WHAT BELONGS TO YOU
an opera for tenor and chamber orchestra
September 26 and 28, 2024
7:30 PM
Alice Jepson Theatre
PHOTO: ERIN BAIANO Modlin
Thank You
THIS WORLD PREMIERE OF
WHAT BELONGS TO YOU
IS MADE POSSIBLE IN PART BY THE GENEROUS SUPPORT OF Louis S. Booth Arts Fund
E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation
Dewitt Fund for the Arts
This project is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
THANKS TO OUR 2024-25 MODLIN ARTS PRESENTS SEASON SPONSORS & COMMUNITY PARTNERS
A. Dale Mayo Fund
Virginia B. Modlin Endowment
H. G. Quigg Fund
Tucker-Boatwright Festival
Norman and Eleanor Leahy
William and Pamela O'Connor
Welcome
At Modlin Center for the Arts, we are committed to providing the University of Richmond campus and our broader community with the best in diverse, thoughtprovoking, and captivating performances. Each season is cultivated with our attention to showcasing artists who provide insight into our shared humanity. At the University of Richmond, we pledge to you—our patrons and partners, on campus and in our region—that the arts will provide broad access to rich voices, creative passion, and unforgettable experiences.
Paul Brohan, Executive Director
PHOTO:
Fall 2024
P Ticketed: Paid
F Free: Tickets Required
F Free: No Tickets Required
Modlin Arts Presents
Department of Theatre and Dance
Department of Music
World Premier
Modlin Commission
September
David Esleck Trio Thu 5 Sep 7:30pm
Family Weekend Concert Fri 13 Sep 7:30pm
Neumann Lecture on Music: Robert Fink Mon 16 Sep 7:30pm
What Belongs to You, an opera for tenor and chamber orchestra Thu 26 Sep 7:30pm Sat 28 Sep 7:30pm
What Belongs to You : Panel Discussion with Creative Team Fri 27 Sep 7pm
October
Stop Kiss
Thu-Sat 3-5 Oct 7:30pm
Sun 6 Oct 2pm F
Circa, Duck Pond
Thu 10 Oct 7:30pm P
Las Cafeteras
Fri 18 Oct 7:30pm P
Family Arts Day: Latin Ballet of Virginia, Fiesta del Sol
Sun 20 Oct
Art Activities 1pm Show 3pm F
Keith Phares, baritone
Thu Oct 24 7:30pm F
Master Class:
Keith Phares, baritone
Fri Oct 25 TBD F
Wagner & Kong Duo: Christoph Wagner, cello, Joanne Kong, piano
Fri 25 Oct 7:30pm F
14th Annual Celebration of Dance
Fri 25 Oct 7:30pm F
Step Afrika! Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence
Sat 26 Oct 7:30pm P
Fall Choral Concert
Sun 27 Oct 3pm F
The Soul Rebels
Thu 31 Oct 7:30pm P
November
Tessa Lark (violin), Joshua Roman (cello), and Edgar Meyer (double bass)
Fri 8 Nov 7:30pm
Jazz & Contemporary Combos Wed 13 Nov 7:30pm
Third Practice Festival
Fri 15 Nov 7:30pm Sat 16 Nov 2pm, 7:30pm
Popular Music Ensemble Tue 19 Nov 7:30pm
Jazz Ensemble with guest saxophonist Dr. Dan Puccio Wed 20 Nov 7:30pm
Miguel Zenón & Luis Perdomo, El Arte del Bolero Thu 21 Nov 7:30pm
The House That Will Not Stand
Thu-Sat 21-23 Nov 7:30pm Sun 24 Nov 2pm
Global Sounds Sun 24 Nov 3pm
Wind Ensemble Mon 25 Nov 7:30pm
December
Chamber Ensembles
Mon 2 Dec 7:30pm
University Symphony Orchestra Wed 4 Dec 7:30pm
Cécile McLorin Salvant Fri 6 Dec 7:30pm
51st Annual Festival of Lessons and Carols Sun 8 Dec 5pm, 8pm
Spring 2025
P Ticketed: Paid
F Free: Tickets Required
F Free: No Tickets Required
Modlin Arts Presents
Department of Theatre and Dance
Department of Music
World Premier
Modlin Commission
January
BODYTRAFFIC
Fri 24 Jan 7:30pm
February
Manual Cinema, Frankenstein Sat 1 Feb 7:30pm
Ronald Crutcher, cello Sun 2 Feb 3pm
Richard Becker, piano Wed 5 Feb 7:30pm
Lab Project: The Woman in Black Thu-Sat 6-8 Feb 7:30pm Sun 9 Feb 2pm
Billy Childs Quartet with Sean Jones, The Winds of Change Fri 7 Feb 7:30pm
Leyla McCalla Thu 13 Feb 7:30pm
Documentary Film Screening: The Sound of Santiago by Dr. Mike Davison and Ed Tillett Wed 19 Feb 7:30pm
Third Coast Percussion with Zakir Hussain Fri 21 Feb 7:30pm
University Dancers
40th Anniversary Concert Fri-Sat 28 Feb-1 Mar 7:30pm Sun 2 Mar 2pm
March
Kardeş Türküler
Sat 1 Mar 7:30pm
Doris Wylee-Becker, piano
Sun 2 Mar 3pm
Anzû Quartet
Wed 5 Mar 7:30pm
Kronos Quartet with Peni Candra Rini
Fri 21 Mar 7:30pm
Tanya Tagaq
Thu 27 Mar 7:30pm
April
Twyla Tharp Dance with Third Coast Percussion
Sat 5 Apr 7:30pm
Global Sounds Sun 6 Apr 3pm
Jazz & Contemporary Combos
Wed 9 Apr 7:30pm
Simone Dinnerstein, piano
Fri 11 Apr 7:30pm
Spring Choral Concert
Sun 13 Apr 3pm
Wind Ensemble
Mon 14 Apr 7:30pm
Popular Music Ensemble
Tue 15 Apr 7:30pm
Urinetown
Thu-Sat 17-19 Apr 7:30pm Sun 20 Apr 2pm
Chamber Ensembles
Mon 21 Apr 7:30pm
University Symphony Orchestra
Wed 23 Apr 7:30pm
Cuban Spectacular: From Mambo to Motown Thu 24 Apr 7:30pm
MODLIN CENTER FOR THE ARTS PRESENTS
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF
What Belongs to You
an opera by David T. Little
Based on the novel by Garth Greenwell
Karim Sulayman as “The American”
Alarm Will Sound
Alan Pierson, Music Director
Mark Morris, Director
Maile Okamura, Set and Costume Design
Nicole Pearce and Mike Faba, Lighting Design
Maciej Lewandowski, Stage Manager
Tonight’s performance will last approximately 90 minutes, including intermission.
PHOTO: CORY WEAVER
PROGRAM NOTES
Garth Greenwell’s debut novel What Belongs to You “tells the story of a man caught between longing and resentment, unable to separate desire from danger, and faced with the impossibility of understanding those he most longs to know.” This manifests as an infatuation with a hustler named Mitko, with whom the unnamed narrator begins a long, unstable, and ultimately destructive affair. The story is specific and personal, but the experience Greenwell describes is universal: the search for self and the desire to belong amidst loneliness and enduring heartbreak. It is no wonder I was drawn to adapt it as an opera: these themes have also haunted my own work over the years, alongside my interest in time, fate, and the sacred.
Like some of this earlier work, What Belongs to You looks back to look forward; toward the mysterious blend of the erotic and devotional found in Britten, Dowland, Monteverdi, Valentini, Schubert, and Grisey; to the seriousness of devotion found in artists like Zurbarán, and the patina of fading beauty evoked by vanitas paintings. These were all sources of inspiration for me as I composed What Belongs to You. Greenwell likewise tells his story through language that imbues a kind of spiritual transcendence into the erotic, a quality seen in many of his own literary influences: James Baldwin, Henry James, Jean Genet, and St. Augustine, his favorite writer.
What Belongs to You progresses in distinct scenes, without the sort of transitional material one might expect in opera. Images appear, communicate, and move on as we turn the page. This is a particular way of achieving what has been called the “compressed logic” that opera requires, and feels akin to the experience of viewing Hogarth’s A Rake’s Progress paintings, where we move between panels showing different plot points and make our own connections between them, as we allow the meaning to gradually accumulate.
This approach allows me to tell rich, often complicated stories in ways that feel both lean and contemporary, but also connected to the past. This aspect of the form is important, as it not only mirrors the intimate privacy of Greenwell’s unnamed narrator, but also the solitary act of reading. It allows the interior to become personal to each audience member and, as Greenwell has said about his own work and its connection to St. Augustine “by turning inward one somehow arrives at a revelation, a truth that can be communicated to others.”
This is the very experience that moved me so tremendously when first reading What Belongs to You. It is what drew me to it, made me cherish it and feel the sacred in it. It is what inspired me to give it a life in music and on stage. It is my hope that through this performance, the audience may also find something meaningful, and true.
What Belongs to You was commissioned by Alarm Will Sound and the Modlin Center for the Arts at the University of Richmond, with the kind support of Linda H. and Richard N. Claytor, Ph.D., and Andrew Martin-Weber. It premiered on September 26, 2024, at the Modlin Center, in a production directed by Mark Morris, conducted by Alan Pierson, and starring Karim Sulayman, for whom it was written. Alarm Will Sound was the orchestra, costumes and set were by Maile Okamura, and lighting was by Nicole Pearce. Special thanks are also due to Eileen Mack, Paul Brohan, Nancy Umanoff, Jeffrey Edelstein, Steven Lankenau, Elizabeth Blaufox, Maggie Heskin, Carol Ann Cheung, and Katy Salomon; and to Garth Greenwell, whose trust in allowing me to adapt his work has meant the world to me.
David T. Little, April 16, 2024
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
What Belongs to You was commissioned by Alarm Will Sound and Modlin Center for the Arts at the University of Richmond.
Commission underwritten by Linda H. and Richard N. Claytor, Ph.D. Additional commissioning support from Andrew Martin-Weber.
With special thanks to Scott Levenson.
Alarm Will Sound gratefully acknowledges our individual donors and the following foundations for their support: Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, Amphion Foundation, BMI Foundation, Cheswatyr Foundation, Howard Gilman Foundation, and the Sinquefield Charitable Trust.
Additional Support provided by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; and the National Endowment for the Arts.
ALARM WILL SOUND PERSONNEL
Erin Lesser, flutes
Christa Robinson, oboes
Eileen Mack, clarinets
Elisabeth Stimpert, clarinets
Michael Harley, bassoons
Laura Weiner, horn
Tim Leopold, trumpet
Michael Clayville, trombone
Chris P. Thompson, percussion
Matt Smallcomb, percussion
John Orfe, piano, synthesizer
Courtney Orlando, violin
Patti Kilroy, violin
Gillian Gallagher, viola
Stefan Freund, cello
Miles Brown, bass
William Stanton, Sound Engineer
Alan Pierson, conductor and Artistic Director
Gavin Chuck, Executive Director
Peter Ferry, Assistant Director of Artistic Planning
Jason Varvaro, Production Manager
Annie Toth, General Manager
Tracy Mendez, Development Manager
Michael Clayville, Director of Marketing
Bill Kalinkos, Librarian
Uday Singh, Program Coordinator
PHOTO: MAILE OKAMURA
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
A natural musical storyteller with “a knack for overturning musical conventions” (The New York Times), composer David T. Little is known for stage, concert, and screen works permeated with the power of the unexpected. Little probes the deep corners of human psychology, invoking political, historical, spiritual, and social themes as pathways for exploring the human condition. His broad catalog speaks to the mix of light and dark that we experience in life, unafraid to invoke the mythical, bewitching, disturbing, surreal, or comedic. He has drawn acclaim for operas including Dog Days, JFK, and the comedy Vinkensport, or The Finch Opera (all with libretto by Royce Vavrek), as well as his GRAMMY®-nominated opera Soldier Songs.
Little’s recent work Black Lodge was nominated for the 2024 GRAMMY® Award for Best Opera Recording and is the recent recipient of a Music Theater Now international prize. Black Lodge, a metal-infused opera with a libretto by poet Anne Waldman, was premiered by Beth Morrison Projects at Opera Philadelphia, with a soundtrack released by Cantaloupe Music. It received its European premiere at the O. Festival in Rotterdam this past May, will receive its West Coast Premiere in October, 2024 as part of an experiential Halloween event presented by CAP UCLA, and will receive its New York premiere in January as part of the 2025 Prototype Festival.
In September, 2024, Little will unveil his opera What Belongs to You, based on the celebrated novel by Garth Greenwell, developed for GRAMMY®-winning tenor Karim Sulayman and Alarm Will Sound, and directed by Mark Morris. This comes on the heels of another major work, the searching theatrical choral work, SIN-EATER, premiered in Philadelphia by The Crossing and Bergamot Quartet in the fall of 2023, conducted by Donald Nally. Based on the ancient practice of paying the poor to ritualistically “eat” the sins of the rich—allowing the privileged to move onto the next life cleansed of their guilty deeds—The Wall Street Journal praised the work’s “shattering impact.”
Little is at work on a commission from the Metropolitan Opera / Lincoln
Center Theater New Works Program, as well as several other new stage, film, and concert projects.
Little has been commissioned by the world’s most prestigious institutions and performers, including recent projects for The Metropolitan Opera/ Lincoln Center Theater new works program, the Kennedy Center, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, New World Symphony, London Sinfonietta, The Crossing, Kronos Quartet, and Beth Morrison Projects. His music has been presented by Carnegie Hall, Holland Festival, LA Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Opéra de Montréal, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and the LA Philharmonic. Little’s recorded catalog includes over 20 commercial releases, on such labels as New Amsterdam Records, Pentatone, Sono Luminus, Bright Shiny Things, and Cantaloupe Music.
Little is the founding artistic director and former drummer for the amplified chamber ensemble, Newspeak, which explores the relationship of music and politics, while confronting head-on the boundaries between the classical and rock traditions. They have released four commercial recordings, with a fifth on the way.
David T. Little received a 2023 Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and is a recipient of the Copland House ResidencyAward. His music is published by Boosey & Hawkes. Learn more at www.davidtlittle.com.
Garth Greenwell is the author of What Belongs to You, which won the British Book Award for Debut of the Year, was longlisted for the National Book Award, and was a finalist for many other awards, including the PEN/Faulkner Award, the LA Times Book Prize, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. His second book, Cleanness, was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award and was longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize, the Joyce Carol Oates Prize, and the Prix Sade, among others. A New York Times Notable Book, it was named a Best Book of 2020 by over thirty publications. His new novel, Small Rain, was published in September. His cultural criticism has appeared widely, and he writes regularly about books, music, and film for the Substack newsletter To a Green Thought. A 2020 Guggenheim Fellow and recipient of the 2021 Vursell Award for prose
style from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, he is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University.
newsletter: garthgreenwell.substack.com website: www.garthgreenwell.com
Mark Morris was born on August 29, 1956, in Seattle, Washington, where he studied with Verla Flowers and Perry Brunson. In the early years of his career, he performed with the companies of Lar Lubovitch, Hannah Kahn, Laura Dean, Eliot Feld, and the Koleda Balkan Dance Ensemble. He formed the Mark Morris Dance Group (MMDG) in 1980 and has since created over 150 works for the company. From 1988 to 1991, he was Director of Dance at Brussels’ Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, the national opera house of Belgium. In 1990, he founded the White Oak Dance Project with Mikhail Baryshnikov. Much in demand as a ballet choreographer, Morris has created 22 ballets since 1986, and his work has been performed by companies worldwide, including San Francisco Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, Ballet am Rhein, Dusseldorf, and the Royal New Zealand Ballet. Noted for his musicality, Morris has been described as “undeviating in his devotion to music” (The New Yorker). He began conducting performances for MMDG in 2006 and has since conducted at Tanglewood Music Center, Lincoln Center, and BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music). He served as Music Director for the 2013 Ojai Music Festival. He also works extensively in opera, directing and choreographing productions for the Metropolitan Opera; New York City Opera; English National Opera; and The Royal Opera, Covent Garden; among others. He was named a Fellow of the MacArthur Foundation in 1991 and has received eleven honorary doctorates to date. He has taught at the University of Washington, Princeton University, and Tanglewood Music Center. A Doris Duke Artist, Morris is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, and has served as an Advisory Board Member for the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative. He has received the Samuel H. Scripps/American Dance Festival Award for Lifetime Achievement, the Leonard Bernstein Lifetime Achievement Award for the Elevation of Music in Society, the Benjamin Franklin Laureate Prize for Creativity, the International Society for the Performing Arts’ Distinguished Artist Award, Cal Performances Award of Distinction in the Performing Arts, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s
Gift of Music Award, and the 2016 Doris Duke Artist Award. In 2015, Morris was inducted into the Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney Hall of Fame at the National Museum of Dance in Saratoga Springs, New York. Morris opened the Mark Morris Dance Center in Brooklyn, New York, in 2001 to provide a home for his company, subsidized rental space for local artists, community education programs for children and seniors, and a school offering dance classes to students of all ages and levels of experience with and without disabilities. Morris’ memoir, Out Loud, cowritten with Wesley Stace, was published in paperback by Penguin Press in October 2021.
Lebanese-American tenor Karim Sulayman has garnered international attention as a sophisticated and versatile artist, praised for his “lucid, velvety tenor and pop-star charisma” (BBC Music Magazine). The 2019 Best Classical Solo Vocal GRAMMY® Award winner, he continues to earn acclaim for his original and innovative programming and recording projects, while regularly performing on the world’s stages in opera, orchestral concerts, recital and chamber music.
Recently Mr. Sulayman was presented by Carnegie Hall for a sold out solo recital debut followed immediately by the world premiere of his own multidisciplinary production, Unholy Wars, a baroque pasticcio centered around the Crusades and the Middle East, at Spoleto Festival USA. He’s also made recent debuts Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, Stockholm’s Drottningholms Slottsteater, Houston Grand Opera, Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, and the Chicago, National and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestras. He debuted at Wigmore Hall in concerts of French chamber music with his frequent collaborators, the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective, which The Arts Desk named to its “Best Performances of 2022.”
Last season saw performances of his acclaimed program with guitarist Sean Shibe, Broken Branches, at Ravinia Festival, Schleswig-Holstein Festival, CAP-UCLA, Boston Celebrity Series and the Phillips Collection, and debuts at Opera Philadelphia (Unholy Wars) and New World Symphony (Britten’s Nocturne). He made his role debut as Grimoaldo in Handel’s Rodelinda (Hudson Hall), created the role of Crow in the world premiere of Layale Chaker/Lisa Schlesinger’s Ruinous Gods (Spoleto
Festival USA), and debuted at the Royal Opera House, reprising the title role of Giant, a role he created the previous year for the Aldeburgh Festival. This season and future engagements include the central role in the world premiere of David T. Little’s highly anticipated monodrama What Belongs to You (based on Garth Greenwell’s acclaimed novel), written for Sulayman and Alarm Will Sound and directed by Mark Morris, his role debut as Pelléas in Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, and concerts at Park Avenue Armory, Wigmore Hall and Hong Kong’s Premiere Performances.
Mr. Sulayman won the 2019 GRAMMY® Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album for his debut solo album, Songs of Orpheus (Avie Records), his original program of early Italian Baroque songs and arias. His second solo album, Where Only Stars Can Hear Us (Avie Records), a program of Schubert Lieder with fortepianist Yi-heng Yang, debuted at #1 on the Billboard Traditional Classical Chart and has received international critical acclaim, including being named “Critic’s Choice” by Opera News and included in the New York Times’ Best Classical Music of 2020. His third album, Broken Branches (Pentatone), was named one of the Best Classical Music Albums of 2023 by the New York Times, and was nominated for the 2024 GRAMMY® Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal album.
Mr. Sulayman has been featured on PBS Great Performances, and he appeared on the second season of Dickinson on Apple TV+. In November 2016, Karim created a social experiment/performance art piece called I Trust You, designed to build bridges in a divided political climate. A video version of this experiment went “viral” on the internet, and was honored as a prize winner at the My Hero Film Festival.
Website: www.karimsulayman.com
Instagram: @thekarimsulayman
Facebook: www.facebook.com/ karimsulaymantenor
Twitter/X: @KarimSulayman
Alan Pierson has been praised as “a dynamic conductor and musical visionary” by The New York Times, a “conductor of monstrous skill” by Newsday, “gifted and electrifying” by the Boston Globe, and “one of the most exciting figures in new music today” by Fanfare. In addition to his work as artistic director of Alarm Will Sound, he has served as Artistic Director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic, and guest conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, L.A. Opera, Nationaltheater Mannheim, the London Sinfonietta, the Steve Reich Ensemble, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the New World Symphony, and the Silk Road Project, among others. He is co-director of the Northwestern University Contemporary Music Ensemble, and has been a visiting faculty conductor at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, the Eastman School of Music, and at the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity.
Passionate about using storytelling to bring listeners inside of contemporary music, he has led the creation of innovative musical experiences, like Alarm Will Sound’s 1969 and Soundbites video series, and the Brooklyn Philharmonic’s Brooklyn Village project. Mr. Pierson has collaborated with major composers and performers, including Yo Yo Ma, Steve Reich, Dawn Upshaw, Osvaldo Golijov, John Adams, John Luther Adams, Augusta Read Thomas, David Lang, Michael Gordon, La Monte Young, and choreographers Mark Morris, Christopher Wheeldon, Akram Khan, and Elliot Feld. Mr. Pierson received bachelor degrees in physics and music from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a doctorate in conducting from the Eastman School of Music. He has recorded for Nonesuch Records, Cantaloupe Music, Sony Classical, Oehms Classics, and Sweetspot DVD.
Maile Okamura has designed and constructed dance and opera costumes for Mark Morris Dance Group, Dance Heginbotham, Atlanta Ballet, Tanglewood Music Festival, American Classical Orchestra, Bard College, and Middlebury College. She has been dancing with Mark Morris Dance Group since 1998.
Nicole Pearce is a multidisciplinary artist living in Queens, NY. Her work has been seen across the United States, Cuba, England, Germany, Japan, Korea, Italy, New Zealand, and Russia. Recent works include The Look of Love choreographed by Mark Morris with the Mark Morris Dance Group, Catch Me If You Can directed by Molly Smith with Arena Stage (Helen Hayes Award Nomination), and Children’s Songs choreographed by Jessica Lang with American Ballet Theatre. Her installation of 1,000 paintings entitled Tiny Paintings for Big Hearts is open to doctors, nurses, staff, and patients of Elmhurst Hospital in Elmhurst, NY.
Mike Faba is a Lighting Designer for Dance, Theater, and Events. Design credits include The Jinkx and DeLa Holiday Show, and All I Want For Christmas is Attention (BenDeLaCreme and Jinkx Monsoon), Poo | Poo (Mythili Prakesh), Americana To Me at Jacob’s Pillow, Beyond Ballet (Sara Mearns) at Jacob’s Pillow, No. 1 (Wang Ramirez & Sara Mearns) at New York City Center, The Joffrey Concert Group at Alvin Ailey, Spectral Preludes (Tom Gold Dance) at Florence Gould Hall, Wednesday Morning, 11:45 (Pilobolus) at Skirball, Marksman (Kate Weare) at The Joyce and the Guggenheim, and Unstruck (Kate Weare) at BAM. Event design work includes the Life Is Beautiful Festival, as well as PatBO and MONSE for NYFW (Rob Ross Design). Lighting Supervisor credits include Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Mark Morris Dance Group, Paul Taylor American Modern Dance, Camille A. Brown & Dancers, Wang Ramirez, Pilobolus, Martha Clarke, and Radiolab Live: In The Dark. Mike is also the Production Manager and Artist’s Assistant for Kurt Perschke’s RedBall Project, the world’s longest-running public art piece.
Alarm Will Sound is a 20-member band committed to innovative performances and recordings of today’s music. They have established a reputation for performing demanding music with energetic skill. Their performances have been described as “equal parts exuberance, nonchalance, and virtuosity” by the Financial Times of London and as “a triumph of ensemble playing” by the San Francisco Chronicle. The New York Times says that Alarm Will Sound is “one of the most vital and
original ensembles on the American music scene.”
With classical skill and unlimited curiosity, Alarm Will Sound takes on music from a wide variety of styles. Its repertoire ranges from European to American works, from the arch-modernist to the pop-influenced. Alarm Will Sound has been associated since its inception with composers at the forefront of contemporary music, premiering pieces by Steve Reich, Meredith Monk, Tyshawn Sorey, David Lang, John Adams, Mary Kouyoumdjian, John Luther Adams, Marcos Balter, and Augusta Read Thomas among others. The group itself includes many composerperformers, which allows for an unusual degree of insight into the creation and performance of new work.
Alarm Will Sound collaborates with artists who work beyond the bounds of classical music. Alarm System and the Matt Marks Impact Fund are initiatives that have created cross-genre music with electronica artists Eartheater, Jlin, King Britt, and Rashad Becker; jazz composer-performer Dave Douglas; multimedia artists Mira Calix, Bakudi Scream, and Damon Davis; soundtrack composers Brian Reitzell and JG Thirlwell; producer Valgeir Sigurðsson, and singer-songwriter Alyssa Pyper.
PHOTO: WOJCIECH WANDZEL
Alarm Will Sound is the resident ensemble at the Mizzou International Composers Festival. Held each July at the University of Missouri in Columbia, the festival features eight world premieres by earlycareer composers. During the weeklong festival, these composers work closely with Alarm Will Sound and two established guest composers to perform and record their new work.
Alarm Will Sound may be heard on eighteen recordings, including For George Lewis | Autoshchediasms, their most recent release featuring music of Tyshawn Sorey; Omnisphere, with jazz
trio Medeski Martin & Wood; a collaboration with Peabody Awardwinning podcast Meet the Composer titled Splitting Adams; and the premiere recording of Steve Reich’s Radio Rewrite. Their genre-bending, critically acclaimed Acoustica features live-performance arrangements of music by electronica guru Aphex Twin. This unique project taps the diverse talents within the group, from the many composers who made arrangements of the original tracks, to the experimental approaches developed by the performers.
In 2016, Alarm Will Sound in a co-production with Opera Theatre of St. Louis, presented the world premiere of the staged version of Donnacha Dennehy’s The Hunger at the BAM Next Wave Festival and the Touhill Performing Arts Center. Featuring Iarla O’Lionárd (traditional Irish singer) and Katherine Manley (soprano) with direction by Tom Creed, The Hunger is punctuated by video commentary and profound early recordings of traditional Irish folk ballads mined from various archives including those of Alan Lomax.
PHOTO: MAANSI SRIVASTAVA
In 2013-14, Alarm Will Sound served as artists-in-residence at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. During that season, the ensemble presented four large ensemble performances at the Met, including two site-specific productions staged in museum galleries (Twinned, a collaboration with Dance Heginbotham and I Was Here I Was I, a new theatrical work by Kate Soper and Nigel Maister), as well as several smaller events in collaboration with the Museum’s educational programs.
In 2011, at Carnegie Hall, the group presented 1969, a multimedia event that uses music, images, text, and staging to tell the compelling story of great musicians—John Lennon, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Paul McCartney, Luciano Berio, Yoko Ono, and Leonard Bernstein—striving for a new music and a new world amidst the turmoil of the late 1960s. 1969’s unconventional approach combining music, history, and ideas has been critically praised by the New York Times (“...a swirling, heady meditation on the intersection of experimental and commercial spheres, and of social and aesthetic agendas.”)
Alarm Will Sound has been presented by Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Miller Theatre, Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Bang on a Can’s Long Play Festival, Disney Hall, Kimmel Center, Library of Congress, Annenberg Center, the Clarice, CAP UCLA, Caramoor, and the Warhol Museum. International tours include the Beijing Modern Festival, the Holland Festival, Sacrum Profanum, Moscow’s Art November, St. Petersburg’s Pro Arte Festival, and the Barbican.
The members of the ensemble have also demonstrated our commitment to the education of young performers and composers through residency performances and activities at Princeton University, the University of Michigan, University of Maryland, Shenandoah University, the Community Music School of Webster University, Cleveland State University, University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Missouri, Eastman School of Music, Dickinson College, Duke University, the Manhattan School of Music, Harvard University, New York University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
For more information and to join the mailing list, visit Alarm Will Sound’s website at www.alarmwillsound.com.
Modlin Arts Presents
CIRCA, DUCK POND
Thu 10 Oct 2024
Alice Jepson Theatre
FEATHERS WILL FLY IN CIRCA’S EXUBERANT TAKE ON SWAN LAKE. THE WORLD’S MOST ROMANTIC BALLET IS RE-IMAGINED AS A CIRCUS SPECTACULAR.
THIS PERFORMANCE IS SOLD OUT! CONTACT THE BOX OFFICE TO JOIN THE WAITLIST.
LAS CAFETERAS
Fri 18 Oct 2024
Camp Concert Hall
WITH AN EXHILARATING FUSION OF MEXICAN FOLK AND ELECTRONIC DANCE BEATS, THIS LOS ANGELES-BASED GROUP TELLS STORIES TO “BUILD A WORLD WHERE MANY WORLDS FIT.”
FAMILY ARTS DAY: LATIN BALLET OF VIRGINIA, FIESTA DEL SOL
Sun 20 Oct 2024
Alice Jepson Theatre
THIS FREE, FAMILY-FRIENDLY EVENT FEATURES FREE ART ACTIVITIES WITH UR MUSEUMS, FOLLOWED BY A CELEBRATION OF THE CULTURE AND TRADITIONS OF THE CARIBBEAN THROUGH DANCE.
TICKET INFORMATION
MODLIN BOX OFFICE Regular hours for window service and phone orders Monday - Friday 1pm - 5pm and 60 minutes prior to all ticketed events. Contact us at 804-289-8980 or modlinarts@richmond.edu.
TICKET POLICY All sales are final. No refunds are available, except in the event of a cancellation.
TICKET DELIVERY For all ticketed events, Modlin Center offers ticket delivery as Hold at Box Office or Mobile Tickets. When purchasing tickets that require an ID to be shown, tickets will only be available for in-person pickup at the Box Office.
TICKET DONATIONS Tickets that cannot be used, or transferred to friends of family, may be returned to the Box Office to be donated for resale. No credit will be issued.
TICKETS ARE REQUIRED All ticketed performances require every patron to have a ticket. This includes children, regardless of age. Children are welcome and must always be accompanied by an adult. Parental discretion is advised as some performances may not be suitable for young children.
PROGRAMS ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE Events can change, sometimes without notice. In the event of a cancellation or date change, we will announce as early as possible, and attempts will be made to contact all ticket holders in advance of the performance. Help us keep you informed by ensuring your contact information is up to date.
