About the Show
AEOLUS is a new opera combining throat singing, multiphonics indie-rock and electronics making its premiere here at National Sawdust. It is written and performed by Ken Ueno (Rome and Berlin Prizes winner) in collaboration with FLUX Quartet (“legendary for its furiously committed, untiring performances,” Alex Ross), and the “haunting, Björk-like vocals” (SF Classical Voice) of Majel Connery.
AEOLUS is inspired by the mythological keeper of the winds, Aeolus, from the Odyssey. In the classic tale, wind shapes human destiny. In the opera, wind, reinterpreted as breath, is a compositional tool. AEOLUS charts Ueno’s personal odyssey, linking impressionistic scenes from memories, found objects and literary fragments from the composer’s past. Musically, the opera juxtaposes “arias” by Ueno and Connery; virtuosic, voiceless passages by FLUX; and meditative textual interludes.
About the Artists
Majel Connery
Majel Connery is a vocalist, composer, producer, and musicologist. Connery served as Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California Berkeley 2013–15, and is currently Mohr Visiting Artist 2016–17 at Stanford University as part of a collaboration with Pulitzer Prize winner Caroline Shaw and the Saint Lawrence String Quartet. She is also Mellon Visiting Artist (with Ken Ueno and Thomas Tsang) at the Newhouse Center at Wellesley College. Recent honors include a USA Artist Fellowship nomination, and a New Music USA Award (with Oracle Hysterical and A Far Cry). Connery is co-founder and Executive & Artistic Director of avant-garde opera company Opera Cabal, and has commissioned, produced, and performed in projects with the company including works by Caroline Shaw, G.F. Haas, and Lewis Nielson. She graduated from Princeton University with an A.B. in music composition and holds an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in ethnomusicology and musicology. Majelconnery.com
FLUX Quartet
The FLUX Quartet, “one of the most fearless and important new-music ensembles around” (Joshua Kosman, SF Chronicle), has thrilled audiences from the Kennedy Center and Carnegie’s Zankel Hall, to maverick art houses such as EMPAC, The Kitchen, and the Walker Art Center, to experimental venues including Roulette, The Music Gallery, and Mount Tremper Arts. The group’s discography features two critically acclaimed releases on Mode Records that encompass Morton Feldman’s full catalogue of string quartet works. Strongly influenced by the irreverent spirit and “anything-goes” philosophy of the fluxus art movement, violinist Tom Chiu founded FLUX in the late 90’s. Alongside late 20th-century masters like Nancarrow, Cage, and Feldman, FLUX has premiered more than 100 works by innovative composers such as David First, Alvin Lucier, Marc Neikrug, Phill Niblock, Michael Schumacher, Sean Shepherd, and Matthew Welch. The spirit to expand stylistic boundaries is a trademark of the quartet, and to that end it avidly pursues projects with genre-transcending artists including choreographers Pam Tanowitz and Christopher Wheeldon, avant balloonist Judy Dunaway, and digital art pioneers OpenEnded Group
Ken Ueno
A recipient of the Rome Prize and the Berlin Prize, Ken Ueno is a composer, extended vocalist, and cross-disciplinary artist, who is currently an Associate Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Kim Kashkashian, BMOP, the Del Sol String Quartet, Steve Schick and the SFCMP, Alarm Will Sound, and Frances-Marie Uitti have championed his music. Ueno’s work has been performed at such venues and festivals as MaerzMusik, Ars Musica, Warsaw Autumn, MusikTriennale Köln Festival, the Muziekgebouw, Spoleto USA, and Lincoln Center. The Hilliard Ensemble featured his Shiroi Ishi in their repertoire for over a decade. Eighth Blackbird toured nationally with his Pharmakon during their 2001-2003 seasons. Ueno has performed as soloist in his vocal concerto with orchestras in Boston, New York, Poland, Lithuania, Thailand, California, Pittsburgh, and North Carolina. His installations have shown at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the MUAC in Mexico City, the Inside-Out Museum, Art Basel, and at Wolfsburg Castle. Ueno holds a Ph.D. from Harvard University, and his bio appears in The Grove Dictionary of American Music. kenueno.com
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Erin Johnson
Erin Johnson is a video, sound, and social practice artist, as well as a curator and organizer. She is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Visual Arts Department at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. Johnson received an MFA and Certificate in New Media in 2013 from the University of California, Berkeley. http://erinjohnson.online/
