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Promoting Woodwind Quintet Music of the Western hemisphere for 40 years!
Quintet of the Americas Announces First 2019-2020 Celebration of 40 Years in New York City Concerts From September 2019 to June 2020 the Quintet will present A Celebration of 40 Years in New York City, a series of free concerts in Queens, Brooklyn, and Manhattan. In 1979, QOA relocated from Colombia to New York City, where it has annually commissioned new works. In recognition of this long commitment to composers, these cross-cultural programs will feature music from folk-based to contemporary. Selections will include dance and lighter music by Colombian Jorge Olaya Munoz, Queens resident James Cohn, and Cuban/American Jose Raul Bernardo. Concert Cancelled in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic - Sunday March 22, 2020 at 2PM - Flushing Library, 41-17 Main St, Flushing, Queens, NY Concert Cancelled in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic - Thursday, March 26, 2020 at 7 PM - Marc A. Scorca Hall of The National Opera Center, 330 Seventh Avenue, 7th Floor, New York, NY Friday, May 15 , 2020 at 7 PM - Marc A. Scorca Hall of The National Opera Center, 330 Seventh Avenue, 7th Floor, New York, NY Continuing the celebration of 40 years of Quintet commissions with global influences. Both events will include works written for the ensemble by Adam Schoenberg, Marcelo Zarvos, Lev “Ljova” Zhurbin, Thiago de and Mello. The program will feature a new commission, “Voices of the Unseen,” by Queens resident Gilbert Galindo.
A year-long project in the Queens neighborhood of Jackson Heights We have had the honor and pleasure to work with composer Lev "Ljova" Zhurbin in this multi-generational project that involves elementary school recorder players from PS. 69, the chorus from PS 149, The Jackson Heights Orchestra, conducted by Patricia Glunt, and seniors at the Catherine Sheridan Senior Center. Ljova has written a four-movement work which has an overall theme of birds. Ljova wrote the first movement based on interviews with the seniors. The next movement, based on the white-throated sparrow's call is for the recorder players and the quintet, another movement is for the quintet and the orchestra, and the last movement brings everyone together, first with the chorus and quintet and then joined by the orchestra and recorder players. We are thrilled that this project was awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts which has funded the composer's commission as well as workshops with all the groups, including people of all ages representing a very diverse neighborhood! Composer LJOVA (born in Russia, and immigrated to New York in 1990) has written more than 120 compositions for classical, jazz, and folk ensembles, as well as scores to four feature and over a dozen short films, and music for contemporary dance. He leads his own ensemble LJOVA AND THE KONTRABAND, and works as a freelance violist, violinist & musical arranger. Recent commissions include the City of London Sinfonia, The Louisville Orchestra, Brooklyn Rider, Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, The Knights, as well arrangements for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, tenor Javier Camarena, conductors Gustavo Dudamel and Alondra de la Parra, the Mexican songwriter Natalia Lafourcade, Argentine composer/guitarist Gustavo Santaolalla, Kronos Quartet, and others. Past works for Quintet of the Americas by Ljova include "Lullaby and Memory" based on interviews with seniors in Jackson Heights, "Click" for students and wind quintet "Rockaway Baby" inspired by interviews with disabled seniors at Peninsula Rehabilitation Center in Rockaway. Photo caption: Lev "Ljova" Zhurbin © 2016 by Mark Gurevich / AGMA Photography
First Memory Project - Bayside Senior Center, Queens, NY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RP0s4XwF8-g New Memory Project work, "Retrospectives" by Harold Gutierrez on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4iVRrj-iQo Memory Project post-concert interviews with students and parents from the Corona Youth Orchestra after our premiere performance of "Dreamers' March" for solo quintet and youth orchestra by Harold Gutierrez https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYWhS2PhZFA New NYSCA Commission "Variable Winds" by Daniel Ott on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQAKs__qfNc
The Quintet announces the release of its exciting new recording, SOUNDS OF BRAZIL, on the MSR label. The music includes choros, lullabies and songs by Gaudencio Thiago de Mello who performs with the Quintet on his unique organic percussion from the Amazon. Thiago plays with the Quintet on works by Ernesto Nazareth and Pixinguinha as well. The Quintet is proud to include Changes, a work they commissioned by Brazilian-American pianist and composer Marcelo Zarvos. Rounding out the CD is Ventos, another Quintet commission by a gifted young composer on the New York scene, Ricardo Romaneiro. Guest artists include Blair McMillen on piano and Scott Kuney on guitar. SOUNDS OF BRAZIL on the MSR Label Karel Husa Recollections on the New World Records label. Dancing in Colombia on the MSR Label - 15 Colombian dances including bambucos, pasillos, bundes and paseos. Self Portrait on the CRI label - avant garde music for Quintet including works by Pauline Oliveros, Elliot Sharp, Amy Rubin, Christopher Culpo and Lee Hyla Discovering the New World on the MMC label - music from the Carnegie Hall Concert (Louis Ballard, William Thomas McKinley, Roberto Sierra, and "America (Suite Popular)" - Ilan Rechtman). Souvenirs, 20 Musical Mementos from the New World on the XLNT label - Samuel Barber's "Summer Music" and many Quintet favorites.
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Some of the venues for our upcoming concerts may close resulting in postponed Quintet of the Americas events.
Thursday, April 9, at 11 AM - Sunnyside Community Services Senior Center, 43-31 39th Street, Sunnyside, NY 11104 Thursday, April 9, at 1 PM - Bayside Senior Center, 221-15 Horace Harding Expressway, Bayside, New York 11364 Tuesday, April 14, at 11 AM - Salvation Army, 86-07 35th Avenue, Jackson Heights, NY Tuesday, April 14, at 1 PM - CCNS Seaside Senior Center, 320 Beach 94 Street, Rockaway Beach, NY 11693 Thursday, May 14, at 11 AM - SNAP Services Now for Adult Persons, Inc. 80-45 Winchester Blvd.,Bldg. 4, CBU 29, Queens Village, NY Thursday, May 14, at 1 PM - Howard Beach Senior Center, 155-55 Crossbay Blvd., Howard Beach, N.Y. 11414 Friday, May 15, 2020 at 7 PM - Marc A. Scorca Hall of The National Opera Center, 330 Seventh Avenue, 7th Floor, New York, NY Sunday, May 17, 2020 at 4 PM - Queens Botanical Garden, 43-50 Main Street, Flushing, NY 11355
Watch the Quintet play in "El Picaflor" Quintet of the Americas visits the New York Hall of Science and Flushing Meadow Park. Hear El Picaflor (also available for download on Amazon from the Dancing in Colombia CD.) Format WMV link – YouTube – Dailymotion – Veoh.com – Vimeo.com
Listen to the Quintet
The Quintet's mission is to broaden knowledge and appreciation of music from the Western Hemisphere, and particularly new music, through the performance, commissioning, and recording of woodwind quintets and related chamber music. We encourage inter-cultural appreciation and understanding by performing contemporary, classical and folk-derived music from the diverse cultural traditions of the Americas. We search out collaborations with composers, guest artists, other ensembles, other art forms and other organizations to enrich our own growth and to enrich the musical products we bring to the community. We seek to enhance understanding and appreciation of this music through exploitation of multiple media and innovative technologies. Through community partnerships the Quintet serves recent immigrants, seniors and lower income audiences in Queens with its unique programs that bring new concert music and living composers to the people. To support the Quintet in their outreach programs, commisions from artisits and other community events and concerts please contact quintetorg@gmail.com.
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Composer Ljova works with the Quintet in Jackson Heights, Queens
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Our website improvements have been made possible by the Queens Council on the Arts with support made possible through the JPMorgan Chase Arts and Culture Regrants Program. |
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Special thanks to our major supporters: |
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New York City Department of Cultural Affairs |
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