It’s been a long time coming, but Shelter is finally here!
The latest collaborative work by Michael Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe is a modern oratorio that reunites the Bang on a Can founders with Deborah Artman (author of the libretto for 2001’s Lost Objects). Produced by Michael Riesman, this premiere recording was performed by Ensemble Signal under the baton of conductor Brad Lubman, and features solo voices Martha Cluver, Mellissa Hughes and Caroline Shaw…
continue readingJuly 29-30, the Britt Music & Arts Festival, presents the world premiere of Michael Gordon’s newest work for orchestra, Natural History, inspired by Crater Lake National Park in Oregon and commissioned by the Britt Orchestra as part of the 100th anniversary of America’s National Park Service.
Natural History will premiere the morning of July 29, 2016, on the rim of the lake at a location that Gordon scouted, with musicians spatially situated around the site…
continue readingOn Saturday July 1 The Crossing Choir premieres Michael Gordon’s concert-length work, Anonymous Man. The text is drawn from Gordon’s experiences living in a changing neighborhood on a street called Desbrosses in Lower Manhattan, meeting Julia Wolfe (to whom he is married), raising a family, and especially encounters with two homeless men who lived across the street.
The piece reaches a surprising epiphany — after the bombing of the neighboring World Trade Center, and a few years later when one of the homeless men dies and Gordon watches the outpouring of sympathy from the community — that evokes Lincoln’s funeral train going through the streets of Manhattan, including Desbrosses St…
continue readingThe PBS documentary “Symphony for Nature” is broadcast nationwide tells the story of the premiere of Michael Gordon’s inspirational work Natural History for orchestra, chorus, and Native American drummers.
The full recording of Natural History has been released on Cantaloupe Music in conjunction with the broadcast of the documentary. Click here to stream the full recording.
Gordon’s work, inspired by Crater Lake National Park in Oregon and commissioned by the Britt Orchestra as part of the 100th anniversary of America’s National Park Service, premiered the morning of July 29, 2016, on the rim of the lake with musicians spatially situated around the site…
continue readingIn a way, this is a tale of two cities
This past November I went to my hometown, Miami Beach, for a performance by the New World Symphony of my orchestral work, Gotham, a three-movement symphony that takes the city of New York as its subject. It is part of an ongoing project of ‘film symphonies’ that I am creating with filmmaker Bill Morrison to capture the aura of cities.
My family moved to Miami Beach from Nicaragua when I was eight years old…
continue readingI’m writing from Sicily, where I just arrived with my ensemble, the Michael Gordon Band. We’re playing a concert at the Etna Festival in Catania. As I’m sitting here in this beautiful Italian hotel, I’m thinking about how lucky I am to be able to travel around the world playing music. There’s no way that this could be possible without the weighty investment that most Western and Asian countries make in the arts. Those of us who perform and compose semi-popular music — that is, experimental, art, classical and jazz — cannot survive in the free market like rock, urban and country musicians do…
continue readingOn October 14 at Bowling Green State University, Mantra Percussion gives the US premiere of Michael Gordon's percussion sextet, Timber — followed by a North American tour that includes the Canadian premiere on October 22 at the X Avant Festival (with indie rock-duo Buke & Gass).
The new work, an evening-length tour de force scored for six graduated wooden 2x4s brings the physicality, endurance and technique of percussion performance to a new level…
continue readingOn November 29, Paul Hillier conducts the Coro Casa da Musica in Porto, Portugal in the world premiere of Michael Gordon's The Bird Watcher for chorus. Click here for more info!
Available now on iTunes and (in stunning wooden case) at Cantaloupe Music. Listen to NPR’s All Things Considered review.
Timber’s wooden CD case
[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2cubmnH6MQ]a 10min video about Timber
On August 30, Michael Gordon’s new percussion sextet, Timber, is released in a very cool wooden CD case on Cantaloupe Music, but is available now for download through iTunes…
continue readingOn November 29, Paul Hillier conducts the Coro Casa da Musica in Porto, Portugal in the world premiere of Michael Gordon’s The Bird Watcher for chorus. Click here for more info!