Professional Development: Field Trips: Bolcom/Allen/Blend

PMP sponsored its largest and most far-reaching professional development field trip to date on December 7-10, 2002. Thirty representatives of 20 Greater Philadelphia music organizations traveled to New York City to attend three concerts of new music, jazz, and opera and participated in panel discussions with nationally renowned artists and arts administrators.

The trip opened with a program on Saturday evening by the Kitchen House Blend, the resident ensemble at the Kitchen in the West Village. The concert juxtaposed world premieres of works by three composers from widely varied backgrounds: Tiyé Giraud, a vocalist and percussionist whose work fuses African, South American, and U.S. folk traditions; clarinetist Evan Ziporyn, who has composed for such acclaimed new music artists as the Kronos Quartet, Bang on a Can All-Stars, and Wu Man; and jazz trumpeter Roy Campbell, whose premiere was a tribute to bassist Wilber Morris.

On Sunday morning, participants took part in a panel discussion on programming philosophies and practices with Don Byron, composer, clarinetist, and artist-in-residence at Symphony Space; Susan Cheng, Executive Director of the ensemble Music from China; and Karen Chester, Director of Merkin Concert Hall. The conversation was led by Frank Oteri, Editor of the American Music Center’s Web magazine, NewMusicBox. Panelists outlined their strategies for developing a unique programming identity, compared methods for introducing audiences to new genres, and discussed lessons learned from successes and failures in their own music programming and other artistic endeavors.

The roundtable was followed by an evening at New York’s legendary Village Vanguard. A trio of jazz masters, headlined by Geri Allen on piano with Buster Williams on bass and Billy Hart on drums, was presented in a program of modern works that highlighted the improvisational skills of each of these consummate artists. Allen, a Blue Note recording artist who emerged as a major force on the scene in the 1990s, is widely recognized for collaborations with Ornette Coleman, Charlie Haden, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams.

Monday’s roundtable featured a presentation by Chamber Music America Program Director Susan Dadian and Jazz Program Specialist Tom Bellino, who gave an overview of grants to music organizations offered by CMA, one of the nation’s leading music service organizations providing support for commissioning projects, new jazz works, and artist residencies, as well as awards for consulting and technical needs.

Their presentation was followed by a conversation with William Bolcom, the Pulitzer Prize–winning composer of A View From the Bridge, which had opened at the Metropolitan Opera the previous weekend. Mr. Bolcom discussed the process of adapting and composing the opera from the original Arthur Miller play on which it is based; the genesis and development of his compositional style; and philosophical and practical lessons learned in the course of his career as a composer, performer, and teacher.

Participants attended a performance of A View From the Bridge at the Metropolitan Opera on Monday evening. The opera, which has been described in the New York Times as "an involving and significant work," tells the tragic story of a Brooklyn longshoreman, Eddie Carbone, whose lust for his niece and obsession with preventing her from marrying an illegal Sicilian immigrant culminate in betrayal and bloodshed.