Upcoming Concert Events
November 2, 2009, Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington DC
Premiere performance of Cosmic Reflections for orchestra and narrator (with visuals by NASA-Goddard), with the Boston University Symphony Orchestra and narrator Carey Harrison, in celebration of the 2009 International Fermi Symposium.
For more information on the companion piece, the GLAST Prelude, for brass quintet, see the GLAST Prelude Page
For more general information on Fermi (formally GLAST):
http://fermi.gsfc.nasa.gov/
For more information on the Kennedy Center concert, with the prospect of attending, contact:
Nancy Christensen: nchristiansen@stanford.edu
November 15, 2009, Shomrei Torah Synagogue, Santa Rosa, CA
Premiere of new chamber work (title TBD) to be written in commemoration of the Dedication of the Torah, currently being inscribed in Jerusalem, commissioned by Shomrei Torah, Rabbi George Gittleman, and Marin & Marlene Stein
Spring 2010 (date TBD), La Mirada Center for Performing Arts, La Mirada, CA
Premiere of new work dedicated to the 50th Anniversary of the City of La Mirada, with the La Mirada Symphony, David Stenske, conductor
Details forthcoming
Fall 2011 (date TBD), Green Music Center, Sonoma County
Grand opening of new state-of-the-art concert hall with debut concert by the Santa Rosa Symphony, featuring a new Sonoma Overture, commissioned by Maestro Bruno Ferrandis and Santa Rosa Symphony
Details forthcoming
2009 Fermi Symposium: Premiere of Cosmic Reflections in Washington D.C.
World Concerto Successfully Premiere – Next up: World Tour
Classical Archives Re-Launched & Rising to the Top
Benny & Joon: Songs Written; Demo Next
2009 Fermi Symposium: Premiere of Cosmic Reflections in Washington D.C.
Readers of this site will recall the excitement experienced in the wake of the very successful premiere and dissemination of the GLAST Prelude, for brass quintet, in conjunction with the launch of the GLAST (now Fermi) Space Telescope from Cocoa Beach last June 11. The full story on the success of the music and the accompanying video (more than 100, 000 hits on YouTube) can be seen on the GLAST Prelude page.
As has been noted, the GLAST Prelude was but the first of two musical projects associated with the Fermi mission, and over the past 5 months Nolan has been in heavy composing mode completing the second, more weighty companion, Cosmic Reflections. The new work, for full orchestra and narrator, will be premiered at the prestigious Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C. on November 2 – as part of the week-long 2009 Fermi Symposium.
The text for Cosmic Reflections – which poetically unfolds the entire history of the Universe – was co-written by famed physicist Lawrence Krauss and Pierre Schwob, the CEO of the Classical Archives (see below) and a gifted amateur cosmologist. Setting the science-rich text has been an amazing challenge and opportunity for Nolan, who himself has become quite an impassioned cosmology “freak” over the past year. The work is in three parts and will run around 40 minutes. It is somewhat akin to Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, in that the music is a leading force in the narrative, depicting or evoking the scientific descriptions within the text in sometimes strident, sometimes lyrical ways as the listener follows the amazing story of our Universe – from the Big Bang to the birth of Stars to life on Earth and beyond.
The concert will feature the Boston University Symphony Orchestra under Maestro David Hoose, along with the esteemed American Brass Quintet – who will reprise the GLAST Prelude and perform an early Baroque work as well. The BU Symphony will also perform Gustav Holst’s The Planets, thereby providing the audience a “then and now” comparison of the music-cosmology interface. Cosmic Reflections will then close the program, performed by the BU Symphony and narrated by actor Carey Harrison, son of the famed Rex Harrison. The work will also be enhanced by an elaborate video presentation created by NASA Goddard, featuring some stunning scientific images.
World Concerto Successfully Premiere – Next up: World Tour
On January 23 and 24, 2009, the virtuoso cellist Maya Beiser was joined by a trio of acclaimed international soloists – Jiebing Chen on erhu, Aruna Narayan-Kalle on sarangi, and Bassam Saba on oud – along with the Oakland Symphony under the direction of Maestro Michael Morgan, in the world premiere of Nolan’s World Concerto for Cello and Orchestra. The two performances, at the Paramount Theater and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music respectively, were both extremely successful, and triggered an amazing outpouring of support and enthusiasm from the audience, the musicians, critics, and more.
A full account of the Concerto, including program notes, bios, audio samples, and reviews, can be found on the separate World Concerto page.
In the wake of the concerto’s success, plans have begun to take the work to cities across the country and the world – given it’s overriding message of cultural cooperation, discovery, and respect. A number of people – including the soloists themselves – have offered to help Nolan in his plans to create a sort of “tour”, to cities such as Washington D.C., London, Vienna, Cairo, Mumbai, Shanghai, and beyond. Given Nolan’s intense composing schedule over the past several months, plans have been slow to get started; but now, with the completion of promotional materials (including those on this website), they will hopefully move into fast gear. Stay tuned!
Classical Archives Re-Launched & Rising to the Top
Although it took a bit longer to arrive than initially anticipated, the newly updated Classical Archives officially launched on May 19, 2009! Creating the perfect classical music website is no easy feat – and though it’s still a work-in-progress (as it will surely always be), it’s something that Nolan and the entire staff are very proud of indeed! If you haven’t checked it out recently, please do so immediately after reading this short news article – at www.classicalarchives.com .
Indeed, the Classical Archives is well on its way to redefining the online classical music space, and giving iTunes a run for its money, as the saying goes. Shortly before the “official” launch, a terrific article ran in the Wall Street Journal that gave the Archives some wonderful validation, and has set the site off to a very good start. More articles are coming out, as well as flurry of blog, Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking activity – which is indeed what is needed to get the word out. The site offers downloads, but most especially is a subscription streaming service, where for a mere $9.95/month (or $99.50/year), you can stream an unlimited number of tracks – the full classical repertory, performed by the world’s greatest artists!
Nolan has his hands full with the site these days, creating a series of Special Features pages, which are getting very good responses. He’s even started doing a few exclusive interviews (the first with the legendary baritone Thomas Hampson) – who knew Nolan would become a journalist? All this in addition to the endless job of cleaning and refining the musical data (metadata), along with his staff of musicologists, creating special concerts, working with the labels and PR firms, etc. It’s good to be the Artistic Director!
Okay, so now go check out the Classical Archives, join, and then tell your friends!
Benny & Joon: 5 Songs Written; Demo Next
Nolan – writing a Broadway musical. It started about a year ago, when veteran theater producer and head of MGM On Stage, Dean Stolber, approached Nolan with a proposition: how’d you like to write a Broadway musical? MGM On Stage is the entity behind the enormously successful musical adaptation of Legally Blonde. Needless to say, he said “yes”, and now only had to pick a film upon which to base the musical.
Eventually, Nolan made his MGM selection, the 1993 film “Benny & Joon”, starring Johnny Depp, Mary Stuart Masterson, and Aidan Quinn. Shortly thereafter, he found a fabulous writing partner, Mindi Dickstein, whose Broadway credits include being the lyricist for Little Woman: The Musical. Though on opposite coasts, Mindi and Nolan kept a fairly steady routine over several months, and completed an initial set of 5 songs – that both are very happy about! The procedure now is that a demo recording must be made and presented to Dean Stolber and the MGM On Stage team. A simple task on paper, but with Nolan’s busy composing schedule, arranging for a planned trip to New York to record the songs has proven hard to make materialize. The current hope is that in the early fall, likely late September or early October, a trip will take place that can move the exciting project of Benny & Joon: The Musical to the next level! Stay tuned.
2 New CDs Coming Soon
Adding to the long list of projects on Nolan’s plate has been the slow gestation of two new performance CDs, of two very different natures: the first is a solo piano CD of principally pop/Rock renditions; the second is the debut CD of the Nolan Gasser Quartet.
The solo piano CD came about via a request / commission from Mr. Jim Rohr of Pittsburg, PA, after hearing Nolan improvise a few Beatles songs last summer. The two discussed some options and decided that Nolan would record a collection of semi-improvised interpretation of some of their favorite songs: principally Beatles, but also Elton John, John Denver, Les Misérables, and others. The CD is nearing completion, and should be available by late-July or early August. Come back here for an update soon.
The second CD project has been a long-time coming, a chance for Nolan and pals Roger Glenn, Terry Miller, and Andy Eberhard to commit something formal to “tape” – and hopefully kick off a set of new performance opportunities: high profile jazz festivals and club dates, a concert tour, etc. More importantly, the project would give the Quartet an opportunity to present a well-crafted and professional offering to the many generous fans they’ve met through the years – and will meet in the future.
Happily, the Quartet project is well under way: Nolan created a set of original arrangements of jazz standards and wrote a couple of original works, all of which the Quartet has now laid down as “basic tracks.” In addition, the superb Alexander String Quartet joins the jazz group on two of the tracks: Dave Brubeck’s “Blue Rondo a la Turk” and the standard “Avalon”, the latter incorporating elements of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” from the 9th Symphony. These tracks too have been recorded, and thus only a few “overdubs” and the various post-production tasks (editing, mixing, etc.) remain. Unfortunately, however, these tasks can be fairly time-consuming, and thus it may be a few months before a product is available – hopefully less. Again, check soon for updates.
See also the Performance page for more on Nolan’s performance activities.
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