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16 PIANOS in Surround Sound
Wednesday, March 20, 2024 - 7:30 PM
to Thursday, March 21, 2024 - 9:30 PM
7:30 PM - 9:30 PM See all dates and Times
Mexican-American composer Nathan Felix returns to Drake University to present his new immersive work titled 16 Pianos in Surround Sound in conjunction with the Drake Piano Program and the Anderson Gallery with two performances on Wednesday, March 20th at 7:30 pm and again on Thursday, March 21st at 7:30 pm. This immersive performance will occur in and around the Anderson Gallery (1310 25th St, Des Moines, IA, 50311) allowing the audience to walk amongst the pianos and performers. The soundscape installation will also incorporate the experimental videos of Felix.
Felix, who premiered his immersive opera, The Cadence of Life, with the Drake Opera Program last fall, is known for his guerilla-style approach in presenting classical music in unconventional spaces including work with multiple pianos. In 2016, Felix was featured on PBS and nominated for a Lone Star Emmy for work on his 6-Piano project, in which he restored six pianos for performances around the world. The 6 Piano Project has been commissioned in Austin (2016), San Antonio (2016), Barcelona (2017), Melbourne (2017) and Houston (2019). The task of composing and producing an even larger piano concert is something Felix looks forward to, stating, “The idea of composing for seventeen pianos was initially overwhelming but once I started to put my pencil to paper, I realized there is an opportunity to create cascading sounds of pianos that hasn’t been heard before and I hope to showcase this as a unique experience for the communities at Drake and Des Moines at large.” Felix will strategically place the pianos in a formation that allows the audience to either sit or walk through them as they listen to his new composition filled with lush warm melodies in a minimalistic style.
This unique concert that blurs the bounds of music, installation and performance art is made possible by the Friends of Drake Arts. 16 Pianos in Surround Sound will be performed on Wednesday March 20th at 7:30 pm and Thursday March 21st at 7:30pm by Dr. Nicholas Roth and Drake University students from his piano studio. The ensemble is rounded out with Drake music professors Susan Ihnen, Ling-Yu Hsiao and more. Anderson Gallery Director Lilah Anderson is pleased to collaborate with Felix and the Drake University Music Department again, remarking, “Exposure to cross-disciplinary experiences such as this are vital to sustaining a lively arts community at Drake and to offer our students opportunities that they may not find at other institutions.”
