What a great photo shoot today with photographer Gerry Szymanski!  Even though Hurricane Irene got in the way of our outdoor photo ideas, we got some nice natural lighting in Annex 901 and 902 at The Eastman School of Music.  You'll see these photos on our website in the near future.

This was our first weekend of rehearsals in preparation for the Luxembourg International Percussion Competition.  We worked on "Sun" by Baljinder Sekhon, "Rain Tree" by Toru Takemitsu and "Triade" by Heinrich Konietzny.  For only two days of rehearsals, we're making good progress.  
We'll be preparing 11 pieces for the competition, so we still have a lot of work to do!

Hey Volta fans, it's Chris Clarino.  Welcome to the Volta blog!  We'll keep you up-to-date with everything we're doing right here.

We've had a lot in the planning over the last few weeks:


•  Thanks to some much-needed funding from Dean Lowry at The Eastman School of Music, Volta Trio will be competing in the 2012 International Percussion Competition in Luxembourg.  We're very excited about this, and we'll be meeting up later this week to discuss repertoire.

•  Our commission with composer Baljinder Sekhon is finished!  Our new piece, SUN, is a 12-minute tour-de-force for percussion trio.  Each player has a keyboard instrument (marimba, vibraphone, and xylophone) as well as a skin, metal, wood and a few other things.  One of the most intriguing aspects of the piece is the "very large cymbal" in the center of the setup, shared by all players.  We will be working with Baljinder in early July to make an audio/video recording of the piece.  

•  The three of us will be traveling down to NYC to perform in John Luther Adams's "Inuksuit" in Morningside Park, as part of Make Music New York.  The piece is scored for 9 to 99 percussionists.  Last summer, we made the premiere recording of JLA's "Always Very Soft" and gave the New York premiere last March, so we're super excited to finally meet him in person.

•  We're working on a grant proposal through the Orange County (NY) Arts Council to present a 5-concert tour at various venues across the county.  So far, we've got the Up Front Exhibition Space and Valley Central High School on board as venues.

•  Have any recommendations for repertoire?  Let us know!


-Chris