Other Minds (organization)
Other Minds is an American nonprofit organization based in San Francisco. It was founded In 1992 by Charles Amirkhanian and Jim Newman. According to their mission statement, the organization is dedicated to the "encouragement and propagation of contemporary music"[1]
The name "Other Minds" has been attributed by Jim Newman to an anonymous obituary that ran in the New Yorker in 1992 which stated that John Cage "...composed music in other people's minds."[2] Other Minds has achieved wide recognition and acclaim including the ASCAP award in 2009 for adventurous programming[3] and the American Music Center's 2005 letter of distinction for service to American composers.[4]
Concerts[edit]
| Other Minds Festival | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Genre | Experimental music, contemporary classical music |
| Location(s) | The Great Star Theater |
| Years active | 1993-present |
| Founded by | Charles Amirkhanian and Jim Newman |
| Website | Website for Other Minds |
Since 1993 they have presented an annual concert series featuring a wide range of international composers. These concerts were previously produced in conjunction with an artist residency retreat held at the Djerassi Resident Artists Program in Woodside, California south of San Francisco[5] in which that year's artists had an opportunity to share their work with each other prior to the festival performances.
In addition, Other Minds organizes concerts and events in various venues in the Bay Area throughout the year, including the series "The Nature of Music"[6] and "Latitudes."[7] "New Music Seances" feature live performances with local artists of music by lesser known past masters such as Henry Cowell, Ruth Crawford, Dane Rudhyar, Alan Hovhaness, and Lester Bowie.
The annual festival is held at the Great Star Theater in San Francisco's Chinatown.[8]
Composers represented in the annual festival have included such artists as Meredith Monk, Muhal Richard Abrams, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, Frederic Rzewski, Margaret Leng Tan, Henry Brant, Conlon Nancarrow, Robert Ashley, Pauline Oliveros, Lou Harrison, Laurie Anderson, LaMonte Young, Leroy Jenkins, Janice Giteck, Kyle Gann, Olly Wilson, William Parker, Gavin Bryars, Michael Nyman, Brian Eno, Raven Chacon,[9] and many others. Henry Brant's Pulitzer Prize winning Ice Field from 2001 was an Other Minds commission.[10] Grawemeyer Award winner Louis Andriessen was featured in 2011[11] as was MacArthur Fellow Jason Moran.
Preservation & Online Archives[edit]
Since 2000, Other Minds has been involved in preserving audiovisual materials which includes an extensive audio collection from the KPFA Music Dept. Archives, as well as the organization's own programming collection. In 2002 Other Minds inaugurated a free online archive called radiOM,[12] where users can access hundreds of hours of archival audio material including interviews with prominent composers of our time, past OM festival performances, examples of sound poetry, and much more.
Broadcasts[edit]
Music from Other Minds[13] is a weekly program produced and hosted by Charles Amirkhanian and Other Minds staff since 2005. It is broadcast on San Francisco radio station KALW and features a wide variety of international new music common to the mission of Other Minds. Weekly programs are also accessible via streaming from the program website following the broadcast.
The Other Minds Podcasts was launched in 2022 and features interviews with composers and performers of contemporary music.[14]
Record Label[edit]
Other Minds also has a record label, with a continually expanding catalog of CDs, LPs, and DVDs. Some of the releases are of recordings from the now defunct 1750 Arch Records such as '10+2:12 American Text Sound Pieces' and the first complete recording (and the only recording done on his own instruments in his Mexico City studio) of Conlon Nancarrow's Player Piano Studies. Other releases include new recordings like 'FIRST LIFE The Rare Early Works' (world premieres of music by Marc Blitzstein).
Current efforts are being made to release some long out of print recordings of American music by pianist Maro Ajemian and violinist Anahid Ajemian. They also stock a selection of contemporary music CDs and related books and scores from other publishers.
Other Minds also has an annual digital release series called Modern which is focused on unearthing archival works by the unsung pioneers of electronic music from the Bay Area and beyond.[15]
See also[edit]
- List of experimental music festivals
- List of electroacoustic festivals
- List of contemporary classical music festivals
References[edit]
- ^ "Other Minds Mission Statement & History". www.otherminds.org. Archived from the original on 2011-09-27.
- ^ Website for Other Minds
- ^ http://www.ascap.com/playback/2009/spring/FACES_PLACES/CONCERT/adventurous.aspx[bare URL]
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-04-06. Retrieved 2011-10-26.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ "Home". djerassi.org.
- ^ "The Nature of Music".
- ^ "Latitudes".
- ^ "Other Minds Festival 26". otherminds.org.
- ^ https://www.sfcv.org/articles/review/electric-ideas-and-novel-concepts-other-minds-festival
- ^ https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/henry-brant[bare URL]
- ^ "Louis Andriessen's music featured at Other Minds". 3 March 2011.
- ^ radiOM.org
- ^ "Music from Other Minds".
- ^ https://www.otherminds.org/podcast/
- ^ "Other Minds Records".
External links[edit]
- Website for Other Minds
- radiOM.org Streaming Archives
- Other Minds Record Label
- Richard Friedman's page for Music from Other Minds
- Djerassi Resident Artists Program Home Page
- Finding aid for Other Minds organizational records, UC Santa Cruz
| General | |
|---|---|
| National libraries | |
