned and premièred her Myrrha for voices and
sic theory/history and saxophone performance as a student of release recordings of the Jennifer Higdon Oboe Concerto with orchestra in Carnegie Hall in May 2006. Her orchestral work 45
Dr. Timothy McAllister at the Crane School of Music. He has the U-M Symphony Band, and the works of Dutilleux for oboe. The Narrows won the top prize of ACO’s Underwood Emerging
performed twice as soloist with the U-M Symphony Band and Ms. King was a finalist in the Fernand Gillet Oboe Competition Composer Commission in the ACO’s 2004 Whitaker New Music

ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

was a two-time finalist in the U-M Concerto Competition. At the held in Graz, Austria, and has been heard as soloist on WQXR Readings. Ms. Kuster earned her DMA from U-M and divides
invitation of music director Michael Tilson Thomas, Mr. Graser radio in New York City and NPR’s Performance Today. She has her time residing in both Ann Arbor and New York City. Ms.
is saxophone fellow at the New World Symphony during the appeared as an international recitalist and was a member of Kuster joined the faculty of the U-M School of Music, Theatre &
current 10/11 season. the jury for the esteemed 2009 Barbirolli Oboe Competition. Dance as assistant professor of composition in 2008.

Pia Eva Greiner (cello) studied with professors Jan-Ype Nota Christopher James Lees (conductor) has appeared in concert
Mark Kirschenmann (director, Creative Arts Orchestra) whose
and Michel Strauss at the Prins Claus conservatory in the Neth- with the National Arts Centre Orchestra (Ottawa, Canada), En-
pioneering live electric trumpet performances are internation-
erlands beginning in 2001. During this period she won several semble Orchestral de Paris (Vendome, France), Cabrillo Fes-
ally acclaimed, is a composer, performer and scholar of cre-
national competitions. Ms. Greiner is continuing studies at U-M tival Orchestra (Santa Cruz, CA), Cleveland Heights Chamber
ative improvisation. He is also the creative force behind the
with professor Richard Aaron where she graduated with her Orchestra, and the Michigan Sinfonietta.  In 2007 he made
band E3Q (blockmrecords.org), an eclectic jazz-influenced trio
master’s degree in May 2010. his debut in South America with a performance of Beethoven’s
with his wife, cellist Katri Ervamaa, and percussionist Michael
Symphony No. 5 at the Festival Internacional de Inverno de
Gould. Most recently, he released the solo album entitled This
David Jackson (trombone) was featured soloist at several recent Campos do Jordao (Brazil). As only the second American con-
Electric Trumpet (sonikmannrecords.com), recorded with the
engagements, including performances at Midwest Band and ductor selected for the Zander Conducting Fellowship with the
Nashville-based electronica duo Sub-ID and has appeared with
Orchestra Clinic in Chicago, Music at Gretna in Mt. Gretna, Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, Mr. Lees assisted conductor
pianist Thollem McDonas, bassist Henry Grimes, flutist Nicole
PA, and with the Ann Arbor Concert Band. He was also guest Benjamin Zander in performances with the Boston Philhar-
Mitchell, cornetist Rob Mazurek’s Sao Paulo Underground,
soloist with the Los Angeles Symphonic Winds, both in Los monic, Ulster, and London Philharmonia orchestras. Mr. Lees
saxophonists Oliver Lake and Arthur Blythe, and pianist Iiro
Angeles and at the MidEurope Festival in Schladming, Aus- received the 2009 Arts Alive Award for Rising Star Young Artist
Rantala of Trio Töykeät. As a composer and writer, he explores
tria. Other recent solo performances include the Interlochen while serving as associate conductor for the Akron Symphony
the confluence of composition and improvisation. He has pub-
World Youth Wind Symphony and with the Idyllwild Festival Orchestra and has worked with musicians including Lorin
lished articles on Messiaen’s use of improvisation as a com-
Wind Ensemble at Disney Hall in Los Angeles. An advocate of Maazel, Pinchas Zuckerman, Marin Alsop, and Gustav Meier.
positional technique, and on new approaches to melodic jazz
new music, Mr. Jackson has commissioned and performed the A dedicated advocate for contemporary American music, Mr.
improvisation. He is on the faculty at U-M, where he shares his
world premières of numerous works for the trombone. He is a Lees has given première performances of numerous orches-
time between the School of Music (Jazz) and the Residential
Conn-Selmer artist and clinician. tral and chamber works, founded a Composer-in-Residence
College. He also directs U-M’s Creative Arts Orchestra, an in-
program as music director of the Akron Youth Symphony, and
novative, creative improvisation ensemble, and the Michigan
Fritz Kaenzig (tuba) has served as principal tubist of the Florida served as associate conductor of the Boston-based Juventas
Youth Jazz Ensemble. Mr. Kirschenmann holds PhD degrees in
Symphony Orchestra and as additional or substitute tubist with New Music Ensemble. He holds a master’s degree from U-M,
composition and music theory from U-M and lives in Ann Arbor
Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw and the symphony orchestras of where he studied with Kenneth Kiesler.
with his wife and their three children.
Detroit, San Francisco, Houston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and St.
Louis, under such conductors as Bernstein, Haitink, Leinsdorf, Sam Livingston (percussion) is currently a senior at U-M where
Ozawa, Salonen, and Slatkin. He has recorded and performed Cary Kocher (percussion) trained at U-M under Michael Udow, he pursues undergraduate studies with Joseph Gramley, Mi-
as soloist with several of these orchestras, as well as appearing the late Charles Owen, and Salvatore Rabbio. He  has a di- chael Udow, Cary Kocher, Ian Ding, and Brian Jones. He is a
as soloist with the US Air Force and Navy Bands. Since 1984, verse performing schedule that includes work with the Ann native of Madison, WI, and has performed as a soloist with the
Mr. Kaenzig has been principal tubist in the Grant Park (Chi- Arbor Symphony and other area orchestras. He has a weekly Concord Chamber Orchestra in Milwaukee.
cago) Orchestra during summers, which has played to capacity gig with Latin jazz group Los Gatos, and plays drums with the
audiences since moving to the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Easy Street Jazz Band. He co-leads a classic vibraphone quar- Jeffrey Lyman (bassoon) has established himself as one of the
Park in 2005. Mr. Kaenzig has performed in ensembles ac- tet with bassist Paul Keller, provides vibes for Dave Bennett’s première performers, teachers, and historians of the bassoon
companying artists as widely varied as Alan Ginsberg, Luciano tribute to Benny Goodman, and plays drums and sings with in the US. He has been associate professor of bassoon at U-M
Pavarotti, and the Moody Blues. Espresso. As a middle school music teacher in Ann Arbor, Mr. since 2006, and, prior to that, held positions at Arizona State
Kocher adjudicates at jazz festivals and clinics, directed the University and Bowling Green State University. He has been a
Nancy Ambrose King (oboe) is the first-prize winner of the Third Gold Jazz Ensemble at Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp for several member of numerous orchestras across the country and has
New York International Competition for Solo Oboists, held in years, and teaches jazz vibes and drums at U-M. performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Metropolitan
1995. She has appeared as soloist throughout the US and Opera Orchestra, the Opera Company of Philadelphia, the Sa-
abroad, including performances with the St. Petersburg, Rus- Yi-Ting Kuo  (violin, ONCE Quartet) was born and raised in vannah Symphony, the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Co-
sia, Philharmonic, the Janáček Philharmonic, the Tokyo Cham- Taiwan. Currently, she is a doctoral student at U-M, studying lumbus, the Grand Rapids Symphony, and the Michigan Opera
ber Orchestra, the Puerto Rico Symphony, the Orchestra of the with Yehonatan Berick. Theater. Mr. Lyman has frequently appeared on the international
Swan in Birmingham, England, the Festival Internacionale de festival circuit, most notably at the Moscow Autumn Festival, the
Musica Orchestra in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the New York Composer Kristin Kuster (piano) “writes commandingly for Festival dei Due Mondi (Spoleto, Italy), Académie Européene
String Orchestra, Cayuga Chamber Orchestra, and Sinfonia da the orchestra,” and her music “has an invitingly tart edge” d’Été de Musique (Tournon, France), Colorado Music Festival,
Camera. She has performed as recitalist in Weill Recital Hall (The New York Times). Professor Kuster’s colorfully enthrall- Vermont Mozart Festival, Bellingham Music Festival, Saint Bart’s
and as soloist at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. She has ing compositions take inspiration from architectural space, Music Festival (French West Indies), and the Chamber Music
recorded three CDs for Boston Records, two for the British la- the weather, and mythology. American Composers Orchestra Conference and Composers’ Forum of the East at Bennington
 College. He performs annually at the conferences of the Inter- Please refer to page 54 for a biography of Steven Rush. ceived commission awards from the Hanson Institute for Amer-

PHOTO: Will Calcutt/Andrea Steves

46 national Double Reed Society and is a popular clinician at bas- ican Music, PRISM Saxophone Quartet, New Music Project,
soon master classes. Mr. Lyman is also known as an author and Anna Skálová (violin, ONCE Quartet), native of the Czech Re- and Asia Trombone Seminar. Her music has been recorded
advocate of new music, and has many publications and com- public, started playing the violin at the age of four. In 2007 on the Innova and Blue Griffin Recording labels. Ms. Yen is
ONCE. MORE. ONCE NOW / THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4

missions to his credit, including works by Yuri Kasparov, John she participated in the New York String Orchestra Seminar as currently on the faculty at the Hong Kong University of Science
Steinmetz, John Allemeier, David Gompper, Bill Douglas, and assistant concertmaster and in 2009 she won “First Prize” in and Technology, teaching music composition.
Kathryn Hoover. His article After Shostakovich, What Next?, an the American String Teachers Association Competition in At-
annotated bibliography of recent music by Moscow composers, lanta. She is a senior at U-M studying with Stephen Shipps. Ms.
helped to spread that repertory around the world. Skálová has played concerts in Germany, Italy, France, Poland,
the US, and Singapore and has participated in master classes
Stacie Mickens (French horn) is currently pursuing her doctor- with Shlomo Mintz, Rugierro Ricci and Jacques Israelievitch.
ate of musical arts at U-M. She previously served on the music
faculty at Luther College in Decorah, IA, and at Winona State One of America’s most versatile tenors and enlightened mu-
University in Winona, MN, where she was a horn and brass in- sicians, George Shirley (narrator) remains in demand nation-
structor and chamber music coach. In addition to her teaching, ally and internationally as performer, teacher, and lecturer. He
she is a frequent solo recitalist and chamber music participant. has won international acclaim for his performances with the
Her primary teachers include Adam Unsworth, Douglas Hill, Metropolitan Opera and with major opera houses and festivals
Bryan Kennedy, and Michael Gast. internationally. Mr. Shirley has recorded for the RCA, Columbia,
Decca, Angel, Vanguard, C.R.I, Capriccio, Philips, and Albany
Hoi Yue Ng (viola, ONCE Quartet), started playing the violin at labels; he received a Grammy Award in 1968 for his role (Fer-
the age of six and in 2005 was awarded Fellowship of Trinity rando) in the RCA recording of Mozart’s Così fan tutte. He has
College London (in violin). Born and raised in Hong Kong, Hoi performed more than 80 operatic roles over the span of his 51-
Yue won numerous prizes at the annual Hong Kong Schools’ year career, as well as oratorio and concert literature with some
Music Festival. Hoi Yue is currently an undergraduate pursuing of the world’s most renowned orchestras and conductors. He
a dual degree in viola performance and biology at U-M. was the first black tenor and second African-American male
to sing leading roles with the Metropolitan Opera, where he re-
Three-time international prize-winning flutist Amy Porter (flutes) mained for 11 years as leading artist. He was the first black high
has been acclaimed by major critics as an exciting and inspir- school vocal music teacher in the Detroit Public Schools and the
ing American artist who matches “her fine controlled playing first black member of the US Army Chorus in Washington, DC.
to a commanding, sensual stage presence.” Ms. Porter first Mr. Shirley is The Joseph Edgar Maddy Distinguished University
leapt to international attention winning the Kobe International Emeritus Professor of Music and Director Emeritus of the Vocal
Flute Competition in Japan, which led to invitations to perform Arts Division of the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance.
throughout the world. She is a touring concert artist who per-
forms recitals in the major concert halls of Asia and the US with Before coming to U-M, Adam Unsworth (French horn) served as
pianist Christopher Harding. She has performed internationally fourth horn of The Philadelphia Orchestra from 1998– 2007.
as concerto soloist with orchestras and has been heard in recit- Prior to his appointment in Philadelphia, he spent three years
al on NPR and highlighted on PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center. as second horn of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. He also
Recently, Ms. Porter has had four world-première commissions served as a guest principal horn with the St. Louis Symphony
composed for her. In 2010, Carl Fischer Publishing produced as well as principal horn of the Colorado Music Festival. A for-
and released her latest DVD, The ABC’s of Flute Playing for mer faculty member at Temple University, he has appeared at
the Absolute Beginner, with Larry Clark, Vice President, Editor- many universities throughout the US as a recitalist and clini-
in-Chief of Carl Fischer Music. This year she will visit Slovenia cian. Mr. Unsworth recorded Jazz Set for Solo Horn (2001) as
for the 8th Slovenian Flute Festival, Brazil for the International part of Thoughtful Wanderings, a compilation of Hill’s works
Flute Festival, the Oklahoma Flute Society, the Texas Flute So- for horn. In 2006, he released his first jazz CD entitled Excerpt
ciety, Classic Chamber Concerts in Naples, Florida, the National This!, which features five of his original compositions for jazz
Flute Association Convention in Anaheim, and participated in the sextet and three unaccompanied works.
2010 ARIA International Summer Academy.
Ming-Hsiu Yen (piano), a native Taiwanese, is an active com-
Theresa Prokes (violin) began studying the violin at the age poser and pianist. Her compositions have been played by the
of four at Buffalo Suzuki Strings. In the Buffalo area she has Minnesota Orchestra, YinQi Symphony Orchestra and Choir
appeared as a soloist with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orches- (Taiwan), University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, and
tra, the Ars Nova Chamber Orchestra, the Clarence Summer by the PRISM Saxophone Quartet, Brave New Works, and OS-
Orchestra, and the Amherst Symphony Orchestra. She is cur- SIA. She has been the winner of the Heckscher Composition
rently pursuing a master’s in violin performance at U-M with Prize, the governmental Literary and Artistic Creation Compe-
Yehonatan Berick. tition (Taiwan), Sun River Composition Competition (China),
and League of Composers/ISCM-USA Competition, and has re-
 47

Andrea Steves’ PAT undergraduate thesis performance. ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3
 WELCOME I am intrigued by the irony of it all. Twenty-five years af-

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

48 ter ONCE, the regents of the University of Michigan in-
augurated the Center for Performing Arts & Technology
by Mary H. Simoni,
(CPAT). What happened after ONCE that laid the foun-
University of Michigan
dation for CPAT? The simple answer is the persistent,
associate dean for research and community
visionary leadership of Paul Boylan and the unwavering
engagement, professor of performing arts
support of James Duderstadt. By the time I arrived in
technology
Ann Arbor in 1986 from the Berklee College of Music,
Paul and James had already sown the seeds for that
first planting. My job, as I saw it, was to cultivate the
25th Anniversary fields that seemed bound only by human imagination
and technological prowess. No one really knew exactly
of the U-M Center for what that first harvest might bring.
Performing Arts By now, we know.

Technology
Friday, November 5, 2010,
11:00 am–6:45 pm
University of Michigan North Campus
Ann Arbor

Free and open to the public.

 49

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

Mary Ashley amongst Space Theatre projection screens (August 1964).
 SCHEDULE Mary Simoni and PAT students, Music and Sound Design
25th Anniversary Celebration

PHOTO: Makepeace Tsao

50 the questions that tempt the sleeper is composed of
11:00 am–12 noon
three interwoven monologues, each centered on dif- Artist Biographies
U-M CENTER FOR PERFORMING ARTS TECHNOLOGY 25TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION / FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5

ferent methods of enquiry in the moments between

Mobile Phones for Musical Performance
sleep and wakefulness. Each monologue employs a As associate professor and chair of the department of
Design Lab #1, Duderstadt Center
set of musical and literary devices that reference the performing arts technology, Jason Corey teaches and
2281 Bonisteel Boulevard
history of the art while suggesting a unique interaction conducts research in the areas of sound recording and
This workshop explores how current mobile smart
of the literary and performing arts. The mobile phone production, technical ear training, and multichannel
phones such as Apple Computer’s iPhone can be used
ensemble becomes a modern-day chorus, while con- audio. He recently published Audio Production and
as musical instruments. We will investigate urMus, a
temporary dance and theater inform motifs drawn from Critical Listening: Technical Ear Training (Focal Press/
platform that allows us to define what kinds of musi-
literary modernism and surrealism. Ultimately, howev- Elsevier). He is a member of the Audio Engineering
cal instruments we want to use and how they should
er, the piece seeks to draw insight from the moments Society, the Acoustical Society of America, the Interna-
sound. Along the way, we will explore what music-mak-
in which we are made aware of ourselves and others, of tional Computer Music Association, and the Society for
ing with mobile devices means and think about playing
searching and loss, as inspired by Virginia Woolf, from Music Perception and Cognition.
in a mobile ensemble. Far beyond playing ring tones
whose novel To the Lighthouse the title is derived.
and mp3 songs, this workshop will focus on how to
Jeremy Edwards is a drummer/percussionist, record-
create new ways to play, perform, and enjoy music. Led
4:00–6:00 pm ing engineer, composer, and educator. He received a
by Georg Essl.
Reception bachelor’s degree in music technology and percussion
Studio 2, Walgreen Drama Center and a master’s degree in improvisation from U-M. Mr.
12 noon–1:00 pm
1226 Murfin Edwards has actively toured the US and Canada per-
Lunch Break
Celebrate the 25th Anniversary of U-M’s Center for forming original music and continues to perform locally
Performing Arts Technology with rock, jazz, and experimental music groups. He
1:00–1:55 pm
works for the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance
Timbral Sensitivity: Developing Aural Skills for Electronic
as a music and multimedia computer specialist.
Music Composition and Sound Recording 6:00–6:45 pm
Audio Studio, Duderstadt Center Gypsy Pond Music XII: An Interactive Installation
Georg Essl, assistant professor in computer science and
Timbre can be described as the tone quality or texture by the Digital Music Ensemble
performing arts technology at the University of Michi-
of sound. Since timbre is used as a means for artistic Stephen Rush, Director
gan, holds a PhD in computer science from Princeton
expression in the fields of electronic music composi- “The Pond,” East side of the Earl V. Moore Building
University. He is founder and director of the Michigan
tion and sound recording, a heightened sensitivity to The Digital Music Ensemble celebrates the 12th year
Mobile Phone Ensemble and has also helped co-found
timbre and the sonic effects of audio equipment are of Gypsy Pond Music, based on a story about Stephen
and co-direct the Stanford University and Berlin Mo-
required for composers and engineers. This workshop Rush. Visiting Hungary and longing to hear Gypsy mu-
bile Phone Orchestras. His current research in mobile
will explore some of the aural skills that are addressed sic, Mr. Rush went to cafés and roamed the streets only
phones as musical instruments is motivated by his be-
through technical ear training. Led by Jason Corey. to be disappointed. After two weeks of searching, he
lief that the joy of music-making should be accessible
decided to take the train. There, at the train station,
to all people and inventing new expressive technologies
2:00–2:55 pm he heard a two-hour impromptu concert of authentic
are essential to this goal.
Integrating Emerging Technologies and Music Performance Gypsy music. As John Cage noted, “Music is (indeed!)
Teleconference Room, Duderstadt Center all around us, if only we had ears to hear.”
Tim Flood is a composer, improvisor, and programmer
This workshop will investigate new technologies be- Students from music, art, engineering, and dance
specializing in live interactive electronic performance.
ing used by composers and performers and explores studies enroll in the Digital Music Ensemble. The stu-
Currently, he is a lecturer of performing arts and tech-
how these tools have influenced modern music. The dents create a site-specific work on “The Pond” that
nology at the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance.
session will include live performance, demonstrations, is inspired by their deep and personal encounter with
He has also taught electronic music and media courses
as well as a brief historical look at technology’s role in these stories and traditions. The Digital Music En-
at Alma College, and bass performance at Albion Col-
music performance. Led by Jeremy Edwards and semble has recorded with Pauline Oliveros and “Blue”
lege. Mr. Flood has recorded a critically acclaimed CD
Tim Flood. Gene Tyranny, and has premièred works by Philip
entitled Bodies and Soul (CIMP) with free-jazz legends
Glass, John Cage, and La Monte Young.
Frank Lowe and Charles Moffett.
3:00–3:55 pm
the questions that tempt the sleeper
Please refer to page 54 for a biography of Stephen Rush.
A play by Shannon Dowd and Mary Simoni
featuring the
Please refer to page 54 for a biography of Mary Simoni.
Michigan Mobile Phone Ensemble
Georg Essl, Director
Video Studio, Duderstadt Center
51

ONCE. MORE. SYMPOSIUM / WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3

Milton Cohen’s Space Theatre, Ann Arbor.
52 U-M Center for Written, Composed,
and Directed by
Connect the Dots

Performing Arts Technology Andy Kirshner

25th Anniversary Concert

Jennifer Furr peacock blue for loudspeakers
Michael Coletti, Percussion
Dane Crozier, Percussion
Katri Ervamaa, Cello Erik Santos KATA-KATA for Percussion Duo and Recorded Sound
Arthur Greene, Piano
Andy Kirshner, Video Projections and Mr. Coletti, Mr. Crozier
Sound Design
Stephen Rush, Piano
Solomia Soroka, Violin Intermission

Roger Arnett, Technical Director

Saturday, November 6, 2010 at 8:00 pm Mary Simoni Piano Trio for Piano, Violin, and Cello with Electronics
Rackham Auditorium Movement I
915 East Washingtong Street Movement II
Ann Arbor Movement III

Free and open to the public. Ms. Ervamaa, Mr. Greene, Ms. Soroka

Stephen Rush BukMix for Computer and Piano

Mr. Rush
Connect the Dots Hot Hand. This device contains technology that senses
human motion and transmits the data wirelessly to a
Artist Biographies 53
Andy Kirshner
receiver connected to a computer. The computer ana-
Please refer to page 44 for a biography of Roger Arnett.

U-M CENTER FOR PERFORMING ARTS TECHNOLOGY 25TH ANNIVERSARY CONCERT / SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6
Connect the Dots is the first completed scene from a lyzes the data from the Hot Hand and responds by cre-
feature film that I am currently developing, entitled  ating a sonic signature that corresponds to the speed
Finnish-born cellist Katri Ervamaa, DMA, is a versatile
Liberty’s Secret: The National Security Musical. It is the and trajectory of the human hand. The composer mod-
performer who specializes in chamber music, new
story of Liberty Smith, an aspiring star of “Christ-cen- ified the Hot Hand from its original form as a ring to a
music, and creative improvisation. Her current groups
tered musical comedy,” who becomes vice-president bracelet that is attached to the bow arm of the violinist
include the Muse String Trio, Brave New Works new
of the US. When innocent young Liberty stumbles onto and cellist.
music ensemble, and E3Q, an improvisation-based
a shocking government secret, she’s confronted by the genre-defying trio with her husband Mark Kirschen-
full force of American Power—and only the teamwork Program note by Mary Simoni.
mann and percussionist Michael Gould. She is on the
of a family-values preacher and a lesbian biker gang faculty at U-M’s Residential College where she is the
can save her. The development of the project has been head of the music program. Ms. Ervamaa is a mother
supported by the Office of the Vice President for BukMix for Computer and Piano (2001) of three and lives in Ann Arbor with her family.
Research at the University of Michigan. For further infor- Stephen Rush
mation, please visit www.libertysecretmovie.com. Programming by Greg Syrjala Jennifer Blair Furr holds a DMA in composition from
the University of Michigan where she was a Regents
Program note by Andy Kirshner. Bukmix is another installation in my lifelong fascina- Fellow. Her works have won awards from SCI/ASCAP,
tion with poet Charles Bukowski (madman? genius? IAWM, and have been performed at ICMC, the U-M
drunk?). It is especially fitting for the ONCE. MORE. Electronic Music Studios Microfestivals, and the Aspen
peacock blue for loudspeakers (2010) Festival to feature Bukowski, since his publisher, Black Music Festival. Most recently her work has been fea-
Jennifer Furr Sparrow Press, had deep connections to Ann Arbor in tured on WCBN’s radio show Special Ed. Ms. Furr is
the 1960s. currently a lecturer in the University of Michigan de-
The text from BukMix is taken from Bukowski’s partment of performing arts and technology.
readings from Ham On Rye, his autobiography (of
KATA-KATA for Percussion Duo and Recorded
sorts). The texts reflect deeply felt hatred of his parents’ Born in New York, Arthur Greene studied at Juilliard with
Sound (2005)
friends, a stifling father, and a search for deep beauty Martin Canin. Mr. Greene was a Gold Medal winner in
Erik Santos
amid dysfunction. These things all rang sadly true for the William Kapell and Gina Bachauer International
me as well, hence my sordid interest in these particular Piano Competitions, and a top laureate at the Busoni
KATA-KATA for percussion duo was written for Eric and
quotes from Ham On Rye. International Competition. He performed the complete
Stacey Jones (aka Equal Temperament Percussion
The quotes are “fed” to the performer—as well as solo piano works of Johannes Brahms in a series of
Duo) for the 2005 Percussive Arts Society International
to the audience—in chapters, or families. Each chapter six programs in Boston, and recorded the complete
Convention in Columbus, Ohio. Kata-kata is the name
has a short pre-written composition (á la Well-Tuned etudes of Alexander Scriabin for Supraphon. He has
of a particular style of Japanese rattle that is used to
Piano by La Monte Young). The performer then plays performed the 10-sonata cycle of Alexander Scriabin
brighten a child’s spirit when they are sad or scared.
the written work, followed with improvisation based in Sofia, Kiev, and Salt Lake City. He has recorded to-
In the darkness, a voice whispers in Japanese: “Now it
on the composition. The improvisation is definitely in- gether with his wife, the violinist Solomia Soroka, the
begins. Don’t forget, you don’t have to be afraid...” The
spired, as well, by “Blue” Gene Tyranny’s work. “Blue” Violin-Piano Sonatas of William Bolcom and the Violin-
text was written and spoken by Toko Shiiki.
was originally known as Robert Scheff, a member Piano Sonatas of Nikolai Roslavets, both for Naxos. He
of the ONCE Group. The text and the improvisation gave the Ann Arbor première of John Corigliano’s Pia-
Program note by Erik Santos.
(piano-music) are manipulated by a computer running no Concerto with the University Symphony Orchestra,
MAX/MSP, programmed by my lifelong friend and col- Kenneth Kiesler conducting, in February 2006.
laborator, Greg Syrjala, an engineer from Rochester,
New York. Andy Kirshner  is a composer, writer, performer, and
Piano Trio for Piano, Violin, and Cello with All told, the performance is an integrated envi- filmmaker who makes hybrid performances and musi-
Electronics (2009–10) ronment with “computer mitigation” certainly, but an cal films. An associate professor at U-M, Mr. Kirshner
Mary Simoni opportunity for the audience member as well as the is jointly appointed by the School of Music, Theatre &
performer to reflect on his or her childhood, and con- Dance, and the School of Art & Design. His work has
Piano Trio is a three-movement work that explores the template one’s own journey, both the pluses and mi- been commissioned by the National Endowment for
number five and its relationship to the fingers of the hu- nuses. All things in balance. the Arts, Artserve Michigan, Meet the Composer, and
man hand. The technological premise of the piece cor-
the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust.
relates the grouping of five with a device known as the Program note by Stephen Rush.
 Stephen Rush has premièred and recorded his classical Violinist Solomia Soroka, born in L’viv, Ukraine, is
54 and jazz compositions worldwide as well co-authored a among the most accomplished Ukrainian musicians of
book on jazz theology, Better Get It In Your Soul. He has her generation. She has won top prizes in three presti-
U-M CENTER FOR PERFORMING ARTS TECHNOLOGY 25TH ANNIVERSARY CONCERT / SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6

performed with Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Grimes, Steve gious international violin competitions held in the former
Swell, Eugene Chadbourne, Pauline Oliveros, “Blue” Soviet Union—the Prokofiev, Lysenko, and Zolota Osin’
Gene Tyranny, the late Peter Kowald, and his band, competitions. Ms. Soroka earned her master’s degree
Yoganaut. His music has been performed by Leonard summa cum laude and completed postgraduate studies
Slatkin, Neeme Jaarvi (Detroit Symphony Orchestra) at the Kyiv Conservatory later serving on its faculty in the
and has been recorded by members of the Cleveland chamber music department. She has a DMA from the
Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic. Eastman School of Music.

Erik Santos  is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, and

singer in many musical genres, including rock, clas-
sical, electronic, and music for theater and dance.
Awards for his music include the Charles Ives Scholar-
ship and the Charles Ives Fellowship from The Ameri-
can Academy of Arts and Letters, Broadcast Music
Incorporated (BMI), the MacDowell Colony. His record-
ings can be found on the Naxos American Classics,
Centaur, Eroica and Oddfellow labels.

Mary Simoni, associate dean for research and com-

munity engagement at the U-M School of Music, The-
atre & Dance, has done post-doctoral studies at the
Stanford University Center for Computer Research
in Music and Acoustics, the City University of New
York Center for Computer Music, and the Mills College
Electronic Music Studios. Her music and multimedia
works have been performed in Asia, Europe, and
widely throughout the US, and have been recorded
by Centaur Records, the Leonardo Music Journal
published by the MIT Press, and the International
Computer Music Association. She is a recipient of the
Computer World Honors Award for her research in
digital music information retrieval. Professor Simoni
has appeared as a pianist, using live electronics at the
Society for Electroacoustic Music in the US and the In-
ternational Computer Music Association, of which she
is a past president. She has authored books, A Gentle
Introduction to Algorithmic Composition, published by
the University of Michigan, and Analytical Methods of
Electroacoustic Music, published by Routledge. The
Knight Foundation, the Kellogg Foundation, the Na-
tional Science Foundation, and the Michigan Council
for the Arts and Cultural Affairs have funded her re-
search.
COLLABORATORS, For Mark Clague’s The Creativity of Community, Sources +
Further Reading:
of academic possibilities for its students. The school itself of-
fers a wide range of programs, from traditional to cutting-edge, 55
THANK YOUS, + CREDITS Gerhard, Roberto. “Is Modern Music Growing Old?” in
from primarily performance-based to academically centered.
The faculty is first rate, with active performing careers, yet still
Gerhard on Music: Selected Writings, edited by Meirion very much resident. The School of Music, Theatre & Dance of-
Bowen (Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate, 2000). fers its students extraordinary performance opportunities, with
Finney, Ross Lee. Profile of a Lifetime: A Musical Autobiography more than 450 concerts, recitals, and staged performances
MAJOR FUNDING PROVIDED BY presented each year.
(New York: C.F. Peters, 1992).
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Interviews by the author with Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma,
Roger Reynolds, and Donald Scavarda (July 2010). One of the oldest performing arts presenters in the country,
“International Conference of Composers” in The Encyclopedia the University Musical Society of the University of Michigan
of Music in Canada (online) at (UMS) is committed to connecting audiences with performing
www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com. artists from around the world in uncommon and engaging
James, Richard S. “ONCE: Microcosm of the 1960s Musical experiences. With a program steeped in music, dance, and
and Multimedia Avant-Garde,” American Music 5:4 theater, UMS contributes to a vibrant cultural community by
(Winter, 1987), 359–90. presenting approximately 60–75 performances and over 100
Miller, Leta. “ONCE and Again: The Evolution of a Legend- free educational activities each season. UMS also commis-
ary Festival,” essay in Music from the ONCE Festival, sions new work, sponsors artist residencies, and organizes
1961–1966 (New York: New World Records 80567-2, collaborative projects with local, national, and international
2003), 13–104. Note: this 5-cd set of archival ONCE partners. While proudly affiliated with the University of
ADDITIONAL FUNDING PROVIDED BY Festival recordings is recommended to those interested in Michigan and housed on the U-M campus, UMS is a separate
George Cacioppo Memorial Fund further listening. not-for-profit organization that supports itself from ticket sales,
The Penny Stamps Distinguished Speaker Series of the Mumma, Gordon. “The Once Festival and How It Happened,” grants, contributions, and endowment income.
University of Michigan School of Art & Design Arts in Society 4:2 (Summer, 1967), 379–98.
University of Michigan Digital Media Commons of the Peckham, Howard H. The Making of The University of Please refer to page 34 for information on the Penny Stamps
Duderstadt Center Michigan, 1917–1992 (Ann Arbor: Bentley Historical Distinguished Speaker Series.
University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance Library, 1994).
University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities Reti, Jean. “An International Conference of Composers,” Tempo
University of Michigan Office of the Vice President for 55/56 (Autumn-Winter, 1960), 6–7.
For further information on addi-
Research Weingarten, Emily. “The Music of ONCE: Perpetual Innovation,”
tional festival events and exhibits,
University Musical Society of the University of Michigan unpublished student paper, 2008.
please visit www.ums.org/ONCE or
scan the QR code to the left with
Credits COLLABORATORS your mobile device.
Makepeace Tsao’s ONCE photographs courtesy of the The Institute for the Humanities is a center for innovative, col-
Tsao Family. laborative study in the humanities and arts. We provide fel-
lowships for Michigan faculty, graduate students, and visiting
Donald Scavarda photographs courtesy of the composer. scholars who work on interdisciplinary projects. We also offer
a wide array of public and scholarly events, including weekly Front Cover (L–R): Roger Reynolds, Donald Scavarda, and
Special thanks to Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma, brown bag talks, public lectures, conferences, art exhibits, and George Cacioppo (Ann Arbor, 1963); photo: Bernard Folta.
Roger Reynolds, and Donald Scavarda for their time, performances. Our mission is to serve as a national and inter- Gathering of students of Roberto Gerhard (Ann Arbor, 1960)
generosity, and essential contributions to ONCE. MORE. national centerpiece for scholarly research in the humanities (see page 9 for complete identification of subjects); photo:
and creative work in the arts at the University of Michigan. We Donald Scavarda.
Special thanks to Laura Kuhn, executive director of the John exist to deepen synergies between the humanities, the arts and ONCE Group at Robert Rauschenberg’s loft (New York, 1965)
Cage Trust; and Leta Miller, professor of music, University of other regions of the university, to carry forward the heritage of (see page 35 for complete identification of subjects);
California, Santa Cruz, for generously allowing the reprinting of the humanities, and to bring the voices of the humanities to photo: Makepeace Tsao.
her work in this publication. public life.
Back Cover (L–R): Mary Ashley’s famous 1964 ONCE Festival
ONCE. MORE. festival guide co-edited by Mark Jacobson, poster. (L–R): Gordon Mumma, Donald Scavarda, George
Founded in 1880, the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance is
University Musical Society of the University of Michigan (UMS) Cacioppo, Robert Ashley, Martina Algire (model).
one of the finest performing arts schools in the country. Encom-
and Stephanie Harrell, U–M Institute for the Humanities. Outdoor performance of Mary Ashley’s Truck (1963); photo:
passing programs in dance, music, musical theater, and the-
Makepeace Tsao.
ater, it is consistently ranked among the nation’s top performing
Designed by Savitski Design, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Milton Cohen’s Space Theatre (1964); photo: Makepeace
arts schools. Its setting within a highly ranked research univer-
Tsao.
sity adds to its uniqueness and opens up a breadth and depth