Jodie Landau | You of All things
Produced by National Sawdust and Beth Morrison Projects
LA IN BROOKLYN
Saturday, November 19th @ 10pm
Tickets
Food and drink will be available
About the Show
Even if, in addition to writing, playing and singing his own material, Jodie Landau had not brought on board an established producer, three other L.A.-based composers, six chamber musicians, and an entire Icelandic women’s chorus, “You of All Things” would still be a most unusual debut album.
For one thing, Landau’s voice is a most unusual instrument. At once raw and exposed, pure and unerringly precise, his vocals are able to veer between choirboy cantillation, torch-singer croon, and full-throated bellow without losing a character that is unmistakably his own. And his compositional aesthetic—which manages to encompass both the unpretentious bounce of popular song and moments of ominous stasis, setting his own, emotionally intimate lyrics or penning purely instrumental interludes—demands that elasticity.
His other instruments are a little out of the ordinary, as well: in addition to singing, Landau beats and bows on a small battery of percussion instruments. But as a vocalist, a composer, and as a percussionist, Landau insinuates himself effortlessly into every layer of music-making on the album. The truly remarkable thing about this project is how naturally Landau brings together the large circle of collaborators responsible for making this album happen. Simply put, Jodie Landau plays well with others.
Jodie Landau
Jodie Landau is a 24-year- old composer, vocalist, and percussionist and is the newest addition to the renowned Icelandic record label Bedroom Community. His music combines elements of chamber music, rock, and jazz for live performance, film, theater, and dance. As a solo performer, Jodie sings while playing vibraphone and marimba. Landau works with the acclaimed modern music collective, wild Up as a performer, composer and production manager.
In Fall 2013, Jodie was the multi-percussionist in The Industry’s invisible opera for wireless headphones, “Invisible Cities” by Christopher Cerrone at Union Station. In Spring 2014, Jodie composed a live score for Ate9 dANCEcOMPANY’s “mouth to mouth” performed by wild Up. In Summer 2014, Jodie and wild Up traveled to Reykjavik, Iceland to collaborate on a concert and recording with Graduale Nobili, the Icelandic choir that recorded and toured with Bjork for her Biophillia project, and recorded at Greenhouse Studios with Valgeir Sigurðsson, the founder of Bedroom Community. On October 2, 2015 Bedroom Community released the culminating album, Jodie Landau / wild Up’s you of all things.
In June 2015, Jodie sang on tour with Ballet National de Marseille and ICKamsterdam performing the premiere of Emio Greco and Pieter C. Scholten’s “Extremalism” with music by Valgeir Sigurðsson. The work premiered at the Holland Festival and Montpellier Danse.
wild Up
wild Up is a modern music collective; a Los Angeles-based group of musicians committed to creating visceral, thought-provoking happenings. wild Up believes that music is a catalyst for shared experiences, and that a concert venue is a place to challenge, excite and ignite a community of listeners.
wild Up has been called “Best in Classical Music 2015” and “…a raucous, grungy, irresistibly exuberant…fun-loving, exceptionally virtuosic family” by Zachary Woolfe of the New York Times, “Searing. Penetrating. And thrilling” by Fred Child of Performance Today and “Magnificent” by Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times. Over the last five years, wild Up has collaborated with orchestras, rock bands and cultural institutions around the world.
The past season, wild Up was Ensemble in Residence with Jennifer Koh and Shai Wosner at the Laguna Beach Music Festival; and the group premiered a few dozen new works, including composer David Lang’s “anatomy theater” at L.A. Opera. In October 2015, wild Up made their New York debut on the American Composers Orchestra’s SONiC festival with a new program called “West.”
This season wild Up is Group in Residence at National Sawdust, and Education Ensemble in Residence with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. They’ll be featured on the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight festival, at the Carlsbad Festival, and at the Valley Performing Arts Center; celebrating John Adams and punk rock, and continue the intensive educational program that they co-founded with the LA Philharmonic, in which ten young composers and a faculty of eight legendary composers meet to collaborate on new work.
Beth Morrison Projects
Founded in 2006, Beth Morrison Projects encourages risk- taking, creating a structure for developing new work that is unique to each artist, which gives them the time and space to experiment and push boundaries. Noted as a composers’ producer, ”Beth Morrison, of Beth Morrison Projects, has been gathering strength for several years, producing some of the most exciting music-theatre projects in the city (The New Yorker).” To date, the company has commissioned, developed, and produced more than forty premiere opera and music-theatre works that have been performed around the globe. The New York Times recently said, “The production of new [opera] works in the city still falls mostly to the tireless Beth Morrison and her Beth Morrison Projects…” The Wall Street Journal wrote, “Ms. Morrison may be immortalized one day as a 21st-century Diaghilev, known for her ability to assemble memorable collaborations among artists.” Current and upcoming projects include works by composers: Darcy James Argue, Mohammed Fairouz, Du Yun, Ted Hearne, David Lang, David T. Little, Zhou Long, Keeril Makan, Missy Mazzoli, Paola Prestini, Kamala Sankaram, Scott Wheeler and more.
