Zach Herchen

Many thanks to everyone who came out for our CD release concerts in Lexington, MA and New York City! Elisabeth Halliday and I had a great time premiering music from our new CD Emerging Voices. We are currently booking more shows in Philadelphia, Baltimore, DC, Providence, and Boston. Hopefully we’ll be able to perform for each of our awesome Kickstarter donors!

One more photo worth sharing, our NYC involved a pre-concert party and desert on the subway for our guests:

Photos were taken by Anthony Trujillo. Check out his portfolio and tumblr!

Elisabeth Halliday and I are finally going to launch our new CD Emerging Voices! We braved the recent earthquake and hurricane, and have rebooked our Lexington CD release for this Sunday. We are also pumped for our NYC CD release one week later! We owe the entire project to our fantastic Kickstarter donors who made it possible. We had fun sending signed, pre-release CDs to our donors. I’ve almost got a new store section ready for this site and we will starting making the CD available to anyone.
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My Emerging Voices CD release in Lexington, MA is cancelled due to Hurricane Irene.

We will try to reschedule for September. If you live in the area be safe through the next 2 days.

In the meantime, (starting soon) CDs will be on sale through this site! We have finished production and are really exciting to share our work.

I’ve been hard at work on my Emerging Voices Project these past few weeks! Elisabeth Halliday and I finished recording and editing our commissioned pieces by Kathleen Bader, Adam Knauss, and George Lam. The CD design is almost done. We’ve signed our license for Lori Laitman’s music. Oh, and I moved out of a sublet into an official apartment. Up next is mixing, mastering, and duplication.

All that means: the CD release is almost upon us! Join Elisabeth and I on Sunday, August 28th in Lexington, MA for the premiere performance of the new works and official CD release. The concert kicks off at 2pm at Follen Church (755 Massachusetts Avenue in Lexington, Massachusetts). Tickets are $10. There will be a reception in the Community Center afterward, and CDs will be available for purchase.

We are nailing down other performance dates around the east coast, including a big NYC CD release. Much thanks to all of our supporters and we can’t wait to celebrate with you!

The SICPP Iditarod is today! For the uninitiated, SICPP is New England Conservatory’s Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice and is lovingly called “Sick Puppy”. The Iditarod, aside from being a massive Alaskan dog sled race, is our 8+ hour marathon concert of the music prepare by participants. This year’s concert starts at 4pm today in Brown Hall at NEC and here’s the lengthy program:

HOUR ONE
James Tenney: Percussion Responses: Ergodan II
David Tarantino, Jeffrey Kolega, Cory Bracken, Gary Donald, percussion
Simon Hanes, electronics

Simon Hanes: TBD
Franziska Huhn, harp
Simon Hanes, electronics

Lee Weisert: New England Drift
Elzbieta Polak, violin
Kayleigh Miller, viola
Ben Schwartz, cello
Jessi Rosinski, flute
Rane Moore, clarinet
Barbara Lieurance, piano
Scott Deal, percussion
Julia Tai, conductor

Douglas Farrand: Untitled work for string trio
Elizabeth Barksdale, violin
Karina Fox, viola
Michael Unterman, cello

Ryo Nakayama: Xxxx xxx
Elizabeth Lee, cello
Zach Herchen, saxophone

George Crumb: Madrigals, Book III
Ceceilia Allwein, soprano
Adrienne Bassett, harp
Gary Robert Donald, percussion

* * * * * * * * * * * *

HOUR TWO
Tristan Murail: Éthers
Elizabeth Barksdale, violin
Kayleigh Miller, viola
Michael Unterman, cello
Kathryn Schulmeister, double bass
McMillan Gaither, trombone
Jessi Rosinski, flute
Jeffrey Means, conductor
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I’ve been running around auditioning for DMA programs this past month, but now I’m back in the swing of things. For those of you in the Baltimore area, AM/PM has a great multimedia concert coming up this weekend. We just finished up prep rehearsals in Baltimore (Coming Together pictured above), got all the videos set, and everything is ready to go! Full details:

Saturday, March 12 @ 9pm
Red Room (Normal’s Books and Records)
425 E. 31st Street
Baltimore, MD
$5 door

Program:

Thom Limbert: Numbers/Dates (quartet and audio)
Matthew Burtner: Incantation S4=X (quartet and audio)
Jacob Ter Veldhuis: Heartbreakers (quartet and audio/video)

Paul Leary: “I Have A Past Life Memory From The War That Blew The Fifth Planet Into The Asteroid Belt” and other stories from AM Radio (quartet and audio)
Kati Agócs: Hymn (quartet and commissioned video by Eli Stine)
Frederic Rzewski: Coming Together (ensemble and audio/video)

Guest performers: Karin Kilper, Domenica Romagni, Esther Hae-In Choi, and Martha Morrison

Breakdown from my gig with Man Down in Baltimore last weekend. Check us out on iTunes.

Little known fact: the horn section thinks this song should be called Easy Bake.

Last Saturday I performed with AM/PM at Metro Gallery in Baltimore. We played a really fun program focused on pieces that use prerecorded electronics:

Thom Limbert: Numbers/Dates
Kati Agócs: Hymn
Jacob Ter Veldhuis: Heartbreakers
Matthew Burtner: Incantation S4=X
Paul Leary: “I Have A Past Life Memory From The War That Blew The Fifth Planet Into The Asteroid Belt” and other stories from AM Radio

Check out Megan Ihnen’s blog post about the event.

Last Wednesday I gave a masterclass in Duxbury, MA as part of my Emerging Voices Project kick-off week. Elisabeth Halliday was supposed to join me, but she was very sick that day and had to miss out on the fun. I met with students from Duxbury High School’s Wind Ensemble at the Performing Arts Center across the street from their school. I’m a graduate from DHS and it was great to be back supporting the amazing music program there!

I spent the class period talking about my experiences working with composers, contemporary techniques, using electronics and processing, and improvisation. For examples, I performed snippets from pieces by Kati Agócs, Kevin Clark, Paul Leary, John Anthony Lennon and had several students perform Ryan Krause’s separate piece(s. At the end I answered questions about life as a musician. It was a fun time!

Project site: http://emergingvoicesproject.blogspot.com/
Support the project: http://kck.st/iel2KP

Elisabeth Halliday and I kicked off our Emerging Voices Project in Plymouth a week ago (its been a busy week!). We performed music by Lori Laitman, Judith Weir, Kevin Clark, and Jason Belcher. There was a great crowd of friends and family and the venue was a really beautiful music salon right in downtown Plymouth. Many thanks to everyone for their support!

Project site: http://emergingvoicesproject.blogspot.com/
Support the project: http://kck.st/iel2KP