Deutsche Bank Concert

Tashi Wada: “Hour of the Star”

Composer Tashi Wada’s “Hour of the Star” is a new long-form piece for voice and mixed-ensemble that draws inspiration from the writings of Brazilian author Clarice Lispector, taking its title from the last novel published within her lifetime. As part of this new work, Wada is collaborating with Berlin’s Harmonic Space Orchestra, a performance collective who focus on tuning and intonation in contemporary music, and longtime collaborator Julia Holter as featured vocalist. For years, Wada and Holter have performed in each other’s groups and projects, developing an intuitive musical kinship. “Ecstatic drones, unconventional tunings, and a spirit of infinity remain alive in Wada and Holter’s concerts” (Jenn Pelly, The New Yorker). “Hour of the Star” will be developed in close collaboration with the ensemble to craft direct relationships between the composition and performers, resulting in a live performance and recording.

Julia Holter is a composer, performer, and recording artist based in Los Angeles. Her interest in sonic mysteries has led her to record in various settings—in her home, outside with a field recorder, and in recording studios—as well as to perform live, often with a focus on the voice and the space between language and babble. Holter’s music is multi-layered and texturally rich. She has amassed a body of work that explores melody within free song structures, atmosphere, and the impulses of the voice.

The Harmonic Space Orchestra is a Berlin-based experimental research and performance collective with rational intonation and extended just intonation at the core of its practice. Initiated by Catherine Lamb, Rebecca Lane and Marc Sabat in 2019, it has been growing and taking shape ever since, integrating an extensive network of musical relationships that have been developing in different constellations, contexts, and countries for over 15 years. The collective currently consists of 15 core composer-performers and musicians who approach precisely tuned sound-forms in a pluralistic manner. The ensemble emerges from practice-based research as a collective on a subject that is rarely placed as a central focus: Harmonic Space, a concept formulated by the late American composer James Tenney.