NOW BELIEVES IN THE ORAL TRADITION OF IMPROVISED MUSIC.
Improvised music is a largely oral tradition. We teach others about improvised music through free workshops, intensive workshops, school outreach and community outreach. We help musicians learn and build a complex vocabulary of improvisational language, techniques, compositional structures to work within and a variety of influences from a number of traditions and cultures, enabling them to develop their own voice as an improviser, playing together in small and large ensembles, and engaging in collaborations with other artistic traditions like dance, visual media and spoken word.
Free workshops
For over 19 years, the New Orchestra Workshop Society has presented an annual series of workshops aimed at educating musicians at all levels of ability in the varied techniques of improvised music. Each week, a different facilitator will present his or her own approaches to this music. Artists from around the world bring their own unique perspectives to the spontaneous creation of music. Often the facilitators are recognized performing musicians, but in addition they may be from other disciplines such as dance, film, visual arts or the spoken word.
Participation usually ranges from 12 to 30 people, who play a wide range of instruments, from novice to professional ability. Attendance at consecutive workshops is not required, but in order to perform in the final concert, attendance in the final weeks is mandatory. Tuition for all workshops is free.
Our past presenters include a wide variety of new music artists: Barry Guy, George Lewis, Ron Samworth, Marilyn Crispell, Francois Houle, Raymond Strid, Ig Henneman, Peggy Lee, Carl Berger, Jesse Zubot, Jaap Blonk, Shubhendra Rao, Jay Hirabayashi, Kedrick James, John Korsrud, Bic Hoang, Mei Han, Clyde Reed, Cleo Palacio-Quinton, Coat Cooke, Sam Rivers, Randy Raine-Reusch, Tony Wilson, Mandido Morris, Jack Duncan, Peter Bingham, Nancy Stark-Smith, John Sobel, Alex Ferguson, Alex MacKenzie, Thomas Anfield, Stefan Smulovitz, Kate Hammett-Vaughan, Chris Kelly, Dave Holland and many more.
Intensive workshops
For more advanced players, the Artistic Director Coat Cooke leads intensive workshops consisting of five in-depth workshops for emerging musicians to play repertoire from the NOW Orchestra. This intensive process helps develop new players, introduces them to NOW Orchestra and culminates in a public concert.
Participation usually ranges from 10 to 20 people, who play a wide range of instruments and are playing at a professional level. Attendance at consecutive workshops is not required, but in order to perform in the final concert, attendance in the final weeks is mandatory. Tuition for the intensive workshops is free.
School outreach
As part of our new outreach efforts, members of the NOW Orchestra conduct free outreach workshops in schools, universities, and community colleges. These events are intended to showcase new music and increase knowledge, awareness and acceptance of improvised new music and build future audiences, with a special focus on youth. Each event consists of a musical demonstration followed by open forum discussion.
We're working on a special series for 2010 with the help of the fabulous Steve Wright!
