Steven Schick in Iowa

I met Steven Schick when I attended the Centre Acanthes in 2000. Among other pieces, he had performed Bone Alphabet, which Brian Ferneyhough had written for him. Steven Schick was a guest at the University of Iowa in October: he was born in Iowa and got a Bachelor and a Masters at the University. It was a treat to hear him perform Bone Alphabet again, but I also enjoyed a lot hearing two performances of Karlheinz Stockhausen's Zyklus, a wonderfully playful piece.

Steven Schick also conducted a beautiful rendering of Varèse's Ionisation, a sensitive piece of percussion chamber music.

I had the pleasure of performing with the Center for New Music conducted by David Gompper. The most important piece on the concert was George Lewis's Soundlines, a piece during which Steven Schick tells the story of a walk he took from San Diego to San Francisco. During the summer, I re-built the live electronics set-up designed by George Lewis; I took care of the live sound performance and projection. I loved the performance, and I think the audience loved it too!

Walking in Iowa City's City Park with doctoral student Kevin Swenson and Steve Schick, a few minutes before the performance of John Luther Adams' Inuksuit.

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