FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
INDIANAPOLIS — A concert of contemporary chamber music performed by the Boston-based Callithumpian Consort will take place Thursday, April 2, at the Indiana Historical Society, 450 W. Ohio St. in Indianapolis. An Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis faculty member will perform with the group.
The concert and a pre-concert lecture by noted American composer Christian Wolff is free and open to the public. Wolff composed a new work for the group’s spring 2015 tour. The lecture will take place at 7 p.m. and the concert at 8 p.m.
In addition to Wolff’s new work, the Consort will perform works by Bela Bartok, Earl Brown and Lee Weisert.
The Callithumpian Consort is configured for this tour in a quartet of two pianos and two percussionists. One of the percussionists is Scott Deal, a professor of music technology in the Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI.
The Callithumpian tour and Wolff lecture are made possible with funding from the IUPUI Arts and Humanities Institute, the Donald Tavel Arts and Technology Research Center at IUPUI, the New England Conservatory and Georgia State University.
Founded by pianist and conductor Stephen Drury in the 1980s, the Callithumpian Consort is a professional ensemble producing concerts of contemporary music. Flexible in size and makeup, its repertoire includes the classics of the past 100 years and new works in the avant-garde and experimental traditions.
Wolff was a primary force in a musical movement historically known as the New York School, consisting of composers who revolutionized music in the 20th century. Academically trained as a classicist, Wolff was professor of classics and music at Dartmouth College from 1971 to 1999.