From Mozart to glow sticks
WSO promises to expand your horizons at the New Music Festival
Jared Story

Always innovative and on the cutting edge, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s annual New Music Festival will be even fresher and more exciting this year.

That’s because this is the first fest with current WSO music director Alexander Mickelthwate at the helm. For the past five years the WSO was under the command of Andrey Boreyko, and the songs will surely not be the same with the baton in Mickelthwate’s hands.

“I guess Andrey was more focused on the kind of music he was interested in. He has a really deep knowledge of the Eastern European composers and a certain style, whereas Alexander is not all over the map but covers a lot more territory in terms of his instruments,” says WSO composer-in-residence T. Patrick Carrabré, who’s worked on the NMF for six years, this being his last.

With Mickelthwate steering the orchestral ship, audiences will be in for a diverse, eclectic ride. From the traditional to the unconventional, this year’s NMF theme is one of musical variety.

“I first wanted to have the big theme, but with seven different concerts you also want variety,” Mickelthwate says. “There is still a flow to the festival. We start with more classical contemporary with (Jennifer) Higdon and (Christos) Hatzis, which can be traced back to (Aaron) Copland or George Crumb, and then go quite out there in the middle of the festival, coming back to the more classical idea of contemporary music in the end. It’s a little arc that we’ve created.”

So just what does Mickelthwate mean when he says “out there”?

Well, because it’s all about new music, the festival will feature a few things you might not associate with the WSO.

For instance, Montreal-based DJ P-Love will be in the house, as well as local electronica guru Blunderspublik. So it’s safe to say this isn’t the kind of event attended exclusively by monocle-wearing aristocrats. It’s all about breaking down barriers, being accessible and challenging the status quo.

“I hate that (posh stiffness),” Mickelthwate says. “With the creative arts, you want to look through this window of how the composer does it. With my Wednesday (Feb. 14) concert, So You Call This Music?, I envisioned questions like ‘why can’t you compose a melody like Mozart’ or ‘why do you have to do this?’”

Always being an open affair, the NMF includes pre-concert talks and post-show café gigs and jams as part of its programming. This is nothing new, but what’s different this year is the way a couple of the post-show cafés will operate. Instead of serving up the usual jazz and refreshments, NMF organizers are throwing something more akin to outright parties after the shows on Feb. 13 and 15.

“We’ve got DJ Mama Cutsworth on Tuesday night, and Blunderspublik is going to do the Thursday. We’re trying to get hip, man,” Carrabré says. “The younger composers we have are all into that. They already have the connection.

“It’s just trying to make that connection for our audience, too, because certainly musicians often have very broad tastes in music, and sometimes our audience just needs a little bit of a holding hand to make that jump.”

If getting your groove on at the posh Centennial Concert Hall seems a little weird after a lifetime of partying at The Zoo and Pyramid, have no fear — the Thursday-night Blunderspublik gig is at the Garrick Centre, so bring that glow stick.

“We wanted a little bit of dance floor and the possibility of people turning it into a bit of a rave after,” Carrabré says. “The Concert Hall is a little stiff for that. It’s not that we haven’t had dancing on the stage of the Concert Hall before — it’s just a lot harder to let yourself go and have fun in that environment.”

Mickelthwate, who’s used to conducting individual concerts spaced out throughout the year, is excited about his opportunity to put on and experience a Winnipeg festival.

“When I was in Atlanta with my new music ensemble we had three or four different projects, but over 12 months, so it was really more you create a concert and that’s it,” Mickelthwate says.

“Here the festival idea is really more to have seven days where you party in the evening, have conversation in the beginning — a really fun festival feel where people mingle and talk with the composers and the conductors. I really hope to create this ‘alive’ feel.”

For more info visit www.wso.mb.ca/nmf