Community Music Center
544 Capp Street Btwn 20th and 21st SF
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Wrack + Rova: On Procedural Grounds

Local improvising oboist and composer/performer Kyle Bruckmann will premiere an extended work for Rova Saxophone Quartet in collaboration with his long-running quintet Wrack.

Kyle Bruckmann’s creative work spans a dizzying range, from a traditional Western classical foundation into genre-bending gray areas encompassing free jazz, electronic music and post-punk rock. International touring and appearances on more than 50 recordings have led to his recognition as "a modern day renaissance musician" and "a seasoned improviser with impressive extended technique and peculiar artistic flair."

Since moving to the Bay Area in 2003, he has performed with the San Francisco Symphony and ensembles throughout the region, joined forces with Quinteto Latino and new music collective sfSound, and become firmly enmeshed in the local improvised music community. From 1996 until his westward relocation, he had been a fixture in Chicago's thriving experimental music underground, with frequent collaborators including Jim Baker, Jeb Bishop, Olivia Block, Guillermo Gregorio, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Robbie Hunsinger, Ernst Karel, and Michael Zerang. Long-term affiliations include the electro-acoustic duo EKG and the "rock" monstrosity Lozenge.

Bruckmann’s Wrack project was founded in 2002 with the explicit intent of blurring distinctions between compositional and improvisational procedures, creative and interpretative mindsets, Afro-American and Euro-American experimental traditions. It is equally a book of compositions, an unconventional chamber ensemble, and an aesthetic philosophy entangling the methodologies of contemporary jazz and classical modernism. The debut record on Red Toucan (2003) demonstrated an "ability to combine turned-up flame with clear-headed attention to texture and space" (Dusted Magazine). The follow-up album on 482 Music, Intents & Purposes (2006), was recognized as “music made by artists unafraid of genre constraints” (All About Jazz) and "dazzling proof that intricately arranged, angular modern jazz can be accessible and enjoyable" (Wire).

“With this project, I am excited by and grateful for the opportunity to bring together beloved musicians from multiple chapters of my life. I can cite a 1993 Rova performance I witnessed while an undergraduate conservatory student in Houston as a seminal experience, instrumental in launching me onto the creative path I’ve pursued ever since. It will be a joy and a great honor to work with them now as colleagues.” -KB

These concerts are made possible in part thanks to the San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music’s Musical Grant Program, the Zellerbach Family Foundation, the W & F Hewlett Foundation, and Subito, the quick advancement grant program of the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of the the American Composers Forum.

$12; $8 student/senior

Cost: $12/8

Audio samples in which musicians at this event play:

Videos featuring musicians playing at this event