Bamboo and Brass LTD Performs Music of Dutch Composer Douwe Eisenga
$10 advance, $15 at the door
- Ken Murphy, soprano saxophone
- Evan Takle, alto saxophone
- Barbara Hubers Drake, tenor saxophone
- Lori Shepherd, baritone saxophone
Douwe Eisenga — Bliss
Douwe Eisenga — Rose Road
Douwe Eisenga — Block Attack
Adrienne Albert — Mirror Images for Saxophone Quartet
Jacob Stenzel — A Fragile State
Ryan Shepherd — Kopi Luwak - written by Alan Ferber arranged for sax quartet by Ryan Shepherd
Bamboo and Brass LTD is thrilled to feature the music of Dutch composer Douwe Eisenga. Eisenga’s compositions incorporate twelve-tone techniques, baroque music, pop songs, sustained ostinato rhythms, and eastern music; he manages to combine these elements in his compositions. Rounding out the concert will be audience favorites and compelling compositions written by members of the Seattle Composers Alliance Jacob Stenzel and Adrienne Albert. With a special thank you to the Dutch government for providing Douwe Eisenga with a travel grant, Bamboo and Brass LTD is thrilled to have Douwe Eisenga in the audience for this once-in-a-lifetime concert.
For the last twenty years, Eisenga has gained world-wide attention. He works with British writer David Mitchell, American choreographer Claudia Schreier, Italian harpist Assia Cunego, and the Russian Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble. Closer to home, he writes music for harpist Lavinia Meijer, pianists Marcel Worms, Jeroen van Veen and Gerard Bouwhuis,Cello Octet Amsterdam, Slagwerk Den Haag, and many more.
In 2017, Eisenga recorded the eight-minute long For Mattia. He is commissioned to write this piece by the parents of a young lady who chose to end her own life. It unintentionally created a starting point for the lightning-fast development of his career as a concert pianist. The touching composition has been high in the Classical Top 400 for five years now, with the 400 compositions most popular on Radio 4 according to listeners. This lustrum was the reason for a guest appearance on a popular Dutch television show, which was watched by approximately one million viewers.
Last fall his new album Open was released by Butler Records / V2 Records. The song Theme I from this album was included in the gift CD (15,000 copies) of a yearly Dutch campaign for classical music. Meanwhile, in September the press praised the music of the location theater project Landmark 369 and the documentary Thirteen Days – with music by Douwe – was nominated for a Golden Calf (a sort of Dutch Oscar).
His musical DNA is rooted in rock, pop, and world music. All these influences, combined with baroque and the minimalistic repetitiveness of Philip Glass, find their way into the pieces of Eisenga.
"Music that could have long-range importance." – American Record Guide
"Douwe Eisenga knows to immerse us miraculously in a timelessness that we could forever linger in." – Inactuelles
"Eisenga possesses the uncanny ability to write expressive, high-quality music capable of appealing to discerning listeners of all ages." – Textura
About Bamboo and Brass LTD
Bamboo and Brass LTD is a group of professional musicians created to discover and explore the wide-range of saxophone quartet repertoire, as there has been an explosion of quartet music for saxophone in the past 20 years. Ken Murphy (soprano sax), Evan Takle (alto sax), Barbara Hubers-Drake (tenor sax), and Lori Shepherd (baritone sax) met while participating in various jazz orchestras throughout the Seattle area. The quartet first came together in 2019 to perform in the international Bach in the Subway Festival and has added an eclectic mix of ensemble music since then. Individually, all have performed nationally and internationally with numerous ensembles at weddings, corporate events, parties, concerts, festivals, educational events, restaurants, clubs, churches, and theater pit orchestras.
https://www.facebook.com/bambooandbrassltd/About Wayward Music Series
Each month, Nonsequitur and a community of like-minded organizations and artists present 10 concerts of adventurous and experimental music in the gorgeous Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center: contemporary/post-classical composition, free improvisation and the outer limits of jazz, electronic/electroacoustic music, new instruments, phonography, sound art, and other innovative musics.
https://www.waywardmusic.org/