Premiere of Inferno Postponed Until Fall 2020/Covid-19

Dear Friends: In an abundance of caution, and following suit with a number of other Bay Area organizations, the March 29, 2020 premiere of my Inferno, Double Concerto for Viola, Cello, and Chamber Orchestra with Jennifer Kloetzel, Jonathan Moerschel, Maestra Barbara Day Turner, and San José Chamber Orchestra has been postponed. However, Silver Lining: We are working on the reschedule! So: watch this space! Meanwhile, let’s keep those on the West Coast, and the Bay Area in particular, in our thoughts.

My Mid-Winter 2020 Newsletter Update!

I’ve been busy, and got a bit behind with this. So here you go:

https://mailchi.mp/d90791d07f39/midwinter-2020-news-from-joel-phillip-friedman?e=cfa78605c4

“Home” was a hit!

“Home” the evening-length puppetry theatre multimedia play I scored had a successful run at the Tank NYC in May. It was a real pleasure to work with an all-star creative team and cast on this moving and beautiful work. I can’t wait to see what happens next!

Taipei, Taiwan!

A fantastic trip traveling all over Taiwan meeting artists, composers, teachers, and administrators, and seeing everything thing from the new ultra modern Weiwuying – National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts, to the Aboriginal Piwan tribes, to the National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei. Composer Dr. Ching-Wen Chao was kind enough to invite me to speak to her fantastic students in her formal analysis class about “Beatle Innovation: When Curiosity & Technology Met Songwriting.” The warmth, breath, and high level of art making here is beyond belief (not to mention… the food!).

Presentation at the Abbey Road Conference!

I had a great time giving my paper/presentation George Harrison and Something- Sinatra’s “favorite Lennon & McCartney song” at the recent Abbey Road Conference at Eastman/University of Rochester (for the 50th Anniversary of the release of Abbey Road). It was a fantastic conference, with amazing participants and presentations, and how often do you get to hang out and chat with legend Ken Townsend, MBE – the inventor of ADT (Artificial Double Tracking), and the savior of Abbey Road Studios?

I’m participating in Come Together: Fifty Years of Abbey Road conference at Eastman!

I’m happy to report that I will be joining the next international Beatles conference “Come Together: Fifty Years of Abbey Road” and presenting my  paper “George Harrison and Something – Sinatra’s ‘favorite Lennon & McCartney song’” at the Eastman School of Music in September. Nothing is Beatle proof! And, if George looks confused… all will be explained in my paper.

Home is happening! Opening May 30th

The score I’ve written for “Home,” a new play by Evolve Puppets (Tanya Khordoc & Barry Weil) is done, and the show opens in New York at the Tank NYC on Thursday, May 30, 2019!

“Home” fuses puppetry, theatre and multimedia (including a lot of music!) into a visually thrilling and emotionally moving story of a woman’s connection to the universe: the Circle Of Life! It features an all-star creative team and cast.

“Home” will be performed at The Tank NYC from May 30-June 2, 2019.

SCHEDULE OF PERFORMANCES:
Thursday May 30 at 7:00 p.m.
Friday May 31 at 7:00 p.m.
Saturday June 1 at 3:00 and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday June 2 at 3:00 p.m.

The Tank NYC is located at 312 West 36th Street, NYC between 8th and 9th Avenues, on the 1st floor. Tickets are $20 at 212-563-6269 or at www.brownpapertickets.com. For more information, visit www.evolvepuppets.com.

Home is opening soon in New York!

I’m excited to be scoring this wonderful show, “Home,” which fuses puppetry, theatre, multimedia, and music into a visually thrilling and emotionally moving story. I’m also happy about this lovely write up in Broadway World. “Home” opens May 30th at The Tank on W. 36th.

SCHEDULE OF PERFORMANCES:
Thursday May 30 at 7:00 p.m.
Friday May 31 at 7:00 p.m.
Saturday June 1 at 3:00 and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday June 2 at 3:00 p.m.

The Tank NYC is located at 312 West 36th Street, NYC between 8th and 9th Avenues, on the 1st floor. Tickets are $20 at 212-563-6269 or at www.brownpapertickets.com. For more information, visit www.evolvepuppets.com.

Thrilled to moderate this important panel on climate change & sustainability

It was immensely gratifying to moderate a panel on climate change & sustainability during the New orchestra of Washington’s recent May 4, 2019 concert: Re(new)al featuring Sandbox Percussion. The panel consisted of Sarah Bedolfe (a marine scientist from Oceana USA), Peter Hillier (the sustainability liaison for Room&Board), Sofia Rojas (a senior at Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart in Bethesda, MD), Ian Rosenbaum (from Sandbox Quartet),  Rabbi Warren Stone (known nationally as “the Climate Rabbi”), and Alan Yu (the director of International Climate Policy at the Center for American Progress). The superb concert centered on Sandbox Percussion as soloists in Viet Cuong’s percussion concerto, “Re(new)al” ) commissioned by the Albany Symphony and General Electric (GE) Renewable Energy), as well as works by Max Richter, and Claude Debussy.

All Things Are Set Ablaze in Keene and New York City.

Those three forces of nature, otherwise known as ModernMedieval – founder Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek, Martha Cluver, and Eliza Bagg – did two more superb performances of their Words of Love and Wisdom program, including my badass Hildegarde piece From: All Things Are Set Ablaze, as part of the Electric Earth Concerts, Keene, NH. and then at the spectacular Fuentidueña Chapel at The Met Cloisters. And Classical Voice North America loved the program too! Click here for the review. I don’t mind “While it was certainly raucous and exciting – the trio played a tambourine, a small mallet-hit hand drum, and a triangle as they sang – the piece was far from furious. In fact, it was so much fun that Horner-Kwiatek’s final triangle ting earned a chuckle from the audience.”