[reviews & mentions]
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In very Ojai fashion, there were so many living composers programmed that Esa-Pekka Salonen didn’t even qualify as a headliner. If anything, he was a known quantity that unintentionally faded amid the novelty of other voices. Carlos Simon’s propulsive and galvanizing “Fate Now Conquers” nodded to Beethoven, but on his own brazen terms. And there continues to be nothing but promise in the emerging Inti Figgis-Vizueta, whose “To give you form and breath,” for three percussionists, slyly warped time in a juxtaposition of resonant and dull sounds of found objects like wood and planters. |
Haimovitz’s playing is thoughtful and committed throughout, the only technical challenge being the balletic section of Nkeiru Okoye’s Eubas Dance, with its perilous interlacing of double-stopping and pivot notes. The audio quality belies the fact the tracks were recorded at von Heyl’s artist studio in Texas. Jorge Sosa’s Reimagined Spring underlines the narrative eloquence of the cello; it is followed by inti figgis-vizueta’s the motion between three worlds, which, alongside its string-crossings and open chords, explores harmonics in a way that attractively opens up the transitional space between the material and immaterial. |
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Highlights for me include inti figgis-vizueta’s the motion between three worlds, a rhythmic piece reflecting the composer’s Andean and Irish roots, Vijay Iyer’s reflective Equal night which includes an occasional nod to Bach’s iconic cello suites, the dramatic by Roberto Sierra and Lisa Bielawa’s otherworldly Missa Primavera... |
For figgis-vizueta, the creation of active creative space for living, breathing communities of composers might be even more important than repairing a long-broken history. |
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No one can keep up with the pace of contemporary composers and their works, but inti figgis-vizueta is someone you don't want to miss. A New York-based composer, inti is an innovator in the style of John Cage. Open work has three sections – knotted object//Trellis in bloom//lightening ache. A generous artist, she allowed us an on-camera peak at the graphic score. While it may look simpler than standard notation, it takes a talented group of musicians to make sense of a non-traditional score and bring it to life. Catchfire's performance was magical. |
Originally from Washington and now based in New York City, figgis-vizueta, 27, knocked my comfiest socks off during the quarantine with “Music for Transitions,” a raw, scraping yet soaring solo piece commissioned and premiered by cellist Andrew Yee. Since then, I’ve been hooked: The Julius Eastman-inspired “Openwork, Knotted Object”; the haunting “No Words” for clarinet and electronics; the “reaching sap-slow toward sky” thriller of “Placemaking” — her music feels sprouted between structures, liberated from certainty and wrought from a language we’d do well to learn. Coming in 2021 are commissions for the JACK quartet and North Carolina-based ensemble earspace. |
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Form the Fabric, an ensemble work by composer inti figgis-vizueta, can be played with any number of musicians on any type of instrument. The score provides lots of gestures, with some indications of harmony, leaving the interpretation up to the performing musicians. No two performances of Form the Fabric are alike, forming a new “fabric” with each performance. According to figgis-vizueta, the phrase “Form the Fabric” derives from archaeologist Ramiro Mato’s description of the cosmological understandings of the Incan & Andean peoples. Mato describes the Inca Road as “threads interwoven to form the fabric of the physical and spiritual world,” and figgis-vizueta conjures an auditory representation of the connectivity between the physical and non-physical. |
Alone Together is a marvel for a time of crisis. Ms. Koh gathered 20 established composers to donate short new works for solo violin and recommend 20 emerging composers to be commissioned as well. The roster is more inclusive than anything in mainstream classical music. |
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inti figgis-vizueta presented the world premiere of three short pieces. Openwork, knotted object introduces quietly focused interlocking rhythmic patterns that weave in and out of each other as they breathe together. The enveloping world evokes a sense of translucence, which slowly rotates until all facets of the space are visible. Conducting the module-based piece, Lidiya Yankovskya allowed the instrumentalists to dictate when things moved forward, sometimes slowly rotating her hands but remaining largely in the background. |
Form [the] Fabric by New York-based composer inti figgis-vizueta is an exploration of collective improvisation where the musicians are provided with flexible lead-sheets. The composer herself conducted this performance which opened with beautiful sustained tones that swelled into a tumultuous ball of loud noise. The piece passed through several more textures, all quite different, but the impressive thing was the smoothness with which these transitions were conducted. |
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Says 2019 [Hildegard Competition] winner inti figgis-vizueta, “When people acknowledge and engage with every part of complex identities, artists can create authentic work.” For figgis-vizueta, the competition win allowed them to “commit a large amount of time to the development and expansion of my practice of overlapping notional and structural schema. Beyond money, however, the most valuable part of this competition was mentorship from people [specifically, Gavin Rayna Russom and Du Yun] who shared more of my lived experiences than any other teachers I’d found in traditional spaces.” |
[older mentions, click for link]
In Review - Starshine & Clay by Brin Solomon
A Trans Composers Playlist by Alex Temple
In Review - Starshine & Clay by Brin Solomon
A Trans Composers Playlist by Alex Temple