Music

January 24, 2003 6:00 PM

Stoking up some songs

Every year Zeitgeist, the St Paul-based new music ensemble, challenges Minnesota's amateur composers to enter a song contest. There is some money for the winners, but the real prize is a chance to hear Zeitgeist perform the piece in concert.

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January 17, 2003 11:30 AM

Livin' live at the Dakota

Over the years the comfortable intimacy of the Dakota Bar and Grill in St. Paul has proved irresistable for jazz artists looking for a place to record a live album. Twin Cities jazz singer Debbie Duncan, Chicago sax great Von Freeman and saxophonist Bobby Watson have all released CDs with "Live at the Dakota" in the title. Dakota owner Lowell Pickett, who's always encouraged the recordings, has now launched his own record label, "Dakota Live". Word of Mouth's Chris Roberts talked to Pickett, and the musician featured on the first release: Nachito Herrera.

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January 7, 2003 2:18 PM

The lengths a musician will go

David Levin is prepared to go to some lengths for his music. His new CD "Zuni" takes its name from three years Levin spent on a reservation in New Mexico. He went with his wife, a doctor, who took a job at the reservation health service. Levin told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr the relative isolation of his new home forced him to think seriously about how to pursue his music. He says realized he was going to have to be diligent about finding places to play. David Levin will play from his new CD Zuni at the Bryant Lake Bowl Wednesday night at 8

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January 3, 2003 12:00 PM

Warped Melon sings the blues

Fargo Moorhead produced a couple of notable blues performers in recent years We're talking of course about Jonny Lang and Shannon Curfmann. There's a growing blues presence in Fargo Moorhead. The Warped Melon Blues band is one of the groups attracting an ever larger following. Mainstreet Radio's Dan Gunderson prepared this report for for Word of Mouth.

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January 1, 2003 12:00 PM

Osvaldo Golijov

Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov draws from many influences. There is the classical music and klezmer he learned through his Russian Jewish immigrant parents. There is the passionate tango of Astor Piazzola which resonates through Argentina, as well as the deep, and at times militant, Christianity of South America. Golijov brought all of these influences together in his composition "St Mark Passion". The piece re-tells the story of the Crucifixion from a South American viewpoint. It has been a huge critical success and enraptured audiences. Golijov was in the Twin Cities recently. He told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr he finds nothing strange in combining all these different musical threads.

by Euan Kerr

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December 24, 2002 6:00 AM

Help wanted: Maestro

Two major regional orchestras in the Upper Midwest are searching for a new Music Director. The Fargo/Moorhead Symphony is interviewing five possible conductors. In Sioux Falls the South Dakota Symphony will form a committee in January to begin a search. Music Director Susan Haig abruptly left during her second season in Sioux Falls.

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December 23, 2002 6:00 AM

A new gift of old music

Many churches around Minnesota boast fine pipe organs. Most of them also have a piano they can wheel out for certain occasions. But rarely can a church add its own harpsichord to Sunday services. Now a Lutheran Church in St. Cloud has unveiled a harpsichord it will use for worship services.

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December 13, 2002 10:00 AM

Remembering Dave Ray

Dave Ray was a third of Koerner, Ray, and Glover -- the trio that few people outside of Minnesota now know. Yet everyone from John Lennon, and the Doors to Bonnie Raitt and Beck cite them as influences. Dave Ray died on Thanksgiving after a battle with cancer.

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December 12, 2002 3:00 PM

Norwegian opera may come to Twin Cities

Some 130 years ago, Norwegian Edvard Grieg started composing music for an opera about Norway's famous Viking King Olav Tryggvason. But after a falling out with his text writer, work on the opera stopped. A team of Norwegians finally completed the opera two years ago, and now they want to bring it to the Twin Cities next May.

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December 11, 2002 2:00 PM

Modern technology helps solve instrument mysteries

Modern violin makers want to unravel the mysteries of how the old great instruments, such as Stradivari violins, were made. One St. Paul violin maker is taking CT scans of 17th and 18th century stringed instruments in hopes of unraveling some of the mysteries.

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