REVIEWS
Michael Udow and Edeta Arts Percussion Festival: A Match of Artistic Excellence
Michael Udow's legacy in the world of percussion truly exemplifies the spirit of a legend. From hosting PASIC 1984 at the University of Michigan to his recent contributions to the Edeta Arts Percussion Festival, Udow has consistently nurtured the percussive arts. PASIC 1984 was the last of the Society's conventions to be hosted on a college campus, due in part to large attendance numbers and the increasing popularity of the event, with performances that year by such world-renowned artists and pedagogues as NEXUS, Keiko Abe, Vinnie Colaiuta, Vida Chenoweth, Ralph Hardimon, Kroumata, Charlie Owen, Jim Campbell and the Phantom Regiment, and Salvatore Rabbio.
Forty years later, after countless performances, storied teaching, endless composition commissions, and awards such as the 2010 Percussive Arts Society (PAS) Lifetime Achievement in Education and 2022 PAS Hall of Fame, Udow continues to do more, as evidenced by his recent involvement with Edeta Arts. The Edeta Arts Festival, facilitated by MCM Arts and its leadership of John Crozman, Dean Marshall, and Anthony Moore, is described as a yearly multidisciplinary festival of the arts that takes place in Valencia, Spain and the surrounding area, including the festival headquarters in the town of Llíria, designated as a UNESCO City of Music.
Edeta Arts commissioned Udow to compose a series of works about his impressions of Llíria by highlighting the city's history, culture, monuments, and commitment to music in daily life. All commissioned works were featured in a grand performance event entitled "Impressions of Llíria" in Llíria's town plaza on July 6, 2024, featuring over 200 musicians from all over the world. Eight percussion ensembles and one steel drum band represented the United States and Europe in the performance of Udow's culminating commissioned work, entitled "Twelve Labors of Hercules," with the connection to Udow being that the directors of the ensembles were either former students or longtime colleagues. Other groups involved in this culminating work included a chorus, brass quintet, plucked string ensembles, and orchestra, alongside narration, video, and dance.
"Twelve Labors of Hercules" Performance in Llíria
The Edeta Arts Percussion Festival provided opportunities for the percussion ensembles and steel drum band to perform their own individual concerts in several venues around Valencia and Llíria from June 30 through July 6, 2024. Festival ensembles were from Bowling Green State University, Central Washington University, Colorado Mesa University, Ohio University, Superior Music Conservatori of València, Texas Tech University, University of Oregon, University of Wisconsin–Madison, and Western Washington University. Two other chamber ensembles performing at the festival included the Unprepared Duo, featuring Roger Braun on percussion and André Gribou on piano, and the Solar Duo, featuring Michelle Camargo on clarinet and saxophone and Johanna Amaya on percussion.
Many of the percussion festival events were held at the Superior Music Conservatori de València, hosted by Professor Manel Ramada, and included daily panel discussions by such performers and pedagogues as Roger Braun, Pius Cheung, Anthony Di Sanza, Darin Kamstra, Dan Piccolo, Lisa Rogers, and Patrick Roulet. There was also time during the festival for cultural immersion, coffee, and paella! In both 1984 and 2024, Michael Udow has facilitated opportunities for percussionists to grow and thrive not only as artists but, more importantly, as individuals. He exemplifies the profound effect a pedagogue and artist can have across generations.
— Lisa Rogers, Percussive Notes, October 2024
A Rhythmic Sourcebook for Actors, Dancers, and Musicians
Michael Udow
While it's no secret that percussion and dance have gone together since the dawn of civilization (and likely before that!), it can be rare to see the combination of movement and sound notated in a precise, yet freely open, manner. Enter the Rhythmic Sourcebook, a creative, foundational guide to the marriage of movement and expression in music and dance.
Movement is explained with pictograms, with the shapes, sizes, and shading serving to generally notate speed and volume of the performer. Because this notation is more open-ended, the parameters for each symbol can be determined by the performers, resulting in creative interpretations by different people. The author states, "This Rhythmic Sourcebookpresents symbols to be interpreted so that the interpreter/performer has wide latitude for creative input while gaining pulsed and non-pulsed rhythmic skills. My goal is that these symbols will not place stylistic strictures on the interpreter/performer. Instead, the symbols will serve as communicators, which elicit questions from the individual that will expand the knowledge, understanding, and performance possibilities of the rhythmic information."
The author explains how he arrived at this notational system, recounts his inspirations for the notation, explains what the symbols can mean, and notes the relationship between different notational systems and their intent on performance (for example: typically, for Western notation, as an "exact-copy" of the intended sounds and instructions, rather than a space for creative interpretation).
As a musician and a teacher, I greatly appreciate the detail that Michael Udow includes, and it is very helpful to understand the thought processes and other methods that influenced and developed this incredible book. This fresh reprinting is clear, and adding it to a personal/professional collection is a must.
— Cassie Bunting, Percussive Notes, August 2022
Understanding — IV
Michael Udow
Composed in 1970, Michael Udow's "Understanding" is very much a piece of theater, more so than a traditional concert work. Although the stage is utilized (including the lowering of the orchestra pit), it is not for musical reasons, but instead serves as a setting for this experience.
To describe the elements involved in a play-by-play fashion would be to give away some of the surprise and ownership inherent to discovering the best way to bring this piece to life. Suffice it to say that, in order to program this work, you will need the following: six soloists, at least eight parade drummers, one conductor, costumes, a lighting operator, a hand gun and rifle filled with blanks, four antiphonal speakers for tape playback, seven basketballs, and a sense of adventure and responsibility to the intent of the work.
There is a political slant to this work, and several moments of extreme emotional intensity (including firing of a gun loaded with blanks at various participants in the piece). The six soloists perform from a sheet of graphic notation, and can play any instrument, so the potential exists for collaboration with colleagues outside of the world of percussion. Everything seems quite intentional by the composer, and the practical aspects of performance appear to be well-planned.
A performance of this work will stand out on any program, and it should be considered for those wanting to explore the boundaries between music and theater, or otherwise push performers or listeners out of their comfort zone.
— Jamie Wind Whitmarsh, Percussive Notes, August 2020