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.
A symphony of 300 bells at the Chicago Philharmonic
November 13, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
November 13, 2017 by John von Rhein In separate concerts over the weekend, two similarly named groups, Third Coast Percussion and Third Coast Baroque, reminded audiences of the increasingly vital roles new classical music and early music play in the performing arts life of Chicago. The quartet of virtuoso percussion players calling themselves Third Coast Percussion has worked on several projects with Chicago composer Augusta Read Thomas. None are more ambitious, more grandly scaled or more rewarding to everybody than her “Sonorous Earth,” a quasi-concerto for more than 300 bells (and other resonant pieces of metal) and symphony orchestra. The four-movement work had its world premiere by the Chicago Philharmonic on Sunday afternoon at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance. Although “Sonorous Earth” draws some of its musical materials and its movement titles from “Resounding Earth” (a 2012 piece for solo percussion Thomas wrote for the Third Coast group),…
Grammy-Winning Third Coast Percussion Preparing For Ambitious World Premiere
November 8, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
November 6, 2017 WDCB's Gary Zidek visited our studio as we prepare our world premiere concerto that explores the layers of bell sounds. Gary even got a "Bells 101" crash course as he explored the instruments we play in Augusta Read Thomas's Sonorous Earth. He interviewed David and Sean about the concerto, its growth from a previous collaboration with Thomas, and the universality of the bell sounds that make up the work. Hear the full interview and explore his photo gallery in "The Arts Section." "It's taking a piece that we love [Thomas's Resounding Earth] and have played so many times, and reimagining it with one of Augusta's favorite mediums to write for: the full symphony orchestra. It's the best of both worlds in that way." -David Skidmore We will premiere the concerto with the Chicago Philharmonic on Sunday, November 12, at 3:00pm in Chicago's Harris Theater.
Seaworthy Beats
October 25, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
October 21, 2017 by Gregory Sullivan Isaacs The Nasher Sculpture Center's Soundings season opens with Third Coast Percussion and an original score for the film Paddle to the Sea. Soundings: New Music at the Nasher is an always-intriguing series at the Nasher Sculpture Center that features the music of our time. On Wednesday, the curators outdid themselves by presenting an ensemble called Third Coast Percussion that performed a live soundtrack to a 1966 Oscar-nominated movie, Paddle to the Sea. It is based on a well-known Canadian children’s book (1941) with the same title by Holling Clancy Holling. The book is in short chapters, designed to be a series of bedtime stories. The film adds an environmental message. The 28-minute movie is available on YouTube here. It was heavily edited and expanded for the performance, extending to 65 minutes. The story concerns a Native Canadian boy who carves a miniature canoe with a seated Native Canadian…
Third Coast Percussion at The Nasher Sculpture Center
October 20, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
October 20, 2017 by Scott Cantrell The Nasher Sculpture Center's "Soundings" would be hard to dethrone as the area's most inventive, even provocative, classical concert series. Curated by pianist Seth Knopp, it mainly focuses on new music, but often with illuminating associations with older fare. The 1966 Bill Mason film Paddle to the Sea, itself based on the eponymous 1941 children's book by Holling C. Holling, was the engine of Wednesday's performance by Third Coast Percussion, a Grammy Award-winning ensemble in residence at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. The program drew a literally SRO audience to the Nasher's basement auditorium; even after additional chairs were brought in, some people were left standing. Facing a side wall, the audience was arranged in semicircles around an array of tuned and untuned percussion instruments. Episodes from the film, about the waterborne adventures of a child's small, hand-carved American Indian in a canoe, were projected…
Chicago Philharmonic Presents New Work by Augusta Read Thomas with Third Coast Percussion
October 19, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
October 18, 2017 by BWW News Desk The Chicago Philharmonic returns to Harris Theater on November 12 for the third year, proudly presenting the world premiere of Augusta Read Thomas' Sonorous Earth with 2017 Grammy award-winning Third Coast Percussion. This celebration of commonality across cultures and the "extraordinary beauty and diversity inherent in bell sounds" (Thomas), was inspired by her 2012 composition Resounding Earth with the groundbreaking Chicago percussion ensemble and features heavily Thomas' trademark use of bells with over 300 pieces of metal sourced from a range of cultures and historical periods. The Chicago Philharmonic Society commissioned this work by Thomas, an acclaimed Grammy winning and Pulitzer nominated composer who is currently University Professor at the University of Chicago. Thomas devoted 18 months to composing Sonorous Earth, which can be heard as a "United-Nations-of-Resonances." The work is also co-commissioned by the Eugene Symphony who will present the West Coast…
Third Coast Percussion Soars After Winning Grammy Award
August 31, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
August 29, 2017 by Louis Harris Last year’s Ear Taxi Festival put Chicago’s vibrant contemporary art music scene on display, demonstrating a deep and talented community of local composers and performers. One of the brightest lights of our scene is Third Coast Percussion, a quartet of classically trained musicians who specialize in hitting objects with mallets, drum sticks, hammers, hands, fingers—anything that elicits a rhythmic sound from another object. ... Their music is not centered on bongos or a drum kit; rather, it features marimbas, vibraphones, bells, triangles, cymbals, chimes, gongs, and all manner of resounding objects. The ensemble has now won their first Grammy, toured internationally, and completed their first collective musical compositions. In reflecting on TCP’s aspirations, Skidmore said, “To continue to reach new audiences is a big thing for us, and that means not just here in the States but also overseas. We’d like to do more international touring, including…
CD Reviews: The Book of Keyboards
, by Third Coast Percussion
by Blair Sanderson August 29, 2017 For its third release on the New Focus label, the Chicago-based ensemble Third Coast Percussion presents works by the French composer Philippe Manoury in an album of intriguing tone color studies called "The Book of Keyboards." ... The performances have a hypnotic quality, and Third Coast Percussion delivers plenty of atmosphere, though the ensemble’s playing is clearly well-rehearsed and precise. ... Click here to read the full review.
CD reviews: a Reich retrospective.
July 22, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
April 15, 2016 by Patrick Rucker REICH: Third Coast Percussion: Cedille Records In artistic matters, labeling anyone “the greatest” almost always boils down to oversimplification or hyperbole. But it is difficult to argue with Kyle Gann, who wrote that Steve Reich “may be considered, by general acclamation, America’s greatest living composer.” Reich turns 80 in October, and the Chicago-based group Third Coast Percussion has devoted its latest recording to works spanning his long career. TCP — Sean Connors, Robert Dillon, Peter Martin and David Skidmore — describe themselves as “second generation” Reich interpreters, meaning that none of them worked with the composer and all of them came of age when his music was already established in the repertory. (more…)
Three Takes on a Minimalist Pioneer
July 18, 2016, by Third Coast Percussion
by Allan Kozinn July 4, 2016 Not so long ago, new recordings of Steve Reich’s music, while intended, on one level, for the enjoyment of the composer’s fans, were just as importantly in the business of documenting Mr. Reich’s evolving style. Most of the performances were by his own ensemble, Steve Reich and Musicians, or by the musicians who commissioned the works, usually with Mr. Reich supervising. It was not certain that these works would ever have second recordings, and at the time that didn’t matter: When you have music that is essentially rhythm-driven, with motoric surfaces and a modernistic rejection of emotionalism in favor of precision, what more do you need than a recording made under the composer’s imprimatur? As it turns out, Mr. Reich’s work is as interpretable as the Beethoven string quartets or the Boulez piano sonatas. Alarm Will Sound made that point with its debut recording,…
Top 10 Classical Albums
January 4, 2017, by Third Coast Percussion
December 23, 2016 by Zoë Madonna REICH: MALLET QUARTET, SEXTET, NAGOYA MARIMBAS AND MUSIC FOR PIECES OF WOOD Third Coast Percussion These Chicago-based percussion adventurers ride Reich’s phasing waves with a subtle hint of slink. This is a record so translucent and playful that the phrases seem to leap out of your headphones, and individual blocks of wood melt into a blissful flow. Click here for original article.
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