Santa Fe New Music Presents Master Accodionist/Composer Guy Klucevsek

Friday, November 9, 2007 • 7 pm
Scottish Rite Center, 463 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, NM

Paris in 1886? Vienna in 1925? How about Santa Fe in 2007? Guy Klucevsek will make you forget everything you thought you knew about the accordion!

Santa Fe New Music continues its 2007-2008 season with a performance featuring guest artist, accordionist Guy Klucevsek. Widely known in music circles for his virtuosic and intensely interesting interpretations of new music through the familiar strains of the accordion sound, Klucevsek will make his first Santa Fe appearance on November 9, 2007 at the Scottish Rite Center in Santa Fe.

With his commission “Polka From the Fringe,” a collection of 32 post-modern two-steps by such composers as Carl Finch, Fred Frith, Christian Marclay and Elliott Sharp, and his performances world wide with his group, “Ain’t Nothin’ But A Polka Band,” Guy Klucevsek is recognized as a leading performer of new music played on an old-world instrument, the accordion.

Deemed “a trailblazing virtuoso,” by the Wall Street Journal, Klucevsek will perform a program of music from modern composers from Burt Bacharach to John Zorn, along with selections from his recent CD, “The Well-Tampered Accordion,” featuring 12 short études, preludes, chorales, dances and a fantasy.

“Santa Fe New Music is excited about bringing Guy to town,” says SFNM’s Artistic Director, John Kennedy. “He is a consummate musician; an advocate of expanding the repertoire, through his many commissions and projects—and his concert program is artfully able to combine sounds, old and new, in a remarkable and entertaining setting.”

In Klucevsek’s concert, audience-members will recognize hints of Bartok, Copland, Gottshalk, Eastern European folk music, Middle Eastern melodies, along with minimalism and sound-bending innovation through some of today’s most interesting composers.

In celebration of Klucevsek’s Santa Fe appearance, the film “Accordion Tribe: Music Travels” will be screened at the Film Center at 1616 St. Michael’s Drive, on November 8 (the night before the concert) at 7:45 p.m. Mr. Klucevsek will be on hand to introduce the film.

Program:

About Guy Klucevsek:

Guy Klucevsek has created a unique repertoire for accordion through his own composing and by commissioning over 50 works from composers including John Zorn, Aaron Jay Kernis, Lois V. Vierk, Fred Frith, Alvin Lucier, Mary Ellen Childs, William Duckworth, Jerome Kitzke, Stephen Montague and Somei Satoh. He has collaborated with many leading artists, such as Ping  Chong, on music-theater pieces; and as a soloist with the Berlin Jazz Festival, New Music America, Serious Fun! at Lincoln Center, Bang on a Can, and the children’s television show Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

Guy Klucevsek has also performed and/or recorded with Laurie Anderson, Anthony Braxton, Fred Frith, the Kronos Quartet, Pauline Oliveros, Present Music, John Zorn, and other leading ensembles of new music. His work has been recorded by many artists including Dave Douglas, Relache, Aki Takahashi, and Margaret Leng Tan.

In 1996, Klucevsek formed The Accordion Tribe, an international line-up of composer/accordionists Maria Kalaniemi (Finland), Lars Hollmer (Sweden), Bratko Bibic (Slovenia), Otto Lechner (Austria), and Klucevsek (USA). They have released two recordings on the Intuition label, and are the subjects of the Stefan Schwietert documentary film, “Accordion Tribe: Music Travels,” which was released in theaters across Europe in 2004-2005, and featured at film festivals in North America.

Klucevsek has released 17 recordings as soloist/leader, including Polka Dots & Laser Beams and  Who Stole the Polka?, which were chosen as the best recordings of 1992 by John Schaefer on the nationally-syndicated radio program New Sounds, and  Transylvanian Softwear, which was cited as a 1995 Recording of Special Merit in Stereo Review. You can also hear him on John Williams's scores for the Steven Spielberg films The Terminal and  Munich. He has performed on Broadway in "Fiddler on the Roof," "Victor/Victoria" and "Piaf."