Eric Cha-Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski and Jason Treuting are the members of So Percussion.
By Kevin Cheng
With the help of world-renowned percussion ensemble So Percussion, students are pushing musical boundaries at Princeton.
Works from the graduate music class “Ends and Means: Issues in Composition” co-taught by Steve Mackey and So Percussion will be performed May 18 and 19 at 8 p.m. in Taplin Auditorium. The performance is free.
So Percussion, the newly appointed Edward T. Cone Ensemble-in-Residence at Princeton University, has been working with both faculty and student musicians in the Princeton community.
Consisting of Eric Cha-Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski, and Jason Treuting, So Percussion has been at the forefront of American music culture with 16 albums recorded and was praised by the New Yorker for their “exhilarating blend of precision and anarchy, rigor and bedlam.”
Its members are also co-directors of a new percussion department at the Bard College-Conservatory of Music. This undergraduate program enrolls each student in a double-degree (bachelor of music and bachelor of arts) course in the Conservatory and Bard College, equipping them with elite conservatory training and a broad liberal arts education.
Steve Mackey, Guggenheim fellow and professor of music at Princeton, spoke of the unique relationship between students and the ensemble that led to the compositions they will be performing at Taplin this month.
“So Percussion were there most of the time demonstrating and working with the students. They would play the musical assignments written by students and we would discuss how they could be improved,” Mackey said.
The majority of works being performed at the concert will be works created in this process by students in the class. Other material from So Percussion’s repertoire will also be featured.
The performance is being organized by Princeton Sound Kitchen, a forum for the creation and premier of new music at Princeton University.
PSK (formerly the Composers Ensemble of Princeton) is a forum for the creation of new music that serves the graduate student and faculty composers of Princeton’s composition program.
PSK presents a wide variety of concerts and events throughout the year. Some are eclectic and feature numerous soloists or groups and a mix of instrumentation, while others focus on a particular chamber ensemble. All have the purpose of demonstrating the range of interests and abilities of the Princeton composers, many of whom take the stage themselves as performers of their own and others’ music.
In addition to So Percussion, ensembles that have been featured at PSK include the Brentano String Quartet, the New Millennium Ensemble, the Now Ensemble, Newspeak, the Crash Ensemble, the Janus Trio and Roomful of Teeth.
PSK is directed by Dan Trueman, composer and professor of music at Princeton, in collaboration with his staff and faculty colleagues and the graduate student composers. Michael Pratt is the resident conductor, and Wally Gunn is the program coordinator.
“It is a real privilege to work with the same students over the course of three or four months. You have the time to really explore the eclectic sounds that various instruments can make,” Jason Treuting said. “One composition consisted of bouncing Ping-Pong balls on a vibraphone—it was quite fantastic!”
It is this dynamic, personal relationship that will drive the performance, with So Percussion premiering their students’ compositions.
“My students are really writing for individuals — for Adam, Eric, Jason, and Josh – not just some abstract group of performers,” Mackey said. “These assignments have blossomed and grown over the months into the pieces you will hear.”
,
