In December, 2011 I received a request from Yale graduate student Victor Caccese to answer a few questions about how NEXUS began and developed. VC: Mr. Becker, I mainly wanted to ask you about the start of NEXUS with your first performances in 1971. Even though all of its members have accomplished a great deal… Read more »
The musical Chess recently completed its run here in Toronto, and I just finished reading The Eight by Katherine Neville. The latter is a fascinating romp of a novel featuring a mystical chess set and a tapestry of historical characters scouring the world for it. Not least among them is the opera composer Francois-Andre Danican… Read more »
NEXUS has just returned home from the whirlwind that is the Percussive Arts Society’s International Conference (PASIC) in Indianapolis. Garry Kvistad found an interesting email in his in-box from his cousin in Chicago: a great article from the Arizona Republic. Do you think the triangle is a “no-brainer” kind of percussion instrument? Check out this… Read more »
The questions below about starting a career in music performance were submitted to me by Peter Ferry, a third-year applied percussion major at the Eastman School of Music. They are all good questions which are frequently asked by career-track music students. The responses are never easy or simple, and can be complex enough to fill… Read more »
The last two weeks of October have been rich in concerts and unexpected percussion influences. It kicked off mid-month with the wonderful SFJazz Collective presenting their take on the rhythmic-rich Stevie Wonder repertoire as well as a selection of new compositions at Koerner Hall here in Toronto. A couple days later, NEXUS presented their glorious… Read more »
Click HERE to read about the recognition by the Toronto Arts Awards of NEXUS’ 40th Anniversary season.
Click HERE to read about the NEXUS concert with the 2X10 Piano Duo at the University of Toronto.
The NEXUS and 2X10 concert last week in Toronto was wonderful. Bill Cahn’s hypnotic new arrangement of Takemitsu’s From me flows what you call Time opened wide skies of sound. The two ensembles took us from the world premiere of Alice Ping Yee Ho’s elegant Heart to Heart, through the Canadian premiere of Steve Reich’s… Read more »
Here are some pictures of the rehearsals which are underway in preparation for the upcoming concert on Monday night, October 17th. The concert is at 7:30 in Walter Hall at the Faculty of Music of the University of Toronto. Photos courtesy of Lorraine Dillard.
The Toronto Arts Foundation has announced its 2011 awards finalists, and we are pleased to congratulate our dear friend and fellow percussionist Trichy Sankaran. He has been named as a finalist, along with Andrew Burashko and Rita Chiarelli, for the Muriel Sherrin Award for International Achievement in Music. Winners of the 2011 Toronto Arts Foundation… Read more »
View photos of rehearsals for this concert . Get ready for another fabulous evening of music with NEXUS and the piano duo 2X10, in Toronto on October 17th. On the heels of their critically acclaimed Series debut last season,
Or, in this case, learn to read music if you’re going to tattoo musical notation to someone’s arm – permanently! Recently, I had the unique experience of meeting a young guy working on a construction crew who had a giant tattoo wrapping around his arm from his wrist to his elbow. He was in his… Read more »
l to r: Bob Becker, Nick Attansio, Russell Hartenberger, Garry Kvistad, Bill Cahn Drum Boogie Festival 2011
On Saturday Sept. 10 Ruth and I drove to Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio in the evening to attend a concert of The Cleveland Orchestra at the Blossom Festival. The weather became drizzly and yet it seemed that about 7 to 8-thousand people braved the dark clouds to be in the Blossom audience. (Fantastic!) The main reason for our… Read more »
For a long while, NEXUS has owned two five octave marimbas and a vibraphone from Adams Musical Instruments . Adams, based in the Netherlands, manufactures timpani, marimbas, bass drums, chimes, mallets, temple blocks and many other percussion instruments.
