Finalist Schminalist Not A Minimimalist

I work with the NYC-based new music ensemble Sequitur. Sequitur's artistic director, Harold Meltzer (and one of my oldest and best friends), was today named a Pulitzer Prize finalist in the music category. For those of you in the Asheville area with sonic memories, I used a portion of Harold's harpsichord concerto, Virginal, in the 2005 NC Stage production of Yazmina Resa's play, Art.

>>> You can listen to excerpts of Harold's music on his website here.


2009 Pulitzer Prize for Music

MUSIC: “Double Sextet,” by Steve Reich
Premiered March 26, 2008 in Richmond, Va.
A major work that displays an ability to channel an initial burst of energy into a large-scale musical event, built with masterful control and consistently intriguing to the ear.

Finalists Also nominated as finalists in this category were: “7 Etudes for Solo Piano,” by Don Byron, premiered on March 15, 2008 at Hallwall’s Contemporary Art Center, Buffalo, N.Y., a deft set of studies that display rhythmic inventiveness and irresistible energy, charm and wit;

and “Brion,” by Harold Meltzer, premiered on April 23, 2008 at Merkin Hall, New York City, a sonic portrait of a cemetery in northern Italy painted with the touch of a watercolorist and marked by an episodic structure and vivid playfulness that offer a graceful, sensual and contemplative experience.