The University at Albany Departments of Music and English and the University Art Museum are proud to welcome the noted conductor and composer Petr Kotik for a three-day series of concerts and lectures: “Music of Words, Poetry of Sounds: A Residency with Petr Kotik.” The Kotik residency offers an introduction to a significant musical, literary and artistic world that arose during the 1950s-70s, a period when sound, image, words and film converged, and continues to this day. The remarkably creative and collaborative works to be presented in the residency, many of them rarely seen or heard on the concert stage, continue to influence many contemporary trends across a spectrum of disciplines. Kotik’s residency will provide a rare opportunity to experience the performance of some of these unique works. Most events are free and all are open to the public. Tickets must be purchased for the Saturday evening performance at the University’s Performing Arts Center Recital Hall.

Petr Kotik has long championed new and innovative musical explorations, both as a composer of his own musical works and as a performer and conductor of music from a long list of seminal 20th-century composers, among them John Cage, Morton Feldman, Pauline Oliveros, Muhal Richard Abrams, and Christian Wolff in an ever-expanding circle of musicians, writers, and artists. The Village Voice declares: “… Kotik stands very near the top, and possibly at the top … his output has been amazingly consistent in quality” (Kyle Gann) and The New York Times calls his S.E.M. Ensemble “…one of New York’s most adventurous new-music groups.” (Alex Ross)

The residency opens on Thursday evening, March 26, 7:00-9:00 p.m., with an open rehearsal in the University’s Performing Arts Center Recital Hall, featuring performers from the University’s Chamber Singers and Percussion Ensemble. This will be an unusual opportunity to observe how the works on Saturday evening’s program are performed and interpreted, and to gain insight about the act of artistic creation and performance. Admission is free.

On day two of the residency, Friday afternoon, March 27, 3:00 – 4:30 p.m., the University’s English Department hosts a talk by Mr. Kotik on “scores” and the relation between music and words. Kotik has often used the writings of others, Gertrude Stein, R. Buckminster Fuller, and Vaclav Havel, for example, in his own musical compositions. The lecture will be held in the University’s Humanities Building, Room 354. Admission is free.

Day two continues on Friday evening, March 27, 6:00 - 8:00 p.m., when the University Art Museum sponsors a special evening performance of sound poetry, or "sound-text" works. The program will include a re-visioning of "Empty Words" (1972) by John Cage, the 20th century musical pioneer who used Henry David Thoreau’s journals as sound material, and will feature a performance by Petr Kotik. The program will also include works of sound poetry created and performed by the Be Blank Consort. Since 2001, the Be Blank Consort has performed and recorded multi-vocal works using visual poetry as a score for performance, focusing on the interplay between image and sound. Admission is free.

The residency culminates in a performance of New Music on Saturday, March 28, 7:00 p.m., in the University's Performing Arts Center Recital Hall. The program will feature music by Phill Niblock, John Cage, Jackson Mac Low, Petr Kotik and Morton Feldman. Performances will be given by members of the University at Albany's Percussion Ensemble and Chamber Singers, and conducted by Petr Kotik. David Griggs-Janower directs The Chamber Singers, and the Director of the Percussion Ensemble is Richard Albagli. Tickets for this event are $8.00. Student admission is $4.00. The works to be performed include:

·Phill Niblock’s PK & SLS  (1989) for flutes, performed simultaneously with Niblock’s video Movement of People Working  (1973-91)

·John Cage’s Solos (1958), simultaneously performed with Cage’s Fontana Mix (1958), for 4-channel tape

·Jackson Mac Low’s Milarepa Gatha (1977) for chorus

·Petr Kotik’s The Plains at Gordium (2004) for six percussionists

·Morton Feldman’s Christian Wolff in Cambridge (1963), for chorus

“Music of Words, Poetry of Sounds: A Residency with Petr Kotik” also includes a small exhibit of visual scores in the University at Albany’s Main Library, featuring the scores of Petr Kotik, works from Geof Huth's papers in The M. E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives, and a wide array of visual-poetic works by the Be Blank Consort and its affiliates. The exhibit is located in four glass cases of the University’s Main Library and will remain open to the public for the Spring semester.

The Czech-born Kotik, who came to the live in the US in 1969, last performed at the University at Albany during the 1970s, as part of the University's "Free Music Store," a new music venue founded and directed by UAlbany Professor Emeritus Joel Chadabe. Kotik is the director of the SEM Ensemble, founded in Buffalo, New York in 1970. Their recordings have been released on the Wergo, Cramps, Ear-Rational, Asphodel, DOG W/A BONE, Labor, and World Edition labels. International performances have included concerts at Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall in New York City, as well as in South America, Europe and Asia. Kotik also founded Ostrava Days in 2001, a biennial Institute and Festival for students and guest lecturers in Ostrava, Czech Republic.

“Music of Words, Poetry of Sounds” is directed by Robert Gluck and Michael Peters, assisted by Rukyatu Tijani. Gluck is Associate Professor of Music and Director of the University’s Electronic Music Studio. Peters is a doctoral candidate in the UAlbany English Department. Tijani is a student in the UAlbany Departments of Political Science and Africana Studies. The Kotik Residency has been made possible by funding and a partnership that includes the Department of English, Department of Music, University Auxiliary Services, the College of Arts and Sciences, The GSO (Graduate Student Organization), The EGSO (English Graduate Student Organization), Jawbone, The UAlbany Art Museum, The M. E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives, The UAlbany Main Library, and The College of Arts and Sciences at the University at Albany.

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