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Modern Orchestra The Knights Will Release First Album, Tour with Bela Fleck

Cutting-edge New York orchestra The Knights have been signed by Warner Classics, and their first album, "the ground beneath our feet," is due to be released Jan 26.The Knights began with brothers Eric and Colin Jacobsen, staging impromptu chamber music readings with their friends at their home while they were music students. Since then, the orchestra has risen and been hailed as “the next generation of classical music.” They have been known to play with big names in the classical and indie music scene, such as Bryce Dessner, guitarist of the band The National.The new album will explore the concerto grosso form, a Baroque form in which musical material is passed between a small group of soloists and a full orchestra. Colin characterizes the relationship between these two musical groups as a “party within a party.”Their "ground beneath our feet" will pair examples by Bach, Haydn, Stravinsky and Reich with world-premiere recordings of two collaboratively composed concertos. True to their collegial creed, the title track is a genuine group composition, collaborative from inceptions to interpretation.The CD release is timed to coincide with The Knights’s extensive, upcoming, seven-state, East Coast tour, where they will be joined by 15-time Grammy-Award-winning banjo artist Bela Fleck.
By Jaime Prisco

  • High-Tech Ballet Shoes Are Able to Trace Dancer's Movements

    Designer and amateur dancer Lesia Trubat has created a new type of ballet shoe for the high-tech ballerina. Electronic Traces records the foot’s contact with the floor, allowing the dancer to “draw” all of their movements in brush-like strokes.“E-Traces,” as it is known, starts with a small electronic device affixed to the bottom or side of a dancer’s shoe. The sensors come from Lilypad Arduinos, which can be purchased online and has been used for all kinds of different wearable electronics.Trubat wove the wires and circuits into the soles of the shoes, and the hardware detects the pressure on the shoe as well as the force of motion from the dancer. A computer program then translates the data and sends it to a custom mobile app program. The result is a beautiful constellation of delicate “paint” marks that look almost as graceful as the dancers themselves.The ballet shoes were designed by Trubat as a degree project for ELISAVA design school in Barcelona, Spain.
    By Jaime Prisco

  • ICYMI: New Art Generation, Orchestra Ambitions, Famous Violinist Returns, NY Philharmonic in Michigan, Dance for South African Children

    Be it classical music, jazz, theater and dance or even art, film or literature, news still gets packed fresh and tight here at "Classicalite."So, we have some leftover headlines.To wit, in order to keep our readers abreast of each and every one of those arts, "C-lite" has compiled the best headlines--those stories, those people...those URLs getting clicked.Here, then, is "Classicalite's" In Case You Missed It:"For City’s Arts Groups, the World Is Their Oyster," by "The Wall Street Journal""Classical Music's New Movement: Bob Riley and the Manchester Camerata," by "The Independent""Overcoming Injury, a Violinist Returns," by "The New York Times""New York Philharmonic Puts Down Roots in Ann Arbor," by the "Detroit Free Press""Dansazania Project Turns Dance Studio into Safe Haven for South African Kids," by "The Huffington Post"
    By Jaime Prisco
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