Classicalite favorite Maya Beiser will perform in Films for Cello as part of Bill Morrison: Compositions at The Museum of Modern Art later this month. The evening will feature films by Bill Morrison and music by Michael Gordon and Michael Harrison. The event is just short of Beiser’s Innova label Uncovered record release, featuring the music of Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Janis Joplin and many others.
Beiser's performance complements the comprehensive view of Morrison’s work at mid-career, with a full retrospective of more than two dozen shorts and feature films. Included in the bill is Light is Calling from 2004 with music by Michael Gordon, Just Ancient Loops from 2012 with music by Michael Harrison and the New York premiere of All Vows from 2103 with live music by Michael Gordon.
Gordon’s All Vows focus is on a reimagination of a Yom Kippur prayer, Kol Nidre. The music for All Vows was commissioned for Beiser in 2006, through the Maria and Robert A. Skirnick Fund for New Works at Carnegie Hall.
“As in my previous work with Michael [Gordon], the film highlights the fragile and corporeal nature of ancient filmstock — the implication of an unknowable future as reflected through a dissolving historic document,” said Morrison on All Vows.
Gordon wrote Light is Calling in his studio on Desbrosses Street in New York immediately post 9/11. Morrison’s film for the composition was created by reprinting and re-editing a scene from the black and white 1926 film, The Bells.
The 25-minute piece Just Ancient Loops by Harrison was also created for Beiser. The film showcases every aspect of the cello, from harmonics to pizzicatos archival footage, chemical processes and animation.
The event takes place on Thursday, October 23, at 8 p.m at MoMA. Tickets start at $12 and you can purchase them here.
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