|
CORNELIUS DUFALLO (violinist/composer)
NEW SOLO CD: DREAM STREETS
ABOUT THE ALBUM
Cornelius Dufallo draws inspiration from the beauty and symbolism of the New York nightscape. Both urban and organic, the acoustic and electronic interweave to create tides of a dramatic, unconscious narrative. Dufallo's luscious violin sound emerges slowly and mysteriously, striking a steady groove - one that echoes with the rhythm and variety of a city street and the flow of an underwater current.
In Dream Streets, Dufallo equates melody with consciousness. As the album unfolds, its tracks wax more abstract and atmospheric, moving toward a sonic dream world. The reverb of the violin supplants earlier wistful tunes and meandering rhythmic grooves trail out to naught. Dufallo's music reaches a state of emotional stasis that detaches earlier movements from the album's peak. However, Dream Streets' final movement opens into a burst of aural exaltation—a new face formed in hard weather.
DOWNLOAD the album at iTunes: http://tr.im/rgGd
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Heralded by the New York Times as one of the "new faces of new music," and praised for his "taut virtuosity," Dufallo is well known for his work with the amplified string quartet ETHEL, and the creative music ensemble Ne(x)tworks. With Dream Streets, Dufallo takes his first serious steps outward as a solo artist. In development since 2004, Dream Streets reflects upon a wide range of experiences, from the deeply personal (in the groove oriented pieces Lighthouse and Waiting for You ) to the philosophical (Transcendence was written as a meditation on compassion and the evolution of the human spirit). Other pieces, like Naiad and Suite for Electric Violin are closer to pure musical explorations.
In recent years Dufallo has commissioned and premiered boundary-breaking works by many of America’s leading composers, including Earle Brown, Joan La Barbara, John King, Don Byron, Marcello Zarvos, Phil Kline, Jed Distler, and Kenji Bunch. His New York premier of Augusta Read Thomas’s violin concerto, Spirit Musings, was praised as an “expert” performance (NY Times), and his 2007 recording of Earle Brown’s chamber music was described as a “major contribution” (The Wire). As a founding member of the Flux string quartet (1996-2002) Dufallo premiered and recorded Morton Feldman’s epic six-hour String Quartet no. 2.
A versatile performer and improviser, Dufallo is comfortable in a variety of musical styles, from classical to jazz, rock, folk, and free improvisation. Some of his recent work includes performances and recordings with jazz artists Oliver Lake and Marty Erlich, rock artists Thomas Dolby, Lenny Kravitz, Jill Sobule, and Sondre Lerche, and “downtown” improvisers Butch Morris, Anthony Coleman, and Christian Wolff. In 2000 he worked closely with Jazz legend Ornette Coleman, preparing Coleman’s music for performances at the Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival and the Ojai Music Festival. Dufallo has toured the US, Europe, and Asia as soloist and collaborative artist, and has performed in such renowned festivals as The Aspen Music Festival, Great Day in New York (Lincoln Center), When Morty Met John… (Carnegie Hall), Grand Canyon Music Festival, Bang On A Can Marathon, MusikTriennale (Germany), Oslo Chamber Music Festival (Norway), Melbourne International Arts Festival (Australia), Taipei International Music festival (Taiwan), and Great Mountains Music Festival (Korea). Upcoming projects include an international tour with Grammy-nominated jazz vocalist Kurt Elling, and two new CDs of music by innovators Alvin Curran and Valentin Silvestrov.
As a composer, Dufallo regularly writes and arranges music for his own groups, ETHEL and Ne(x)tworks. In the 2006-2007 season his compositions were performed around the country, as well as in Germany, Australia, and Jamaica. Recently commissioned works include Fragments of Celestial Light (premiered by the Maple City Chamber Orchestra), and Night Visions (featured on pianist Jenny Lin’s upcoming CD, American Insomniac). In 2006 Realeyes, Dufallo's thirty-minute piece for solo violin and electronics, was programmed at several American contemporary music festivals. In the 2000-2001 season, Dufallo was a “featured American composer” at the Library of Congress, where the Flux Quartet performed his Afterimage: the Crossing of Invisible Paths. Dufallo is a composer and publisher member of ASCAP.
A dedicated teacher, Dufallo currently has a private violin studio in New York and frequently presents master classes, guest lectures, and workshops at schools and colleges around the country. He was Assistant Professor of Violin at SUNY Fredonia from 1999-2002 and has served as a teaching artist for the Lincoln Center Institute, American String Teachers Association, and the Grand Canyon Music Festival’s Native American Composers Apprentice Project. Dufallo is also the author of “The Indeterminate Violin: A Pedagogical Approach to Indeterminacy in the Violin Repertoire” (DMA doc., The Juilliard School, 2002), and winner of The Juilliard School’s Richard French Memorial Prize for Doctoral Research.
Dufallo's projects have received grants from American Music Center, Chamber Music America, Meet the Composer, and Foundation for Contemporary Arts. He has recorded for the Mode, Tzadik, and Cantaloupe labels. Dufallo holds Bachelors, Masters, and Doctoral degrees from The Juilliard School where he studied with Dorothy DeLay and Masao Kawasaki. 
|
Online Now!
