Unmeasured Time: The Music of Jarrad Powell
Featuring Gamelan Pacifica, Jessika Kenney and Warren Chang
Free! Info: www.cornish.edu/calendar
Free parking in the garage adjacent to Kerry Hall on Boylston St.
“Because the signs of time’s coming and going are obvious, people do not doubt it. Although they do not doubt it, they do not understand it.” —Dōgen
Cornish College of the Arts celebrates the music of composer and retiring faculty member Jarrad Powell. The concert will look back over his 35 years as professor at Cornish and Director of Gamelan Pacifica. The music will pay homage to the great poet W.S. Merwin and Zen Master Dōgen and will feature Gamelan Pacifica, with the remarkable vocalist Jessika Kenney and Seattle’s leading erhu player and Music Director of the Seattle Chinese Orchestra, Warren Chang.
Featured gamelan performers: Marguerite Brown, Noah Colbeck, Michael Dorrity, Stephen Fandrich, Ted Gill, Emily Hockel, Deena Manis, Anna McDermott, Troy Scheifelbein, Jesse Snyder, Dick Valentine and Jarrad Powell.
Jarrad Powell is a composer, performer and teacher. He is a professor in the Music Department at Cornish College of the Arts, where he has taught for 35 years. His compositions have been performed and broadcast internationally and include pieces for voice, gamelan, various western and non-western instruments, electro-acoustic music, music for theater, dance and film. His work also includes numerous cross-cultural collaborations, particularly with Indonesian artists. He has studied and performed gamelan music for many years and has worked with such notable artists as K.R.T. Wasitodiningrat, Goenawan Mohamad, Tony Prabowo, Rahayu Supanggah, Midiyanto, Didik Nini Thowok, Al. Suwardi, Peni Chandra Rini and many others.
Since the early 1980s, Powell has directed Gamelan Pacifica, one of the most active and adventurous gamelan ensembles in the U.S. As Music Director and composer for Scott/Powell Performance, a contemporary dance company formed in 1994, he has created over 20 major works with choreographer and visual artist Mary Sheldon Scott. He also collaborated extensively with the vocalist and composer Jessika Kenney, both on projects with Gamelan Pacifica and independently. Their CD Stonehouse Songs is on the Present Sounds label.
Powell’s work has been commissioned by the Walker Art Center, Performing Arts Chicago, On the Boards, Music in Motion, Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Myrna Loy Center/Helena Presents, the National Performance Network as well as individual performers. He has received numerous grants and awards, including NEA, Arts International, Rockefeller Foundation, Paul Allen Family Foundation, 4Culture/King County, Office of Arts and Cultural Affairs/Seattle, Artist Trust and Creative Capital Foundation. His 2015 recording, Nourishment, with Gamelan Pacifica, is on Blind Stone Records. His recordings, Natural Selection and Stonehouse Songs are available from Present Sounds Recordings; Scenes from Cavafy, the premiere recording of three major works by composer Lou Harrison with Gamelan Pacifica, was released on New World Records.
Warren Chang, one of the foremost erhu experts in the United States, is President and founder of the Chinese Arts and Music Association and resides in the greater Seattle area. He has performed extensively and made numerous television and radio appearances both nationally and in China. He has traveled throughout the US lecturing and performing to introduce and promote Chinese music to the American public. His incomparable determination and continuing efforts to introduce Chinese music to the Western world has gained a great deal of respect and admiration from both professional musicians and music lovers in general. In January 1995, Mr. Chang was invited by the Japanese producer to record the soundtrack for the epic movie, "The Soong Sisters," with the original score by the famous contemporary composer, Kitaro. During the recordings, Mr. Chang was invited to play all the erhu segments for the entire soundtrack. He has also performed with Seattle Philharmonic Orchestra, Cascade Symphony, Port Angeles Symphony, Seattle Symphony, and Whatcom Symphony Orchestra for his master erhu concert pieces.
Jessika Kenney is a vocalist, composer, teacher, artist, and healer, currently based in the Los Angeles area. Kenney has been a practitioner of sindhenan (Central Javanese solo female vocal music of the gamelan) since 1996 as a student of Ibu Hj Supadmi, and of Classical Persian music as a student of Ostad Hossein Omoumi since 2004. Her own live and recorded works tend to be radical interpretations or “headless translations” of literary, sacred, and other texts from these and other traditions that emphasize transformative energies, ritual, and extreme literalism. Kenney currently teaches “Learning to Scream” at CalArts. Her awards include the James W. Ray Distinguished Artist Award, The Stranger Genius Award with Eyvind Kang, and the Lionel Hampton Best Jazz Vocalist Award. Kenney taught at her alma mater Cornish College of the Arts from 2007–2015 and was with Gamelan Pacifica from 1995–2015.
Gamelan Pacifica is among the finest ensembles devoted to the performance of music for gamelan in the U.S. Formed in 1980, it has performed extensively in the Pacific Northwest, as well as Canada and throughout the U.S. Gamelan Pacifica is an active and adventurous ensemble, with a reputation for creating diverse productions merging traditional and contemporary musical forms with dance, theater, puppetry, and visual media. They have been guest performers at The Smithsonian Institute's Festival of Indonesia, New Music Across America Festival, Vancouver New Music Society, On the Boards, Walker Art Center, Performing Arts Chicago, and many others. In the Northwest they perform regularly and have appeared at the University of Washington, Seattle University, Town Hall, Cornish College of the Arts, the Seattle Art Museum, Evergreen State College, Centrum, Bumbershoot Festival, Arts in Nature Festival, University of Oregon, Whidbey Institute, CenterStage, and others. Visiting artists have included some of the most notable artists of Indonesia, including Rahayu Supanggah, Al Suwardi, Peni Chandra Rini, Heri Purwanto, Sutrisno Hartana, Wayan Sinti, Didik Nini Thowok, Sri Djoko Rahardja, I Made Sidia, Endo Suanda, Dedek Wahyudi, Ki Purbo Asmoro, Goenawan Mohamad, and Tony Prabowo. Gamelan Pacifica's recordings, Trance Gong, Scenes from Cavafy, and Nourishment, have received international acclaim.
A professional ensemble-in-residence at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, Gamelan Pacifica is directed by noted composer and Cornish faculty member Jarrad Powell. This concert is a partnership with the Music Department at Cornish College of the Arts.
In addition to sponsoring the Javanese gamelan ensemble, Gamelan Pacifica is a well-respected non-profit arts organization that supports various programs and special projects relating to music and dance, with a special emphasis on cross-cultural and interdisciplinary collaboration. Gamelan Pacifica has been the recipient of numerous grants, including support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation and Arts International. Gamelan Pacifica is currently supported in part by sustaining funds from the Seattle Office of Arts and Culture and 4Culture.