Exclusive Premiere on Apple Music starts July 22
Listen Now: http://bit.ly/AppleMusicTranceClassical
Watch the Trailer: http://bit.ly/AppleMusicTranceClassicalTrailer
Pre-order on iTunes: http://bit.ly/Pre-orderTranceClassical
Worldwide Release Date: July 29, 2016 (Innova)
“cello rock star” – Rolling Stone
“the reigning queen of the avant-garde cello” – Washington Post
“Maya Beiser conjure[d] orchestral splendor from four strings.” – Vice’s Noisey
Maya Beiser Online: www.mayabeiser.com
New York, NY – Maya Beiser, acclaimed as “a force of nature” (Boston Globe) and “ferociously adventurous” (San Francisco Chronicle), will release her next album, TranceClassical, worldwide on July 29, 2016 on Innova Recordings. The full album is streaming this week, beginning on July 22, exclusively on Apple Music. Watch the album trailer now Here. TranceClassical is available for pre-order on iTunes.
In TranceClassical, Maya explores music for cello that entrances, and that transforms and transcends boundaries, styles, and centuries. TranceClassical includes selections by a wide array of composers, brought to common ground by Maya’s unique artistic vision – from J.S. Bach to Imogen Heap, from Medieval visionary composer Hildegard von Bingen to Wilco drummer and composer Glenn Kotche, from Arab-American composer Mohammed Fairouz‘s new Kol Nidrei to David Lang‘s take on Lou Reed‘s Heroin, plus world premiere recordings of music by Michael Gordon, Julia Wolfe, and David T. Little, and original arrangements by Maya.
Praise for TranceClassical so far:
“The pulsating bass line ticks away, reminding us of the timelessness of [Bach’s] music” –NPR
“a kickass new record” –WNYC
“Maya Beiser‘s aptly titled new album indeed casts a spell.” –Blogcritics
“simply one of the most interesting, most stunning albums of contemporary music I have heard in a while” –Audiophile Audition
“a surreal soundscape contained in an industrial chamber … Maya Beiser continues her category-defying path with TranceClassical” –MusicWeb International
“rockstar glam and personal magnetism … endlessly inventive and a joy to listen to” –San Francisco Classical Voice
“Beiser’s cello is augmented with all manner of high-tech studio wizardry and guest stars that yield orchestral-size textures. Bigger surprises include the Lou Reed song Heroin with dreamy Bachlike arpeggios in an arrangement by David Lang. David T. Little’s Hellhound is a cauldron of metal-prone, electric-driven textures. Best is last: O Virtus Sapientiae by the 12th-century abbess Hildegard of Bingen is presented as a stripped-down sparsely accompanied cello solo.” –The Philadelphia Inquirer
Upcoming Concert Dates (details: www.mayabeiser.com/calender-page):
August 13: Breckenridge, CO – Breckenridge Music Festival
August 17: San Francisco, CA – SFJAZZ Center
September 13: New York, NY – Le Poisson Rouge
October 27: Iowa City, IA – Hancher Auditorium
November 19: Stockholm, Sweden – Konserthus
February 10: London, England – Kings Place
Of this very personal project, Maya says, “TranceClassical started from a washed-out still photo in my mind – me, as a little girl curled with a blanket on her parents’ sofa, hearing Bach for the first time, hanging on to every mysterious note coming out of the scratchy LP. TranceClassical is the arc my mind sketches between everything I create and Bach – David Lang and Bach, Glenn Kotche and Bach, Michael Gordon and Bach. No matter how far I venture, how rebellious, or avant-garde or electronic, my artistic mooring stays with the creation of this immense genius. Was it his music? Or just being an impressionable young girl, trying to partake in her parents’ worship? Probably both. But the pieces I bring here give me a sense of trance – a reverie and meditation on his place in my heart.”
Maya’s performance of J.S. Bach’s Air on G, which opens the album, evokes the sound of an old LP, spinning on a distant turntable. Michael Gordon’s All Vows takes the Jewish Yom Kippur prayer, the Kol Nidrei (which translates to All Vows) and reimagines it entirely. Maya melds cello and electronically transformed vocals, sung simultaneously while she plays, in Imogen Heap’s mesmerizing Hide and Seek. Composer and drummer Glenn Kotche of Wilco contributes Three Parts Wisdom, a rhythmic and multilayered new work for Maya, described as “a soaring, gorgeous tour de force for solo cello” by The Washington Post. In Lou Reed’s Heroin, arranged by David Lang, Maya sings the haunting confessional over her cello’s arpeggios in a startlingly moving take on the original. Julia Wolfe’s Emunah (or “belief”) is an ancient-feeling vocal and cello duo expressing and expounding on the idea of devotion. Arab-American composer Mohammed Fairouz’s new Kol Nidrei, in which Maya sings the text in Aramaic, also engages echoes of ancient cantorial styles, and has been described as “simply gorgeous” (The New York Times) and “luxuriant” (San Francisco Chronicle). David T. Little’s driving Hellhound, written for Maya, is based on legendary bluesman Robert Johnson’s 1937 song Hellhound On My Trail, which tells the story of a man pursued by demons, unable to rest. The album closes with Maya’s plaintive but ardent arrangement of Medieval visionary Hildegard von Bingen’s O Virtus Sapientiae.
Cellist Maya Beiser defies categories. Passionately forging a career path through uncharted territories, she has captivated audiences worldwide with her virtuosity, eclectic repertoire, and relentless quest to redefine her instrument’s boundaries. The Boston Globe declares, “With virtuoso chops, rock-star charisma, and an appetite for pushing her instrument to the edge of avant-garde adventurousness, Maya Beiser is the post-modern diva of the cello.”
Maya has dedicated her work to reinventing solo cello performance in the mainstream classical arena. A featured performer on the world’s most prestigious stages including Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, London’s South Bank Centre, Sydney Opera House, Beijing Festival, Big Ears festival, and the Barbican’s Sound Unbound, she has collaborated with a wide range of artists across many disciplines, including Brian Eno, Philip Glass, Shirin Neshat, Steve Reich, David Lang, Tan Dun, Robert Woodruff, Bill Morrison, Evan Ziporyn and Osvaldo Golijov, among many others.
Maya Beiser is a United States Artists (USA) Distinguished Fellow in Music for 2015. Invited to present at the prestigious TED main stage in Long Beach, CA, Maya’s 2011 TEDtalk has been watched by close to one million people and translated to 32 languages. In 2013, she was a featured guest alongside such luminaries as Yoko Ono, Marina Abramović, and Isabella Rossellini at ICASTICA, a festival celebrating women working in artistic fields in Arezzo, Italy.
Maya is a graduate of Yale University and a founding member of the Bang on a Can All-Stars. Her vast discography includes eight solo albums and many studio recordings and film music collaborations. Her 2010 album Provenance topped the classical and world music charts on both Amazon and iTunes, and her album Time Loops was selected among NPR’s top 10 recordings of 2012. Her latest album Uncovered, a collection of re-imagined and re-contextualized classic rock masterpieces, was in the top 10 on the Billboard Classical Chart upon release in August 2014 and has been garnering rave reviews.
Maya Beiser: TranceClassical | Innova Recordings | Release Date: July 29, 2016
1. Air on G – J.S. Bach
2. All Vows – Michael Gordon
3. Hide and Seek – Imogen Heap / arr. Maya Beiser
4. Three Parts Wisdom – Glenn Kotche
5. Heroin – Lou Reed / arr. David Lang
6. Emunah – Julia Wolfe
7. Kol Nidrei – Mohammed Fairouz
8. Hellhound – David T. Little
9. O Virtus Sapientiae – Hildegard von Bingen / arr. Maya Beiser
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