From concert and album reviews to feature articles, Third Coast Percussion is in the news.
We are fortunate to have garnered critical acclaim and recognition for so many of our performances and projects. See for yourself what the buzz is all about by reading what the press has to say! Browse reviews, articles, and much more below.
Review: Third Coast Percussion and the Civic Orchestra Premiered new Concerto Sunday Night
May 14, 2019, by Third Coast Percussion
May 14, 2019 by Louis Harris The front of the stage at Symphony Center was cluttered with marimbas, vibraphones, wood slabs, cymbals, crotales, and other gear as Chicago’s Third Coast Percussion opened the Civic Orchestra of Chicago’s concert Sunday night with the world premiere of Meander, Spiral, and Explode by Christopher Cerrone. It was the start of an excellent concert by the training orchestra that backs up the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. If one were to judge an orchestra based on the younger players waiting in the wings, the CSO is obviously top notch. Under the baton of Ken-David Masur, the Civic, as it usually does, delivered a delightful program on Sunday night and displayed a level proficiency worthy of the big leagues. Naturally, given the stage set-up demands, the Grammy-Award winning quartet Third Coast Percussion went first. They were backed up by a smaller, 50-piece Civic ensemble that included a piano and a two-person percussion section, which…
Concert review: Cerrone’s “Meander, Spiral, Explode” with the Civic Orchestra
, by Third Coast Percussion
May 14, 2019 by Howard Reich The Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s recently ended seven-week strike meant that the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, too, fell silent during that time. Sunday evening’s performance in Orchestra Hall brought the young musicians back into the spotlight, and they seized it, opening with the world premiere of Christopher Cerrone’s “Meander, Spiral, Explode” for percussion quartet and orchestra. Third Coast Percussion collaborated animatedly with the orchestra in the gripping work, its three movements unfolding without pause. Though subtlety was not this composition’s strong point, there was no resisting Third Coast Percussion’s telegraphic opening statements, which pulsed over a relentless orchestral crescendo. The hypnotic incantations of the second movement eventually gave way to a propulsive finale, Third Coast Percussion’s speed demons giving listeners a great deal to marvel at. The program, sensitively conducted by Ken-David Masur, also included a solid performance of Debussy’s technically challenging “La Mer” and an…
Concert Review: Composer Portrait Frames Little As Social Interlocutor
May 13, 2019, by Third Coast Percussion
April 23, 2019 by Xenia Hanusiak This season, the Miller Theatre’s signature Composer Portraits series celebrates its 20th iteration. This vital and well-patronized series showcases the musical influencers of our time – composers and performers who are moving the needle of contemporary composition with assured and individual voices. The reputations of the featured artist are well validated. In the current season, the six composers have earned prestige awards ranging from the Pulitzer Prize to the MacArthur Fellowship: soprano/composer Kate Soper, performance artist/composer Du Yun, drummer/composer Tyshawn Sorey, Wang Lu, John Zorn, and David T. Little. The supporting musicians are integral, and for this season executive director Melissa Smey has snared the marquee names of contemporary music: International Contemporary Ensemble, Yarn/Wire, JACK Quartet, American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME), and Third Coast Percussion. The synergy between composer and performers is essential to the enterprise. The portrait experience is multi-layered. Each presentation features the composer as curator and spokesperson (an onstage conversation is part of the concert experience). Lara Pellegrinelli’s program notes provide…
Review: A Composer’s Redacted Music and Raucous Noise
, by Third Coast Percussion
April 19, 2019 by Zachary Woolfe Redaction was on my mind on Thursday, as the Mueller report was released to the public with swaths of its text blacked out for legal and security reasons. I didn’t think I’d encounter the same thing at the concert hall that evening. But near the end of the score for “AGENCY” — David T. Little’s raucous, passionate 2013 work for amplified string quartet and electronics, which was given its New York premiere at the Miller Theater at Columbia University — some of the notes are obscured by those distinctive blunt, dark rectangles. A musical score takes on the trappings — and with them, the aura of obfuscation and unknowability — of a classified government document. Which makes sense given the subject of “AGENCY”: the proximity of Pine Gap, a defense intelligence facility in Australia, to Uluru, an indigenous holy site also known as Ayers Rock. ... Each roughly half…
Album Review: Perpetulum
, by Third Coast Percussion
April 25, 2019 by InfoDad Team Minimalist music would be more readily dismissible if it did not occasionally stop taking itself so seriously. But give credit to Philip Glass, a master of the form: although much of what he has created sounds like New Age-y background music (which is readily dismissible), Glass often proffers a glimmer, or more than a glimmer, of amusement and cleverness that sets his work apart from similar material by other composers. Such is the case with Perpetulum, Glass’ first-ever work for percussion ensemble – and one whose portmanteau title (“perpetual” plus “pendulum”) gives a pleasant hint of its structure and approach, and of the fact that it is quite an enjoyable piece that does not include any deep emotional or intellectual material or expect major analysis from the audience. Third Coast Percussion, which commissioned Perpetulum, is an avant-garde group that also does not take itself…
In Review: David T. Little Composer Portrait
, by Third Coast Percussion
April 18, 2019 by Olivia Giovetti In physics, when an object vibrates at a high enough speed it appears to be still to the naked eye. The range of movement becomes so infinitesimal that it’s imperceptible. Sound, an act of vibration unto itself, is performed across a range of movement that we’re able to perceive through hearing. Accelerate the speed of sonic vibration high enough and you’re left with silence – or, perhaps more accurately, you’re left with an unknowable sound. Rounding out the Composer Portraits series at Miller Theatre on April 18, an evening of music by David T. Little fought for the unknowable with a ferociousness that has come to characterize Little’s visceral, voracious works. A kinetic mind, Little has an appetite that stretches not just across the breadth of ideas, but also across each idea’s own universe of vantage points. (Per the Miller Theatre’s program notes for the evening, he references The Hill, CNN, and…
Elkhart STEM+Music students to perform with Third Coast Percussion
April 30, 2019, by Third Coast Percussion
We are so proud and honored to be part of this fantastic program, in collaboration the University of Notre Dame's Center for Civic Innovation, DeBartolo Performing Arts Center, College of Engineering, and most especially, Jay Brockman. Thank you for the amazing work you are doing, and thank you for making us part of it! We'll be performing on Friday, May 3, with students from two South Bend area schools, and we'd love to see you there! Read about the program, the amazing students and teachers, and the work we've been doing together, below. April 30, 2019 by Erin Blasko With help from the University of Notre Dame, students at Roosevelt STEAM Academy and Pierre Moran Middle School spent several months this semester building instruments and composing music as part of STEM+Music, an educational program of the Center for Civic Innovation (CCI) and DeBartolo Performing Arts Center at Notre Dame. Working from kits…
The New Yorker: Goings On About Town
April 19, 2019, by Third Coast Percussion
April 11, 2019 Steve Smith Composer Portrait: David T. Little Widely admired as an opera composer, David T. Little applies his potent theatrical instincts to his instrumental works. This Miller Theatre “Composer Portrait” features two of his most provocative pieces. “Haunt of Last Nightfall,” inspired by a 1981 military massacre in El Salvador, is performed by Third Coast Percussion, the Chicago quartet that commissioned it. The American Contemporary Music Ensemble handles “AGENCY,” a string quartet encoded with subliminal references to global intelligence organizations and Australian Aboriginal lore. See the full classical music listing here.
7 Classical Music Concerts to See in NYC This Weekend
, by Third Coast Percussion
April 11, 2019 by David Allen Composer Portrait: David T. Little David T. Little at Miller Theater (April 18, 8 p.m.). Little is perhaps best and deservedly known for his operas, including “Dog Days” and “JFK,” so this composer portrait is a welcome opportunity to hear some of his instrumental music. Not that the music to be played here sets aside the political approach that he has taken in so much of his work. “Haunt of Last Nightfall,” for percussion quartet and electronics, takes its story from the 1981 El Mozote massacre in El Salvador by soldiers trained by the United States military; “AGENCY,” for string quartet and electronics, is a work about secrecy, itself written using ciphers. Third Coast Percussion and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble are on hand to perform. See the full listing here.
Third Coast Percussion Lays Down a Virtuosic Set at Samueli
April 11, 2019, by Third Coast Percussion
April 9, 2019 by Timothy Mangan "The virtuosity on display is a wonder to see and hear." "...opens up new vistas of sound..." "...invariably aimed at getting us closer to the music itself." "...one of the most entertaining and energetic concerts this listener has heard..." Perhaps a concert of music for percussion was a tough sell. Or maybe it was that the percussionists in question were appearing on the Segerstrom Center’s solid gold Chamber Music series, normally devoted to music by people with names like Mozart, Brahms and Schubert. Maybe word hadn’t gotten out. For whatever reason, there were plenty of empty seats Friday night in Samueli Theater when Third Coast Percussion gave one of the most entertaining and energetic concerts this listener has heard in quite awhile. Make no mistake, the Chicago-based quartet — Sean Connors, Robert Dillon, Peter Martin and David Skidmore, who all met when studying at…
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