5-Penny presents MIKROKOSMOS, music for sixteenth-tone piano

Sudbury Concert Features Extraordinary Piano

Distinguished composer-pianist Bruce Mather is the featured artist as Sudbury's 5-Penny New Music Concert series launches its 2009-10 season. The concert is on Friday, October 16, 2009, at 8 p.m. at St. Peter's United Church in Sudbury. Admission is $15 and $10 for students. Tickets will be available at the door or at Black Cat, 96 Durham Street, Sudbury.

For this concert, Mather will bring from Montreal his "microtonal" piano. The only one of its kind in Canada, it looks like an ordinary piano but sounds extraordinarily different. The instrument is pitched in sixteenth-tone intervals from key to key, instead of the semitones of conventional pianos. It has 97 keys instead of the usual 88, yet the instrument spans only one octave from top to bottom. Within this range, delicate waves of sonorities are created as the performer moves between the intervals.

At the concert, Mather will perform selections from his set of Microtonal Etudes. Composed in 2000, they explore a range of expressive moods in a shimmering, bell-like style reminiscent of the Javanese gamelan. Also on the program are pieces by John Burke, Jacques Desjardins, John Oliver, Gilles Tremblay and Alain Banquart, the latter with electronics.

Born in Toronto in 1939, Bruce Mather taught at McGill University until his retirement in 2001. A leading figure in Canadian contemporary music, Mather has written extensively in a variety of genres. He has performed widely as a pianist, including with his wife, Pierrette LePage, as a member of the Mather/LePage piano duo.


This event is presented by the 5-Penny New Music Concerts in collaboration with Laurentian University and Cambrain College. It is also made possible with the financial support of the Canada Council for the Arts, SOCAN Foundation, Ontario Arts Council, and the City of Greater Sudbury.

Montreal Guitarist Arturo Parra Explores ’ÄúCinema for the Ear’Äù

Montreal guitarist and composer Arturo Parra is the featured artist in the concluding concert of the 5-Penny New Music Concerts' season. The event will be held on Saturday, May 23, at 8 pm at St. Peter's United Church, 203 York Street, Sudbury. Admission is $15 and $10 for students. Tickets will be available at the door or at Black Cat, 96 Durham Street, Sudbury.

Parra will perform selections from his new CD, "Voz" (Voice). Scored for guitar with vocal sounds, the album's programmatic narrative depicts in four movements a musical pathway through the elements of earth, fire, air and water. Each movement is in three parts, beginning with the edge, progressing to the heart, and then moving to the deepest recesses. The piece also contains political and literary allusions. The third movement, subtitled "Spirit of Freedom," pays homage to the Spanish poet, Miguel Hernˆ°ndez, who died in 1942 at the hands of the Franco dictatorship in Spain. The finale, subtitled "The Sleepy Ship Weighs Anchor," contains references to Homer's Odyssey. Throughout, "Voz" displays Parra's gift for writing music of emotional breadth, and it also brilliantly showcases a gallery of extended guitar-playing techniques with vocal sounds.

A native of Columbia, Parra moved to Montreal in 1989, earning his masters and doctoral degrees in music at the Universitˆ© de Montrˆ©al in 1991 and 1998 respectively.

His compositional explorations have led him to develop innovative playing techniques that are complemented by a variety of "vocal expressions." According to Parra's web site, "The two 'voices,' guitar and guitarist, fuse to produce a kind of sound poetry suggestive of a 'cinema for the ear' ’Äì no screen or projector needed."

This event is presented in cooperation with Laurentian University and Cambrian College. It is also made possible with the financial support of the SOCAN Foundation, Ontario Arts Council, and the City of Greater Sudbury.

Arturo Parra will also offer a series of conferences and workshops in the schools of Sudbury on May 21 and 22 thanks to the Socan Foundation.

For more information:

Robert Lemay, (705) 523-4167, rlemay@laurentian.ca

Arturo Parra, 514-525-8351, parraguitarra@yahoo.ca