Pioneer Works and the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) present the world premiere of Earl Howard’s Boson1, a flexible-instrumentation structured improvisation for ten musicians and a performer of live sound processing. This performance is the outcome of a series of workshops at the composer’s home, where the performers learned to become conversant with Howard’s unique compositional and improvisative languages. The nineteenth installment of Pioneer Works’ False Harmonics series, which explores alternative approaches to composition, improvisation, and performance, the evening will also feature contrasting works performed by musicians of International Contemporary Ensemble.

Program

Fay Victor: SafeHarbor Shade for voice and bassoon

Isabel Lepanto Gleicher: Del Lago for open instrumentation

Ingrid Laubrock: Koans (selections) for voice and cello

Rick Burkhardt: Prologue for flute, percussion, violin, cello

Nicole Mitchell: Birdsongs for Equitable Togetherness for open instrumentation

(Intermission)

Earl Howard: Boson1 (2024, World Premiere) for electronic performer and ten musicians

International Contemporary Ensemble

Now in its third decade, the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) is a multidisciplinary collective of musicians, digital media artists, producers, and educators committed to building and innovating collaborative environments in order to inspire audiences to reimagine how they experience contemporary music and sound. The Ensemble creates a mosaic musical ecosystem as “America’s foremost new-music group” (The New Yorker), honoring the diversity of human experience and expression by commissioning, developing, recording, and performing the works of living artists. Co-founded in 2001 by flutist and MacArthur “genius” Fellow Claire Chase, the Ensemble has premiered over 1,000 works. The Ensemble has given performances at Warsaw Autumn, TIME:SPANS, Berliner Festspiele, HEAR NOW Los Angeles, Darmstadt International Summer Courses for New Music, Ojai Music Festival, and Big Ears Festival as well as in venues such as the Dutch National Opera, Cité de la Musique (Paris), Metropolitan Museum of Art, Carnegie Hall, Japan Society, Merkin Hall at the Kaufman Music Center, Fridman Gallery, Chelsea Factory, NYU Skirball and Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Earl Howard

Earl Howard has been performing his compositions and creating sound installations and soundtracks for over fifty years. His recent compositions include music for live electronics, electronic tape music as well as music for electronics and instruments. Howard's method of creating orchestrated sounds with electronics and adding live, improvisational performance creates unique, densely layered compositions. Howard has performed at numerous venues including Merkin Hall, the Whitney Museum, The Kitchen, The Knitting Factory, Roulette, and Carnegie Recital Hall. Howard is a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow, and he has received three New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships and a Fromm Foundation Commission.

Howard has performed nationally and international with such major artists as Georg Graewe, Mari Kimura, Mark Dresser, Anne LeBaron, Evan Parker, Thomas Buckner, JD Parran, Gerry Hemingway, Miya Masaoka, Mark Dresser, Ernst Reijseger, Mari Kimura, Carl Stone, Roscoe Mitchell, Wu Wei, Carl Stone, Richard Teitelbaum, David Wessel, and Maryanne Amacher. In 2005 he premiered a live improvisation with at CINMAT in Berkeley, California. In 2006 he was commissioned by the Donaueschinger Musiktage to produce a new ensemble work, Clepton. Howard has been guest synthesizer performer and sound designer for Anthony Davis’s operas, including the Metropolitan Opera’s performance of X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X, and Wakonda’s Dream. Howard has also produced soundtracks for some of the leading film and video artists, including Nam June Paik, Mary Lucier, Rii Kanzaki, Bob Harris, and Bill Brand.

Credits

Boson1 was commissioned by the International Contemporary Ensemble, with lead support from the New York State Council on the Arts.

The International Contemporary Ensemble’s performances and commissioning activities during the 2024-25 concert season are made possible by the generous support of our board of directors, many individuals, as well as the Mellon Foundation, Howard Gilman Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Robert D. Bielecki Foundation, Aaron Copland Fund for Music Inc., Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, The Arlene and Larry Dunn Fund for Afrodiasporic Music, Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts, Amphion Foundation, Cheswatyr Foundation, The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, Siemens Musikstiftung, New Music USA, Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, BMI Foundation, as well as public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council for the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, the Illinois Arts Council Agency, and the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) from the U.S. Small Business Administration. Yamaha Artist Services New York is the exclusive piano provider for the International Contemporary Ensemble.