In an evening of American premieres, Sō Percussion perform the World Premiere of Bryce Dessner's Wood and Strings: Infinite Choral. Carnegie Hall will host the internationally renowned percussion quartet this Friday January 23 for the evening as they present new works by Caroline Shaw, Michael J. Love and Kendall K. Williams alongside Dessner's work.
Sō Percussion’s history with Dessner reaches back to graduate school at the Yale School of Music where Bryce was a classical guitar major before he was an international rock star with his Grammy-winning band The National, who Sō have since opened for and recorded with.
In 2013 Bryce came up with a novel idea when commissioned to write a new piece for Sō, inventing a new set of instruments inspired by the electric guitar called “chord sticks.” These instruments lie flat, threaded with guitar strings and amplified. But instead of picking or strumming them, they are played like hammer dulcimers with pencils. The four instruments function as soprano, alto, tenor, and bass, with only the lowest bass string fretted.
Music for Wood and Strings was premiered at Carnegie Hall in 2013. Although the instrument recalls the sound of the electric guitar, the writing is pure percussion: Composite melodies bounce around the ensemble in tight rhythmic formations while driving grooves predominate in this work which has now been toured and performed widely.
For Wood and Strings: Infinite Chorale, Dessner harnesses the groups familiarity with the chord sticks to create a darker, heavier piece with the perfume of early minimalism. The instruments are re-tuned and complemented with bass drums, synths, and other electronics in textures which build and change slowly with a relentless energy.
Get your tickets and find out more about the performance here.
The concert will also be performed on January 30 at Richardson Auditorium in Princeton.
