“If the name Gyorgy Ligeti doesn’t ring an immediate bell in the minds of local classical music buffs … a major series of events at the University of Chicago over the next six months could well upend that situation,” writes John von Rhein in Wednesday’s (10/18) Chicago Tribune. “The Gyorgy Ligeti Series … will launch Friday night in Mandel Hall with a concert by the Arditti Quartet…. Ligeti’s two string quartets will share the program with quartets by his Hungarian countryman Bela Bartok. Four later [chamber] concerts of Ligeti works … a lecture-demonstration and a scholarly conference will enlist groups such as the Imani Winds, Ensemble Dal Niente and Eighth Blackbird, along with French pianist and Ligeti champion Pierre-Laurent Aimard, among other performers…. Professors … will deliver pre-concert lectures, and a raft of student musicians will collaborate with Third Coast Percussion in a rare performance of one of Ligeti’s quirkier experimental pieces, the ‘Poeme Symphonique’ for 100 … windup metronomes.” Other composers in the series include Lukas Ligeti, the composer’s son, Steve Reich, Aurel Hollo, and Christopher Cerrone, and there will be a “Ligeti in Context: The Witch’s Kitchen” sound installation by the University of Chicago’s electronics studio director Sam Pluta.
Posted October 20, 2017
