Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

Live from Merkin Concert Hall’s Ecstatic Music Festival 2012

“On Saturday, March 24 at 7:30 pm, ET, Q2 Music presents a live audio Webcast of the sold-out Ecstatic Music Festival concert of influential, indie pioneers Mountain Goats and the acclaimed early vocal music ensemble Anonymous 4.

The show centers around a performance of Transcendental Youth, a new song cycle by songwriter John Darnielle of the Mountain Goats presented here in an imaginative arrangement by violinist-composer Owen Pallett for voices, piano and guitar. Pallett, aside from releasing numerous albums under his own name (and previously as Final Fantasy), has worked extensively with such indie-rock icons as Arcade Fire and Grizzly Bear.”

See the full article here.

Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

Live from Merkin Concert Hall’s Ecstatic Music Festival 2012

“On Tuesday, March 20 at 7:30 pm ET, Q2 Music and New Sounds Live present a live audio webcast of composer and indie heavyweight Dan Deacon from Merkin Concert Hall’s Ecstatic Music Festival. Following on last year’s collaboration with So Percussion, Dan Deacon now teams up with NOW Ensemble and the Calder Quartet to present a series of world premiere works for chamber ensembles.”

Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

A live Webcast of the Ecstatic Music Festival

“On Wednesday, February 8 at 7:30 pm ET, John Schaefer of WNYC’s New Sounds Live hosts a live audio Webcast on Q2 Music of Son Lux, Arcade Fire’s Richard Reed Parry, and new-music heavyweights yMusic as part of the Ecstatic Music Festival‘s continued collaboration between classical and indie musicians.

John Schaefer

yMusic

Multi-instrumentalist and composer Richard Reed Parry, of the Grammy-winning rockers Arcade Fire, is also a founding member and producer of the Montreal-based instrumental group Bell Orchestre. Ryan Lott, who as Son Lux melds elements of electronica, indie rock, and classical composition, has earned accolades for his two LPs, At War with Walls & Mazes and We Are Rising, a record composed during a single month in response to an NPR challenge.

yMusic, a sextet of classically-trained New York-based composers, released their debut album, Beautiful Mechanical last fall. The record was rated the number-one classical release of 2011 by The New York Times and included compositional contributions from Son Lux along with indie rock luminaries St. Vincent and Shara Worden as well as from composer and Ecstatic Music Festival curator Judd Greenstein. The ensemble’s collaborative spirit is a microcosm for that of the festival: its members have collaborated with Grizzly Bear, The National, Björk and others.”

See the full article here.

Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

Just Announced: A Live Webcast of the Ecstatic Music Festival’s SOLD-OUT Opening Concert
Saturday, February 04, 2012

Jherek Bischoff

“This Saturday, February 4 at 7:30 pm ET, Q2 Music presents a live audio Webcast of the Ecstatic Music Festival’s sold-out opening concert, featuring Seattle-based producer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Jherek Bischoff. The concert marks the first-ever collaboration between Wordless Music Orchestra and the Ecstatic Music Festival.

Saturday’s show will feature Bischoff in collaboration with a number of A-list “rock” innovators, including David Byrne, Deerhoof’s Greg Saunier, Zac Pennington of Parenthetical Girls, singer/songwriter Mirah, Carla Bozulich of the influential alt-country band the Geraldine Fibbers, composer/performer Charlie Looker, and fellow Dead Science member Sam Mickens.”

Listen to Bischoff discuss Saturday’s upcoming performance in a recent interview with host Nadia Sirota.

See the full article here.

Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

An Evening of Musical Curiosity and Cross-Pollination at The Greene Space
Wednesday, February 01, 2012

“On Wednesday, Feb. 1 at 7 pm in The Greene Space, Q2 Music presents a live concert and videocast with a star-studded lineup of composer-performers from this season’s hotly-anticipated Ecstatic Music Festival 2012. Hosted by WQXR’s Terrance McKnight, the show includes performances by composer-percussionist Jason Treuting of So Percussion, multi-instrumentalist Angélica Negron of Arturo en el Barco, and musical polymath Jherek Bischoff of bands including Xiu Xiu and Parenthetical Girls. The evening also features conversation with composer and Ecstatic Music Festival curator Judd Greenstein.

Terrance McKnight

At the nexus of the active, New York-centric indie-classical scene, Merkin Concert Hall’s Ecstatic Music Festival made a name for itself in its inaugural year as a ground-breaking series emphasizing vibrant, adventurous ensembles and unlikely collaborations between composers from the pop and classical realms. In this its second year, the festival returns with an exciting new line-up of artists from diverse musical backgrounds and its signature emphasis on curiosity, risk and discovery.

See the full post here.

The New Canon streams Mondays at 4PM on Q2; encore presentations Wednesdays at 10AM and Sundays at 8PM on Q2.

Straddling the Divide between Indie Rock and Indie Classical

“On The New Canon this week, we chat with composer and Slow Six bandleader Christopher Tignor in advance of his performance with the genre-bending Ecstatic Music Festival, begging the question: Do we really need to distinguish between Indie Rock and Indie Classical?

Last year’s Ecstatic Music Festival was the bee’s knees and the dog’s bollocks, combining music from the independently-fueled classical and rock spheres and creating a veritable who’s who of the New York music scene. The idea was simple: Showing the connective tissue between these two seemingly disparate genres, but when you really chewed on all that was on offer, you started to wonder if there was more tissue than negative space and whether or not we really needed to distinguish between the two forms.

One of the champions of such world-rocking questions is Christopher Tignor, a composer and bandleader of Slow Six who rocks out classical and brings some epic symphonic measures to rock. With the return of EMF (including a show on Feb 9 with string orchestra A Far Cry and post-rock powerhouse This Will Destroy You), we pull Christopher into the Canon.”

The New Canon on Q2 is hosted by Olivia Giovetti

Olivia Giovetti

Q2 is the 24/7 New Music Stream from New York Public Radio

An Evening of Musical Cross-Pollination at The Greene Space
Wednesday, February 01, 2012

“On Wednesday, Feb. 1 at 7 pm in The Greene Space, Q2 Music presents a live concert and videocast with a star-studded lineup of composer-performers from this season’s hotly-anticipated Ecstatic Music Festival 2012. Hosted by WQXR’s Terrance McKnight, the show includes performances by new-music polymaths Jason Treuting, Angélica Negron, Sxip Shirey and Jherek Bischoff, as well as a conversation with composer and Ecstatic Music Festival curator and founder, Judd Greenstein.

Terrance McKnight

At the nexus of the active, New York-centric indie-classical scene, The Ecstatic Music Festival made a name for itself in its inaugural year as a ground-breaking series emphasizing vibrant, adventurous ensembles and unlikely collaborations between composers from the pop and classical realms. In this its second year, the festival returns with an exciting new line-up of artists from diverse musical backgrounds and its signature emphasis on curiosity, risk and discovery.

See the full article here.