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Gentle Gazzetta Readers,

For me, the first half of 2017 has been one continuous stream of composing deadlines. With the completion and mounting of each new work, it was necessary to immediately launch into making the next one.

In March, I completed and staged Correspondence – a work for voice & electronics, video, a chamber ensemble, a 20-voice chamber choir, and a typewriter-wielding laptop ensemble at Wesleyan University. In early May, Donald Swearingen and I staged our new work, Pascal’s Triangle, for voice, electronics, keyboard, samples, video, violin, and cello, at Royce Gallery in San Francisco. This coming weekend marks the culmination of the third large work I’ve completed this year. I composed the score for Occupy, a site specific dance work by choreographer Stephan Koplowitz for Axis Dance Company. The production will take place throughout Yerba Buena Gardens in downtown San Francisco on the afternoons of July 1st and 2nd. Stephan has choreographed and directed a truly exceptional work, and I’m feeling quite proud of the music I composed for it. Scroll or jump down for all the details…

Concertizing amidst Non-stop Composing...
As if working on all these large projects wasn’t enough, I also gave a number of intervening performances including a concert with Christine Bonansea presented by Harvestworks in New York, a part in Richard Marriott’s Voyage at Fort Mason Center in San Francisco, a performance and talk at Eighth Blackbird’s Creative Lab in Ojai, and New Music Bay Area’s "Garden of Memory" Summer Solstice event at Chapel of the Chimes in Oakland, to name just a few. I also presented the reed quintet Splinter Reeds on the ROOM Series, and joined them in performing a Tom Johnson work.

... and Concert-going
During all of this frenetic composing and performing, there has been no shortage of inspiring work to take in, and I tried to squeeze a lot of art-seeing into as condensed a time as possible.

Another such opportunity was the Don Buchla Memorial Festival at Gray Area Foundation in San Francisco. This packed weekend featured performances by a seemingly endless succession of Buchla’s friends, colleagues, and admirers – including Laetita Sonami, Joel Davel, Amy X Neuburg, and Morton Subotnick.

I also attended an Innova Recordings showcase at National Sawdust in New York, which included works by Miya Masaoka, Mari Kimura, and Neil Rolnick. And I attended concerts on the Berkeley installment of this year’s Ojai Festival – featuring new work by Vijay Iyer, an ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble) performance of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, and an opera by George Lewis. I managed to visit SFMOMA the day before the closing of the Mattisse/Diebenkorn show as well, and I made it to the New York Metropolitan Museum's Comme des Garçons exhibition.

It was a challenge to fit in all of this activity at such a busy time, but I truly rely on seeing great art as fuel to propel my own art-making.

Let the Recording Begin
These six months of hardcore, concentrated composing have been intense, though ultimately rewarding. I must confess that I’m feeling enormously relieved at the prospect of a reprieve from working creatively at such a punishing pace. (Although it’s been a welcome distraction from the horrifying current political climate!) The coming summer months represent the first time in longer than I can remember that I will have a relatively sparse schedule of public performances and no immediately pending composing deadlines. This will give me a chance to finally tackle projects I’ve had to keep on the back burner – not the least of which are the recording projects. My ambitious hope is to finish recording and mixing two new albums by the end of this year. Hopefully I can get them mastered and released in close succession after that. We’ll see how that goes. I need to get on it before the deadlines begin to mount again.

And the deadlines certainly will return sooner than I can catch my breath. Looking forward, I have a commission for the San Francisco Girls Chorus in the coming year, and I’ve been asked to compose music for a new work by Sara Shelton Mann in 2018. But, for now, I’m going to take a big breath, release a grand sigh, and welcome a change of pace.

Love,

PZ

PZ performing Tom Johnson's Narayana's Cows with Splinter Reeds.

Pascal's Triangle

Axis rehearsing for Occupy

Karang Sai carving on one of Richard Marriott's Gamelan instruments

I shared my Garden of Memory niche with Juraj Kojs & Paula Matthusen

Laetitia Sonami's Spring Sprye

PZ with Rob Bailis outside Zellerbach Hall during Ojai at Berkeley

PZ w/ Sean Griffin (who directed George Lewis' opera) and Miya Masaoka

a Kawakubo garment at the Met Museum

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upcoming event details:

Original Pamela Z score for
Stephan Koplowitz's OCCUPY with Axis Dance
Saturday and Sunday, July 1 and 2, 2017, 12 noon and 2:30pm

photo: Robbie Sweeney

OCCUPY
Choreographed by renowned site artist Stephan Koplowitz
with an original score by Pamela Z & costumes by Callie Floor

AXIS Dance Company, Dancers’ Group and Yerba Buena Gardens Festival are pleased to present Occupy - A site-specific journey through an urban garden, July 1-2, 2017. Occupy is inspired by the history, design and architecture of Yerba Buena Gardens, San Francisco and the unique movement capabilities of AXIS Dance Company and their extended cast of performers. Featuring twenty disabled and non-disabled performers, Occupy offers both an immersive and expansive experience. All performances are free, but RSVP is encouraged.

Saturday and Sunday, July 1 & 2, 2017
Guided Performances at 12pm & 2:30pm
Esplanade, Yerba Buena Gardens
Mission St. between 3rd & 4th Sts.
San Francisco, CA

FREE - RSVP encouraged

Yerba Buena Gardens
701 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA

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Pamela Z: Works for Voice & Electronics
RITE OF SUMMER Music Festival
Saturday July 8, 2017, 1pm & 3pm

photo: rubra (courtesy of Ars Electronica)

Pamela Z will perform a program of short solo works for voice, real-time electronic processing, sampled sounds, and wireless gesture controllers.

Free Outdoor Concerts

RITE OF SUMMER Music Festival
Governors Island Nolan Park
New York, NY

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Solo Concert at BROWN UNIVERSITY
Friday September 29, 2017, 8pm