PRESS RELEASE
June 11, 2024
Biophony: Solstice Presented by Metropolis Ensemble and Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Grammy-nominated NYC new music pillar Metropolis Ensemble announces live performances of Simeon ten Holt's minimalist landmark Canto Ostinato for over 50 musicians on the Summer Solstice, June 20, 2024, in collaboration with acclaimed instrumentalist/composer Erik Hall, and Grammy-nominated Sandbox Percussion, featuring an immersive sonic experience at sunrise and sunset at Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Brooklyn Botanic Garden's Cherry Esplanade. Photo by Michael Stewart, courtesy of Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Brooklyn, New York— Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Metropolis Ensemble today announced “Biophony: Solstice,” an immersive sonic experience on the summer solstice, celebrating new energy and abundance, and featuring a world-premiere large-scale arrangement of composer Simeon ten Holt's lyrical gem, "Canto Ostinato."
Created by visionary NYC new music pillar Metropolis Ensemble with Brooklyn’s Grammy-nominated Sandbox Percussion and acclaimed Michigan musician/composer Erik Hall for over 50 percussionists (from the Mannes School of Music at The New School) and strings, keyboardists and wind players from Metropolis Ensemble, "Biophony: Solstice" is the culmination of a four-season collaboration between Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Metropolis Ensemble. The project is produced by artistic director Andrew Cyr in collaboration with composers/arrangers Benjamin Wallace, Ledah Finck, and David Leon.
On the longest day of the year, June 20, 2024, Metropolis will present an intimate arrangement of "Canto Ostinato" with Sandbox Percussion and pianist Erik Hall at 5:00am on Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s famed Cherry Esplanade, just as the sun rises at 5:24am. After the sun arcs the stunning 52-acre gardens, the day will end with an epic 50-musician rendition of “Canto Ostinato” starting at 7:30pm in the Plant Family Collection until the sun sets at 8:30pm, celebrating the start of summer in the Northern Hemisphere.
Erik Hall's 2023 album release of Simeon ten Holt's Canto Ostinato.
In early 2023, Erik Hall released an acclaimed interpretation of Simeon ten Holt's blissfully adventurous magnum opus “Canto Ostinato,” the second album in a trilogy of reinterpretations that began in 2020 with the release of Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians. Metropolis Ensemble founder and conductor Andrew Cyr discovered the piece through a feature in The New York Times that included Hall, who had recently released Canto Ostinato via Austin record label Western Vinyl. They ultimately linked up, with Cyr finding the ideal time and backdrop to showcase the piece in a live setting.
Written for four pianos from 1976 to 1979 by the late Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt, Erik’s take on the piece is freshly framed as an intimate, hour-long solo performance consisting of multi-tracked grand pianos, electric piano, and organ. Canto Ostinato is inherently vast, and its score gives great creative license to the performers. Comprising 106 sections, complete freedom is given to repeat each one as many or as few times as desired. Additional leeway is given with regard to dynamics, articulation, and even instrumentation.
For this singular Brooklyn event, the ensemble will consist of 30+ percussionists, 4 keyboards, and 16 strings and saxophones. Working collaboratively over 9 months, a team of composers (Benjamin Wallace, Ledah Finck, and David Leon) partnered with Erik Hall, Jonny Allen (Sandbox Percussion) and Andrew Cyr (Metropolis) to develop the expanded arrangement, which gives artists complete freedom in the dynamics, articulation, and instrumentation used in the performance.
Tickets for "Biophony: Solstice" are free with Garden admission. Visit bbg.org/biophony for tickets and more information.
More details about the project:
metropolisensemble.org/solstice
Featured Artists in the Installation:Erik Hall
Ian Rosenbaum
Jonny Allen
Terry Sweeney
Victor Caccese
Estelle Choi
Alfredo Colon
Ledah Finck
Umi Garrett
Mira Glenn
Madison Greenstone
Charlotte Greve
Irene Han
David Leon
Jennifer Liu
Nora Stanley
Kevin Sun
Amy Tan
Sarah Thomas
Yuma Uesaka
Henry Wang
Artist Quotes:Erik Hall provides some additional background and insight:
"Since recording the piece alone at home I've dreamed of performing it live with other musicians. I couldn't have asked for a more exciting or ideal opportunity than this. Metropolis Ensemble and Sandbox Percussion are world-class musicians and thinkers, and I'm simply honored and invigorated to be working on the piece in their company. Canto Ostinato’s score allows for ample decision-making within a certain framework. In previously realizing the piece, I constructed a small world out of a mere three keyboard instruments. This time the palette comprises several keyboards, extensive mallet percussion, woodwinds, and strings, and rather than just fall straight into fanfare, we want to use these many tones to go deep into the inherent beauty of the piece."
Cyr and Jonny Allen (Sandbox Percussion) chime in on the event as well:
“Simeon ten Holt’s Canto Ostinato seems to have its own gravitational pull, drawing in performers and listeners alike. Drawing on a ten-year plus history of collaboration between Sandbox and Metropolis, we are thrilled to be working closely with pianist/composer Erik Hall to develop a large-scale World Premiere arrangement for 50+ percussionists, keyboards (analog synths and Rhodes), strings, and saxophones for Brooklyn Botanic Garden. We are looking forward to celebrating this work’s immersive kaleidoscopic sound and ecstatic music making potential as the sun rises and sets on the summer solstice!”
About the Biophony Series“Biophony: Solstice” is the fifth and culminating partnership and collaboration between Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Metropolis Ensemble; previous projects include the "Biophony: SoundGarden" installation in the conservatory gardens in 2023; “For the Birds” opening celebration in June 2022; and “Biophony Festival,” an outdoor musical adventure across the gardens, in both May 2022 and September 2021. Thousands of visitors have experienced these performances from BBG's "Art in the Garden" series.
About Erik HallErik Hall is a musician, composer, and record producer in southwest Michigan. He has recorded and performed solo, as In Tall Buildings, and with NOMO, Wild Belle, His Name Is Alive, and Lean Year, appearing at Lollapalooza, Austin City Limits, Coachella, Pitchfork Music Festival, SXSW, WOMEX, Montreal Jazz Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, CONAN, and The Tonight Show. As a producer/engineer Erik has worked on records for Lean Year (Western Vinyl), Natalie Bergman (Third Man Records), Small Sur (Worried Songs), and Justin Walter (Kranky). He composed the score for the feature film The Night Clerk (2020) and contributed music to The Mountain (2019), which premiered worldwide at the Venice International Film Festival and in the US at Sundance. In 2020 Erik released his solo re-creation of Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians, which won the 2021 Libera Award for Best Classical Record. He followed in 2023 with a multitracked reinterpretation of Simeon ten Holt’s Canto Ostinato. More »
About Sandbox PercussionDescribed as “exhilarating” (The New York Times) and “utterly mesmerizing” (The Guardian), Grammy-nominated ensemble Sandbox Percussion is dedicated to artistry in contemporary chamber music. The ensemble was brought together in 2011 by a love of chamber music and the simple joy of playing together; today, Sandbox Percussion captivates worldwide audiences with visually and aurally stunning performances. Sandbox members have collaborated with Metropolis since 2014, including Ian Rosenbaum, Jonny Allen, Terry Sweeney, and Victor Caccese. Their 2021 album Seven Pillars was nominated for two Grammy awards — Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance and Best Contemporary Classical Composition. More »
About Andrew CyrA champion of new work, Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr has led premiere performances at venues ranging from Cité de la Musique (Paris, FR), The Met Museum, Celebrate Brooklyn(!), New Victory Theatre, Hamer Hall (Melbourne, AU), Radio City Music Hall, BAM’s Next Wave Festival, and the Tonight Show. Cyr’s work as conductor has been described by Esa-Pekka Salonen as “precise, rhythmically incisive and fluid. He made complex new pieces sound natural and organic.” Described as a “prominent influence in the world of newly emerging music” (Washington Post), Cyr’s passion for creating new platforms for outstanding composers and performing artists led him to found Metropolis Ensemble in 2006. More »
About Benjamin WallaceDescribed as "Brilliant, humorous, and rhythmically complex," (Tacoma Symphony) Ben Wallace is a composer, percussionist, and keyboard player hailing from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Ben's music spans a wide range of styles from chamber and orchestral, to disco and samba, and occasionally into the video game remix world. He is a founding member of DiscoCactus, a VGM remix band, and INVISIBLE ANATOMY, an ensemble of hybrid composer/performers. More »
About David LeonDavid Leon is a Miami-born saxophonist, woodwinds player, composer, and improviser living in Brooklyn, New York. His work is guided by a persistent search for vitality through autonomy, contradiction, hyperbole, and humor. Most recently, David was named a 2024 Music Composition Fellow by the CINTAS Foundation, an organization supporting Cubans in the arts. He was also awarded a Roulette 2024 Jerome Commission to support the creation of a hybrid work of chamber music and wordless puppet theatre, A Divine Echo, which premiers at Roulette Intermedium in May 2024. More »
About Ledah FinckLedah Finck is a violinist, violist, improviser, and composer based in NYC. A passionate performer, creator, and curator of contemporary classical and experimental music, she is a co-founder of the Bergamot Quartet, as well as Tropos and earspace ensemble. As a composer, she has been commissioned by Imani Winds, Alarm Will Sound/Now Hear This, Ayane and Paul, the Bridge Ensemble, and The Peabody Community Chorus among others. Her music embodies a desire to create and share a sound-world in which the classical tradition, the folk music with which she grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and an extensive improvisatory sensibility can be in productive dialogue. More »
About Brooklyn Botanic GardenBrooklyn Botanic Garden is an urban botanic garden that connects people to the world of plants, fostering delight and curiosity while inspiring an appreciation and sense of stewardship of the environment. Situated on 52 acres in the heart of Brooklyn and open year-round, the Garden is home to over 12,000 kinds of plants and more than 30 specialty gardens. More »
About Metropolis EnsembleMetropolis Ensemble is a Grammy-nominated nonprofit organization dedicated to commissioning and producing ambitious creative projects and expanding opportunities for emerging professional musical creators and performers to inspire audiences. They partner with world-class institutions to create, commission, and produce site-specific performances, new works, recordings, and digital experiences. More »
About Mannes School of MusicMannes School of Music at The New School has transformed the traditional music conservatory by integrating rigorous classical training with real-world experience and cross-disciplinary learning. Work hands-on with award-winning faculty to develop as an artist at one of the best music schools in New York City. Sandbox Percussion hosts a summer seminar for percussionists in partnership with the Mannes School, and this year’s participants are featured in the Biophony Solstice project at Brooklyn Botanic Garden. More »
Press Contacts
Armistead Booker, Metropolis Ensemble
press@metropolisensemble.org
(757) 870-4591
Elizabeth Reina-Longoria, Brooklyn Botanic Garden
communications@bbg.org
(718) 623-7241
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