Event Concerts and Performances Music of Anthony Braxton

For more than half a century Anthony Braxton has played a key role in contemporary and avant-garde music as a composer, multi-instrumentalist, music theorist, teacher and visionary. Inspired by Jazz, European art music, and music of global cultures, Braxton labels his output Creative Music. The Library of Congress celebrates his work with a concert featuring an array of stellar collaborators. Fittingly for a composer known for his expansive range, the three works on the program employ different systems of notation, improvisation and Braxton’s current explorations in live-electronic music.  

“Composition No. 100” (1981) is a key work in the composer’s output for Creative Music Orchestra, embedding his Language Music within notated and graphical structures. “Composition No. 222” for violin and piano, a commission from the Library’s McKim Fund, was premiered in the Coolidge Auditorium in 1998. A selection from Braxton’s “Ghost Trance Music,” the duo holds a special place in that series as one of the composer’s only pieces written for a specific instrumentation. Always looking forward, the evening concludes with the U.S. premiere of Thunder Music, a new musical system that allows each performer to control the live electronic modulation of sound as well as the sound of thunder. 

This concert is presented in cooperation with the Tri-Centric Foundation. 

Join us for a pre-concert conversation about the music of Anthony Braxton featuring performers, moderator Timo Hoyer and Music Division curator Stephanie Akau,  Whittall Pavilion, 6:30 p.m.