These hour-long, family friendly concerts combine extraordinary music with reflections by pianist and artistic director Simone Dinnerstein. Musicians donate their performances, and all ticket sales benefit the students of the host schools.
Not recommended for children under age six.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012, 7pm
P.S. 321 | 180 7th Avenue | Brooklyn, NY
Buy Tickets
Classical music and avant-garde cabaret merge when pianist Simone Dinnerstein, thereminist Pamelia Kurstin, and actor Alvin Epstein join forces and journey together from Bach, Mozart, and Chopin to Poulenc’s The Story of Babar the Elephant, weaving together disparate elements in an unusual evening of poetry, music, improvisation, and narration.
Saturday, December 1, 2012, 7pm
P.S. 142 | 100 Attorney Street | New York, NY
Buy Tickets
Shut Your Eyes is an evening of powerful music that will send you sprawling along an emotional and kaleidoscopic voyage - a night of heightened senses brought about by the most visceral music of the present moment by Conor Brown, Bryce Dessner, and Donnacha Dennehy. Shut your eyes and Contemporaneous will provide the view. Contemporaneous is a New York-based ensemble of 40+ musicians which performs the most exciting music of this generation. Founded in 2010 at Bard College, Contemporaneous has played over 40 concerts at venues including the Merkin Concert Hall, Galapagos Art Space, Roulette, and The Stone.
Sunday, December 2, 2012, 3pm
P.S. 69Q | 77-02 37th Ave. | Queens, NY
Tickets: $15 at the door ($5 for P.S. 69Q students and their families)
Jazz and rock music meet contemporary classical in this, the second concert that the sensational kids of Face the Music bring to P.S. 69Q. Central to the program are three pieces that mix jazz and rock with contemporary classical sounds: Andy Didorenko’s Concerto for Two Violins; hip-hop violinist Daniel Bernard Roumain’s La La La La for chamber orchestra; and FTM’s own Ethan Cohn’s Lionfish for large jazz combo. The concert also includes Philip Glass’ sparkling String Quartet No. 5, as well as a quartet by one of the Philip Glass Ensemble’s current members (David Crowell’s Open Road). Finally, the kids will present a work by the young Abe Gold, his Four NYC Pieces, bringing the sounds of the city - car horns included - to the stage.
Monday, February 11, 2013, 7pm
P.S. 142 | 100 Attorney Street | New York, NY
Buy Tickets
Contemporaneous brings to life some of some of the world’s most jaw-dropping and unabashedly cool pieces of music written by composers living today.
Headlined by Sean Friar’s head-banging Clunker Concerto for percussion quartet playing junk car parts with a chamber orchestra, this music is as bold as it gets.
Don’t even think about missing it!
Contemporaneous, a New York-based new music ensemble of 20+ young musicians, performs the most exciting music of this generation.
Tuesday, March 12, 2013, 7pm
P.S. 321 | 180 7th Avenue | Brooklyn, NY
Buy Tickets
Renowned for bringing fresh excitement to traditional string quartet repertoire as well as for creating insightful interpretations of new music, the Chiara String Quartet (Rebecca Fischer and Hyeyung Julie Yoon, violins; Jonah Sirota, viola; Gregory Beaver, cello) captivates its audiences throughout the country and is lauded for its "highly virtuosic, edge-of-the-seat playing" (The Boston Globe). At P.S. 321, the Chiara and pianist Simone Dinnerstein perform Czech composer Antonín Dvořák's lyrical Piano Quintet in A major. The Chiara will also play Ravel's String Quartet in F Major, entirely from memory!
Thursday, April 11, 2013, 7pm
P.S. 321 | 180 7th Avenue | Brooklyn, NY
Buy Tickets
Known as the “go to” pianist by many other musicians and band leaders, Lafayette Harris, Jr. (a P.S. 321 parent!) has performed with the Duke Ellington Legacy Orchestra, toured for seven years with Max Roach, currently tours Europe and the U.S. with four time Grammy nominee-Ernestine Anderson and has worked with Al Grey, John Gordon, Slide Hampton, Curtis Fuller, Roswell Rudd, Chico Freeman, and Cindy Blackman, Allan Harris, Carla Cook, René Marie and many others. Harris' two most recent albums are In the Middle of the Night, a contemporary funk/fusion project, and Trio Talk, a jazz trio outing featuring Winard Harper and Dwayne Dolphin. He is also featured on Ernestine Anderson’s 2011 release, Nightlife.
Sunday, May 19, 2013, 2:30pm
P.S. 142 | 100 Attorney Street | New York, NY
Buy Tickets
In Face the Music’s program, jazz and rock meet contemporary classical music inAndy Didorenko’s Concerto for Two Violins, featuring two of Face the Music’s longtime violin virtuosi; hip-hop violinist Daniel Bernard Roumain’s La La La La for chamber orchestra; and Face the Music’s own Ethan Cohn’s Lionfish for jazz combo. The concert will also include two classic works by Bang on a Can rock stars: Michael Gordon’s Yo Shakespeare and Julia Wolfe’s Lick.