ALIAS, Nashville’s most eclectic and critically acclaimed chamber music ensemble, and Latin Grammy Award-winning composer and Guggenheim fellow Gabriela Lena Frank will give the world-premiere performance of Hilos on Friday, October 1, 2010 at 8 p.m. at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music in Nashville.  Also on the program are works by DJ Sparr, Kenji Bunch and Bayani Mendoza de Leon.

The Schubert Club in St. Paul, Minn. will host the second performance of Hilos on Tuesday, November 16, 2010, at 8 p.m.

Commissioned by ALIAS, The Schubert Club, and Drs. Jonathan Neufeld and Jennifer Lena supported by a grant from Vanderbilt University, Hilos (Spanish for “threads”) is an eight-movement quartet for piano, violin, cello and clarinet. It will be performed by Ms. Frank (piano) and three members of the 12-member ALIAS ensemble:  Zeneba Bowers (violin), Matthew Walker (cello) and Lee Levine (clarinet).

ALIAS will record Hilos, which will be released by Naxos on the American Classics imprint, along with other premiere recordings of Ms. Frank’s works, performed by the composer and ALIAS ensemble members.  The recording is anticipated for a 2011 release.

“ALIAS has been inspired by Gabriela for years and has already programmed four of her chamber works on our regular season concerts.  Naturally, we were thrilled and honored to have this opportunity to commission a piece from her and to perform and record it alongside her,” says Zeneba Bowers, founder and artistic director of ALIAS.

Ms. Frank frequently draws on her multicultural Latin heritage as inspiration for her music. In Hilos, each of the short movements evoke vivid pictures, such as “Canto del Altiplano” (Song of the Highlands), “Zumballyu” (Spinning Top), and “Juegos de los Niños” (Games of the Children).

“There are similarities to Pictures at an Exhibition in that each movement tells a different story,” explains Ms. Frank.  “Hilos refers to the ‘threads’ that make up Andean textiles and how these threads weave together to portray tantalizing pictures.  I am looking forward to bringing this piece to life with an innovative, quality ensemble like ALIAS.”

In conjunction with the premiere of Hilos, ALIAS and Ms. Frank will participate in “Mestiza Music in Music City,” an educational outreach initiative that will take place in September and October 2010 as part of National Hispanic Heritage Month.  This NEA-funded initiative will bring Hispanic music, including Hilos, and related educational materials to minority schools and communities in Nashville.  The purpose of the program is to help promote understanding between Nashville’s diverse cultures.  In addition, Ms. Frank is participating in the interdisciplinary Music, Authority and Community project with Drs. Lena and Neufeld at Vanderbilt University.

Tickets to the world-premiere performance of Hilos in Nashville are $12 ($5 for students) and are available in advance at www.aliasmusic.org, or by clicking HERE. All proceeds will benefit Conexion Americas.

General Admission $12

Students w/ID $5

Tickets to The Schubert Club performance will go on-sale September 7 and can be purchased by calling 651-292-3268, or by visiting www.schubert.org.

Biographies

ALIAS

Founded in 2002, ALIAS is a chamber ensemble dedicated to innovative repertoire, artistic excellence, and a desire to give back to the community. Comprised of 12 professional musicians in Nashville, its wide-ranging repertoire brings audiences a mix of chamber music that cannot be heard anywhere else in the community.  To date, ALIAS has premiered 10 new works and makes a point of performing undiscovered or seldom heard pierces.  As part of its mission, ALIAS also adopts three nonprofit partners each season and gives 100 percent of its ticket proceeds to these partners. For more information about ALIAS, visit: www.aliasmusic.org.

Gabriela Lena Frank, Composer and Pianist

Identity has always been at the center of Gabriela Lena Frank’s music. Born in Berkeley, California, to a mother of mixed Peruvian/Chinese ancestry and a father of Lithuanian/Jewish descent, Frank explores her multicultural heritage most ardently through her compositions. Inspired by the works of Bela Bartók and Alberto Ginastera, Frank is something of a musical anthropologist. She has travelled extensively throughout South America and her pieces reflect and refract her studies of Latin-American folklore, incorporating poetry, mythology, and native musical styles into a western classical framework that is uniquely her own. She writes challenging idiomatic parts for solo instrumentalists, vocalists, chamber ensembles, and orchestras. For more information about Gabriela Lena Frank, visit: http://www.schirmer.com.

ALIAS is proud to announce the group’s major new project to feature Guggenheim Fellowship- and Latin Grammy-winning composer Gabriela Lena Frank as the centerpiece.  The overarching project, to take place in 2010, includes a commission of a quartet (for clarinet, violin, cello, and piano) by composer Gabriela Lena Frank; the commission is funded through partnerships with the Music, Authority and Community Project at Vanderbilt University, and with The Schubert Club of St. Paul, Minn.

The project also includes the first-ever ALIAS recording, which will feature Ms. Frank’s chamber works for NAXOS, on its American Classics label. This recording is being made possible with our partnership with Vanderbilt and with support from the Metro Nashville Arts Commission. The recording will include the new commissioned work, and several other works which will be recording premieres.

ALIAS was drawn to Ms. Frank’s music due to her artistic incorporation of folk idioms from the Andes and Peru. She travels extensively and uses the traditional music of South America as inspiration. A date for the recording’s release has not been announced.

“At the time of this announcement, I confess I’ve been in the thick of creating a new piece of music for ALIAS for more than a month,” said the composer, Gabriela Lena Frank. “In these early days of sifting, choosing, discarding, and sometimes rescuing ideas, I’ve frequently been suffused with a feeling of overwhelming gratitude towards these excellent musicians for the confidence and interest they have in my work as a composer. I’m so looking forward to working with them closely in bringing the new work to life, to our recording on the NAXOS label, and to our live performances. ALIAS is exactly why us composers love what we do.”

“We are very excited to work with ALIAS on their upcoming recording featuring the music of Gabriela Lena Frank,” said Lea D. Maitlen, Senior Marketing Manager, Naxos of America, Inc. “This excellent ensemble is an important part of the Nashville community, and I applaud their focus on new composers and lesser known repertoire.”

This commission, as well as the recording, is funded in large part by the ongoing Music, Authority and Community Project, led by Vanderbilt professors Jonathan Neufeld and Jennifer Lena. It combines scholarship from philosophy, sociology and music, and it is an unprecedented means of funding the creation of a new composition. “ALIAS has wanted to commission a new work from Gabriela, and to record it, for a long time,” says Matt Walker, cellist and Executive Director of ALIAS. “We are very grateful that Jonathan and Jenn’s profound academic efforts have helped us bring the idea to fruition.”

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About Gabriela Lena Frank:

Identity has always been at the center of Gabriela Lena Frank’s music. Born in Berkeley, California, to a mother of mixed Peruvian/Chinese ancestry and a father of Lithuanian/Jewish descent, Frank explores her multicultural heritage most ardently through her compositions. Inspired by the works of Bela Bartók and Alberto Ginastera, Frank is something of a musical anthropologist. She has travelled extensively throughout South America and her pieces reflect and refract her studies of Latin-American folklore, incorporating poetry, mythology, and native musical styles into a western classical framework that is uniquely her own. She writes challenging idiomatic parts for solo instrumentalists, vocalists, chamber ensembles, and orchestras.

For full bio, click here.

Interviews with 2007 Joyce Awards winners, Gabriela Lena Frank and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra in Indianapolis.

Video of Gabriela Lena Frank, winner of Hispanic Scholarship Fund’s 2008 Brillante Prize.

The project is one component of the GLF Project, and will feature a series of educational and outreach programs based in Nashville’s Hispanic community during Hispanic Cultural Heritage Month, from Sept. 15 through Oct. 15.

More details, including a schedule, will be available at aliasmusic.org when they become available.

For more details about other Nashville arts organizations that received part of the $1.1 million NEA grants, please click here for a link to the full story at Tennessean.com.

For full details about The GLF Project, including how you can be part of this special event, please click here.

After intermission, artistic director and violinist Zeneba Bowers excitedly gave the audience details about the ambitious new venture. Alias has commissioned a quartet for clarinet, violin, cello and piano from rising star composer Gabriela Lena Frank, and the ensemble is set to record a full album of Frank’s music for leading classical label Naxos, with the composer herself appearing as pianist.

A nice deal for anyone, and a truly impressive one for a young nonprofit ensemble with all-volunteer membership and no institutional affiliation. With the same zeal and inventiveness that informs their music-making, ALIAS lined up funding and support from the long-established Schubert Club of St. Paul, Minn., as well as from Vanderbilt and the Metro Nashville Arts Commission…”

Click here to read the full story and concert review at nashvillescene.com.

The Nashville ensemble, known for its charity concerts and diverse repertoire, has commissioned a new work by Guggenheim fellowship-winning composer Gabriela Lena Frank. The work is being done in partnership with Vanderbilt University and the Schubert Club, a St. Paul, Minn.-based arts nonprofit founded in 1882, with support from the Metro Nashville Arts Commission.

ALIAS will premiere the piece, a quartet for clarinet, violin, cello and piano, at a concert to be announced and will record it, along with four other pieces by Frank, for the Naxos label.

Click here for the full story at tennessean.com.