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[MUSIC REVIEW] Bang on a Can All-Stars at MASS MoCA with Iva Bittova
7.22.07
MASS MoCA
6th Annual Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival
Bang on a Can All-Stars
with Iva Bittova
review by SETH ROGOVOY, editor-in-chief and critic-at-large, BERKSHIRE LIVING Magazine
(North Adams, Mass., JULY 21, 2007) -- Once again the Bang on a Can All-Stars took center stage at MASS MoCA and demonstrated why they are the premier avant-garde new-music ensemble in the world. What that means is something different to everyone. But by the merits of Saturday night's concert, it means that this band can do just about anything and has impeccable taste in music.
They're also not afraid to share the stage with guest artists, and this year they generously -- perhaps a little bit too much so -- shared the stage with Czech avant-garde vocalist and violinist Iva Bittova. While the band recorded a terrific album with Bittova last year called Elida, surrendering the entire second half of the program to her Meredith Monk-like shrieking vocals came as a bit of a disappointment after a dynamite first half that got off to a great start with Bang co-founder Michael Gordon's City Walk, an "expanded minimalist" (I just made that up) number that could well serve as the quintessential Michael Gordon and Bang on a Can composition. The All-Stars seemed to play this number accompanied by one of Bill Morrison's signature films as easy as they breathed, and it was probably the highlight of the evening.
Close behind was Dutch composer Cornelis de Bondt's About the Good Days of Good Signs, which juxtaposed tape recordings of scientists including Thomas Edison, Niels Bohr, and Albert Einstein meditating on 20th-century scientific "progress" and the atomic bomb next to 14th and 15th century dance rhythms.
The first half also included the premiere of bassist Gregg August's Oriente, which was rooted in the clave rhythm and found the All-Stars at their jazziest and rockingest.
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