MONDAY EVENING CONCERTS: JOHN CAGE - 'SPEECH'

CROSS POSTED WITH LA & OC WEIRDO MUSIC AND ART FORUM

FREE CONCERT, BUT YOU MUST RSVP BELOW!

ACTION III :
JOHN CAGE - 'SPEECH' (1955)
AS PART OF FRIEZE LOS ANGELES' 'AGAINST THE EDGE'
​ECHOI, PERFORMERS

Date: Thursday, February 16, 2023

Doors at 7:00 PM, Performance at 7:30 PM

Venue: Merry-Go-Round Building at the Santa Monica Pier
1550 Appian Way | Santa Monica, CA | 90401

Monday Evening Concerts (MEC) is the world's longest-running series devoted to contemporary music. Read about the series here:
https://www.mondayeveningconcerts.org/about.html

RSVP and concert information:
https://www.mondayeveningconcerts.org/21623---john-cage-speech.html

PROGRAM:

JOHN CAGE - 'SPEECH' (1955)

DESCRIPTION OF EVENT:
Los Angeles curator Walter Hopps organized his first major group exhibition ‘Action’ (1955) in the Santa Monica Pier’s Merry-Go-Round building. Hopps wrapped the carousel in fabric and suspended paintings by a number of California abstract painters including Sonia Gechtoff, Craig Kauffman, Jay DeFeo and Richard Diebenkorn. Unusually, Hopps also included a musical component to the exhibition, playing recorded jazz music and the carousel’s soundtrack as well as his own renditions of John Cage's 'Imaginary Landscape No. 4' for twelve radios.

As part of Frieze Los Angeles' ‘Against the Edge’ program, Jonathan Hepfer, Artistic Director of Monday Evening Concerts, has devised a program of music to play in homage to Hopps’s exhibition.

On Thursday, February 16th at 7:30 PM, Hepfer and a cast of notable figures from the worlds of visual art, literature and music will perform John Cage’s Speech, composed the same year as the Hopps exhibition took place. (Monday Evening Concerts, or MEC, was founded in 1939 by Peter Yates, music critic for Arts & Architecture magazine.)

ECHOI:
​​SISSÒN, (RADIO​)
Hamza WALKER (RADIO)
Orion CARLOTO (RADIO)
Ariana REINES (NEWSREADER)
Arman NAFÉEI (NEWSREADER)
Isabelle ALBUQUERQUE (RADIO)
Ariana PAPADEMETROPOULOS (RADIO)
Jonathan HEPFER (ARTISTIC DIRECTOR)

To read the complete text for MEC Action 3 at the Merry-Go-Round Building, click here:
https://www.delvazprojects.com/monday-evening-concerts-action-3

MEC Mission Statement:
​Monday Evening Concerts (MEC) presents unique artistic experiences rooted in the living legacy of classical music. Offering insightfully curated programs consisting of rare and challenging compositions that might otherwise never reach the ears of local audiences, MEC breathes life into its programming by engaging performing artists of the highest international caliber. Whether focusing on (or juxtaposing) ancient works by Hildegard von Bingen or recent compositions by Julius Eastman, MEC's goals are the same: depth and transcendence. With passionate, devoted audiences consisting of everyone from art-world intelligentsia to first-time concertgoers, MEC aims to provide a warm, engaging, visceral and often revelatory musical environment, sparking unexpected curiosities, providing contemplative space, and illuminating new perspectives in the minds of its listeners.

​Founded on a Ruldolf Schindler-designed rooftop in Silverlake in 1939 by the poet / critic Peter Yates and the pianist Frances Mullen, MEC is well known for its intimate historical relationships with mavericks such as Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, John Cage, Pierre Boulez, Michael Tilson Thomas and even Aldous Huxley. An indispensable part of Los Angeles's cultural history, MEC remains at the vanguard of its discipline, continuing to innovate and evolve the field of classical music at sold-out concert halls and art galleries across Los Angeles today.