PRISM Quartet with Diane Monroe, Ursula Rucker, and Tyshawn Sorey: Unlocking Your Inner Composer (NYC)

PRISM Quartet, a world-renowned all-saxophone ensemble, is joining forces with violinist and Pew Fellow Diane Monroe, poet/vocalist and Pew Fellow Ursula Rucker, and percussionist and Pulitzer Prize winner Tyshawn Sorey to present a concert in NYC of music from their residency at the Free Library of Philadelphia. The program will feature world premieres of works by rising stars from PRISM’s Unlocking Your Inner Composer project.  (Check this page in October for a list of composers and repertoire.)

Very limited seating. Get your tickets early!

 

 

 

 

 

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

“A bold ensemble that set the standard for contemporary-classical saxophone quartets” (The New York Times), PRISM Quartet has been presented by Carnegie Hall, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and throughout Latin America, China, and Russia under the auspices of USIA and USArtists International. PRISM has also appeared as soloists with the Detroit Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra, and conducted residencies at the nation’s leading conservatories, including the Curtis Institute and the Oberlin Conservatory. Two-time recipients of the Chamber Music America/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming, PRISM has commissioned over 300 works by eminent composers, including Pulitzer Prize-winners Susie Ibarra, Tyshawn Sorey, Julia Wolfe, William Bolcom, Jennifer Higdon, Zhou Long, and Bernard Rands, and MacArthur Fellows George Lewis, Bright Sheng, and Miguel Zenón. PRISM’s discography is extensive, with releases on Albany, BCM&D, BMOP/Sound, ECM, innova, Koch International, Navona, Naxos, New Dynamic, New Focus, Orange Mountain Music, and its own label, XAS Records. PRISM’s 2018 release with The Crossing of Gavin Bryars The Fifth Century won a Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance. PRISM Quartet performs exclusively on Selmer saxophones.

Diane Monroe bridges classical string repertoire, jazz and blues improvisation, African and African American musical traditions, and contemporary experimental music. Her cross-genre work has included engagements with artists and groups such as Bobby Zankel, Odean Pope, and John Blake; the Max Roach Double Quartet; Harlem Symphony Orchestra; and Bang on a Can All Stars. Monroe has been leading her own ensembles for more than 15 years, including The Diane Monroe Quartet and a duo with her longtime musical partner, vibraphonist Tony Miceli, with whom she released the album Alone Together in 2014. Monroe is a Philadelphia native and graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and University of the Arts. She has taught at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Swarthmore College, Lehigh University and Temple University. Monroe is a recipient of a Pew Fellowship in the Arts.

Ursula Rucker is a poet, performer, and recording artist who has inspired listeners around the world for nearly three decades. She is a Philadelphia native and graduate of Temple University’s school of journalism. She has collaborated with musical artists King Britt, The Roots, 4Hero, Jazzanova, Louie Vega, Doodlebug of Digable Planets, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, and more—as well as Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Clarence Williams III.  She recently contributed to Aṣẹ: Afro Frequencies, an immersive and interactive digital art exhibit created by ARTECHOUSE in collaboration with Vince Fraser, a London-based Afro-surrealist digital artist and illustrator. About her practice, she writes “I stand for poetry as a source of profound truth. That truth, for me, is connected to the idea that cities are places that redeem our strivings and leave us longing; the ways family life shapes and shakes us, and brings us back; and the thought that artists safeguard stories and struggles.” Rucker is a recipient of a Pew Fellowship in the Arts.

2024 Pulitzer Prize winner Tyshawn Sorey is celebrated for his incomparable virtuosity, effortless mastery and memorization of highly complex scores, and an extraordinary ability to blend composition and improvisation in his work. He has performed nationally and internationally with his own ensembles, as well as artists such as John Zorn, Vijay Iyer, Roscoe Mitchell, Muhal Richard Abrams, Wadada Leo Smith, Marilyn Crispell, George Lewis, Claire Chase, Steve Lehman, Jason Moran, Evan Parker, Anthony Braxton, and Myra Melford. The New Yorker’s Alex Ross described him as “among the most formidable denizens of the in-between zone…An extraordinary talent who can see across the entire musical landscape.” Sorey has composed works for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, ICE, soprano Julia Bullock, JACK Quartet, TAK Ensemble, Alarm Will Sound, and Opera Philadelphia in partnership with Carnegie Hall. He is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and Doris Duke Impact Award. He is Presidential Assistant Professor of Music at the University of Pennsylvania, where he also teaches in the department of Africana Studies.

TICKETS: This concert is presented on a pay-what-you-wish basis, with three levels of tickets for general admission — $10, $22.50, and $35 — in order to make it affordable to the widest possible audience.

SUPPORT PRISM QUARTET
Ticket revenue covers only a small percentage of the cost of producing this concert. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation to PRISM Quartet’s nonprofit organization to support our concert series, educational programs, and commissioning and recording projects. Visit the Support page.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This program is presented with generous support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, the Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, and Conn-Selmer. PRISM Quartet plays Selmer saxophones exclusively.

ACCESSIBILITY
PRISM Quartet welcomes all individuals to our concerts, and provides a variety of accommodations for those with disabilities in accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. For specific accommodations, please contact info@prismquartet.com or 215.438.5282.