MIT Sounding 2023-24

Contemporary music with a global cast

The 2023–24 season of the innovative annual performance series MIT Sounding continues to expand musical boundaries. MIT Sounding presents unique artists who push the envelope of their respective genres, creating new evolving music for the 21st century. This season is curated by Evan Ziporyn, faculty director of the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST).

MIT Sounding is presented by the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology and MIT Music and Theater Arts.

Evan Ziporyn solo: Moondog, Riley, Glass

Sunday, March 10, 2024 / 3:00pm
MIT Killian Hall, Building 14W-111
160 Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA 02139

Boston premieres of works for multiple clarinets by three seminal American composers, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, and Louis B. Hardin (aka Moondog). Plus Ziporyn’s own multi-clarinet arrangements from his 2022 album Pop Channel. Terry Riley’s Ki (2023) was written especially for Ziporyn, while Philip Glass Best Out of Three (1968), had been unperformed for over 50 years until Ziporyn realized it from manuscripts found in the composer’s archive. 

More information about the program

Explore Past Seasons of MIT Sounding

2022-23 MIT Sounding

On the occasion of Terry Riley’s 88th birthday, MIT Sounding and ContaQt hosted a celebratory event that reverberated across the globe. The season also included a performance by 2022 Eugene McDermott Award Recipient Pamela Z, and the return of Hearing Amazônia, featuring the world premiere of Amazônia Sem Lei (“Lawless Amazon”) by Grammy-nominated Brazilian-American composer Clarice Assad.

2021-22 MIT Sounding

Featuring performances by Maki Namekawa, a leading pianist dedicated to exploring new works by composers on a global scale; Czech avant-garde violinist, singer, and composer Iva Bittová; 2020-21 CAST Virtual Visiting Artists Luciana Souza and Anat Cohen; Portugal-born vocalist-composer Sara Serpa; and MIT Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor of Music Evan Ziporyn along with an array of MIT musicians (MIT Festival Jazz Ensemble, MIT Wind Ensemble, and MIT Vocal Jazz Ensemble). The 2021-22 season also included It Must Be Now! (IMBN!), a performance that brought together three leading musicians (Terri Lyne Carrington, Braxton Cook, and Sean Jones) to collectively compose a large-scale work for MIT musicians on the overall theme of racial justice.

Previous in MIT Sounding

Curated by Evan Ziporyn, Faculty Director of the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology, the series integrates the avant-garde sounds of ancient instruments and traditional practices with cutting-edge composition and technology to present various visions of a new, evolving music that defies genre.

Since the series was inaugurated in 2014, MIT Sounding has featured world premieres, reconstructed classics, and Grammy Award-winning musicians in a concert series

Boston premieres of works by two seminal American composers, Terry Riley and Philip Glass, plus Ziporyn’s own multi-clarinet arrangements of music by Moondog, McFabulous, Maurice White and Charles Stepney, Jaco Pastorius, Joni Mitchell, Paul McCartney, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, and Steven Tyler and Joe Perry.

Highlights include:

• Philip Glass’s Best Out of Three (Boston Premiere), a newly discovered 1968 piece offering a glimpse into the composer’s early brilliance

• Terry Riley’s Ki, a 2022 collaborative creation inspired by the sights and sounds of Riley’s home in Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan

• Moondog’s Symphonique #6: Good for Goodie, Louis B. Hardin’s tribute to Benny Goodman arranged by Ziporyn for multiple clarinets

MITSO: The Night Before

2019-20 Terry and Rick Stone Concert

(Cancelled due to COVID-19)
March 13, 2020 / 8:00pm / Kresge Auditorium
Pre-show Composer Talk / 7:00pm / Kresge Little Theater

MIT Building W16
48 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA