Author: Joanna

MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu

Meccore String Quartet Performs Haydn, Szymanowski, and Sibelius

La Jolla, C.A.—ArtPower at UC San Diego presents the Meccore String Quartet on Friday, March 4, at 8 p.m. Praised for their flawlessly executed, breathtaking performances, the visionary quartet will perform Franz Joseph  Haydn’s String Quartet in C Major, Op. 50, No. 2; Karol Szymanowski’s String Quartet No.1 in C Major, Op. 37; and Jean Sibelius’ String Quartet in D Minor, Op. 56, “Voces intimae.” The evening performance is part of ArtPower’s chamber music series and takes place at the Department of Music’s Conrad Prebys Concert Hall at UC San Diego, with a pre-performance ArtTalk at 7 p.m. at The Loft. Tickets for event are $36–54 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.

Formed in 2007 by four of Europe’s most celebrated young string players, Meccore performs extensively throughout the continent. The players of the quartet are postgraduates at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, and collaborates with pianist Alfred Brendel on interpretations of Beethoven’s music. The quartet won second prize—along with three additional special awards—at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition in April 2012, as well as numerous top prizes at other competitions. Adam Suprynowicz from Muzkya w Mieście (Music in the City) expresses that the quartet “possesses a perfect command of form and charming lyricism.”

About the Chamber Music Series
The UC San Diego campus community has always enjoyed chamber music performances, a tradition established by many of our founding faculty members. The origins of our Chamber Music series have their roots in the university concert series inaugurated in 1963. In 1996, Robert and Sonia Hamburger, both avid chamber music supporters and both on the faculty at UC San Diego, established the Hamburger Endowment Fund. When ArtPower was created in 2004, the Chamber Music series became an integral part of the program.

About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.

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MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu

Celebrated Mauritanian Vocalist and Instrumentalist
Noura Mint Seymali Makes Her San Diego Debut

“A modernising, transformative force in Mauritanian music.”—The Guardian

La Jolla, C.A.—One of Mauritanian’s most adventurous young artists, Noura Mint Seymali blends her entrancing voice with a mix of funk bass, drums, and psych guitar and creates “a mesmerizing tension between ancient and futuristic” (Chicago Reader). Raised at a crossroad where sounds and culture from the Sahara, the Maghreb, and West Africa coalesce, Noura applies ancient musical traditions of the griot with a savvy aesthetic engagement in our contemporary moment, emerging as a powerful voice at the nexus of a changing Africa. Presented by ArtPower at UC San Diego, Noura Mint Seymali performs at UC San Diego’s Price Center East Ballroom on Thursday, March 3, at 8 p.m. Tickets for event are $30 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.

Noura Mint Seymali is a nationally beloved star and one of Mauritania’s foremost musical emissaries.  Born into a prominent line of Moorish griot (West African traveling poets, musicians, and/or storytellers), Noura began her career at age 13 as a supporting vocalist with her stepmother, the legendary Dimi Mint Abba. Trained in instrumental technique by her grandmother, Mounina, Noura mastered the ardine, a 9-string harp reserved only for women. Seymali Ould Ahmed Vall, Noura’s father and namesake, sparked her compositional instincts, himself a seminal scholar figure in Mauritanian music; studying Arab classical music in Iraq, devising the first system for Moorish melodic notation, adapting the national anthem, and composing many works popularized by his wife, Dimi. Fueled by the exploratory sound of her husband Jeiche Ould Chighaly’s emotive psych guitar lines, Noura and Jeiche formed their first “fusion” band in 2004. Jeiche, a master of the tidinit (traditional stringed musical instrument from West Africa), brings the force of yet another important line of Moorish griot to bear, translating the tidinit’s intricate phrasing to a modified electric guitar with heroic effect. His unique sound, mirroring vocal lines and then refracting their melodies into the either, was born out of years presiding over wedding ceremonies, directing the dance often as the sole melodic instrument. In addition to his work with Noura, Jeiche remains one of Nouakchott’s most sought after guitarists for traditional ceremonies.

About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.

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MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu

Harlem Quartet Makes Its San Diego Debut
Performing Works by Beethoven, Mendelssohn,
Dizzy Gillespie, and Rafael Hernández Marín

La Jolla, C.A.—Praised for its “panache” by the New York Times, the Harlem Quartet is “bringing a new attitude to classical music, one that is fresh, bracing, and intelligent” (Cincinnati Enquirer). Since its debut in 2006 at Carnegie Hall, this New York–based ensemble has performed throughout the U.S. and worldwide, including at The White House for President Obama. On stage at ArtPower on Friday, February 19, at 8 p.m., the Harlem Quartet will make its San Diego debut with a diverse program—Ludwig van Beethoven: String Quartet No. 4 in C Minor, Op. 18; Felix Mendelssohn: String Quartet No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 44; and arrangements of Dizzy Gillespie: Night in Tunisia and Rafael Hernández Marín: El Cumbanchero. The evening performance is part of ArtPower’s chamber music series and takes place at the Department of Music’s Conrad Prebys Concert Hall at UC San Diego, with a pre-performance ArtTalk at 7 p.m. at The Loft. Tickets for event are $36–54 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.

The quartet—consisting of violinists Ilmar Gavilán and Melissa White; violist Jaime Amador; and cellist Felix Umansky—is passionate about advancing diversity in classical music and engaging young audiences through the discovery of repertoire that includes works by minority composers. While in San Diego, the quartet will also give a workshop and performance for the students at The Preuss School, UC San Diego.

About the Chamber Music Series
The UC San Diego campus community has always enjoyed chamber music performances, a tradition established by many of our founding faculty members. The origins of our Chamber Music series have their roots in the university concert series inaugurated in 1963. In 1996, Robert and Sonia Hamburger, both avid chamber music supporters and both on the faculty at UC San Diego, established the Hamburger Endowment Fund. When ArtPower was created in 2004, the Chamber Music series became an integral part of the program.

About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.

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MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu

Kota Yamazaki/Fluid Hug-Hug Dance Company Performs OQ

La Jolla, C.A.—Bessie Award–winning choreographer Kota Yamazaki brings his latest work OQ to ArtPower on Friday, January 29, at 8 p.m. Inspired by Japanese ritual poetry readings held at the Imperial Palace, OQ (ōkyu is the phonetic reading of the Japanese word for palace) features dancers from diverse cultural and dance backgrounds including Western contemporary, butoh, hip-hop, and Jamaican dance. OQ is performed within a space designed by award–winning New York architect collective SO-IL that complements the dancers’ fluid motions. The performance concludes with a post-performance ArtTalk with the choreographer. Tickets for event are $28–46 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.

About Kota Yamazaki/Fluid Hug-Hug Dance Company
Kota Yamazaki/Fluid Hug-Hug was founded in New York in 2002 on the principle of “traveling, exchanging, and exploring.” Yamazaki believes that a person is fluid and has to keep flowing like water, so that exchange between people of different backgrounds become easier and freer. The name Fluid Hug-Hug comes from this idea of fluidity as well as people coming together from all over the world. The company has been invited to perform at festivals and theaters in the United States, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and Australia.

About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.

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MEDIA CONTACT
JOANNA SZU
858.822.3199
jszu@ucsd.edu

Calder Quartet Performs Beethoven, Janáček, Bjarnason, and Norman

La Jolla, C.A.—The “outstanding” and “superb” (New York Times) Calder Quartet returns to ArtPower at UC San Diego on Saturday, January 23, at 8 p.m. “One of America’s most satisfying and enterprising quartets,” (Los Angeles Times), Calder Quartet is the choice ensemble for many leading composers and known for their broad repertoire. The program will include string quartet favorites: Janáček’s String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate Letters” and Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 12 in E-flat Major, Opus 127; along with 21st century works: Daníel Bjarnason’s Stillshot and Andrew Norman’s Sabina. The evening performance is part of ArtPower’s chamber music series and takes place at the Department of Music’s Conrad Prebys Concert Hall at UC San Diego, with a pre-performance ArtTalk with the artists at 7 p.m. at The Loft. Tickets for event are $36–54 and can be ordered online at boxoffice.ucsd.edu or by calling the box office at 858.534.TIXS (8497). Additional program information can be found at artpower.ucsd.edu.

Named after the American artist Alexander Calder and winners of the 2014 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Calder Quartet brings fresh curiosity to the diverse repertoire they perform. The quartet formed at University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music and continued their study under Ronald Leonard at the Colburn Conservatory of Music as well as Juilliard School. Calder Quartet has been featured on various popular TV shows and launched a non-profit in 2011 to facilitate their collaboration with the Getty Museum, Segerstrom Center for the Arts, and the Barbican Centre in London.

About the Chamber Music Series
The UC San Diego campus community has always enjoyed chamber music performances, a tradition established by many of our founding faculty members. The origins of our Chamber Music series have their roots in the university concert series inaugurated in 1963. In 1996, Robert and Sonia Hamburger, both avid chamber music supporters and both on the faculty at UC San Diego, established the Hamburger Endowment Fund. When ArtPower was created in 2004, the Chamber Music series became an integral part of the program.

About ArtPower
ArtPower at UC San Diego builds creative experiences in music, dance, film, exhibition, and food for our collective pleasure and inspiration. We engage diverse audiences through vibrant, challenging, multi-disciplinary performances by emerging and renowned international artists. Through extensive partnerships, ArtPower provides exciting opportunities for research, participation, and creation of new work, igniting powerful dialogue between artists, students, scholars, and the community.

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