Music Preview: Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and PROJECT Trio join to debut work at Alex Theatre in Glendale
Composer Adam Schoenberg is so often asked if he is related to the renowned 20th-century composer Arnold Schoenberg that despite knowing of no familial connection, he had a DNA test done recently to be sure.
“I’m supposed to find out in mid-November,” he said. In the process, however, Schoenberg has just learned that his bloodline includes a very different composer.
“My fourth great-grandfather was George Gershwin’s great-grandfather,” he said. “I’m 99% sure we’re not related to [Arnold] Schoenberg, but if we are, that would be quite strange.”
Perhaps not so strange: at age 36, Adam Schoenberg has made it on the list compiled by U.S. orchestras of top 10 “most performed living classical composers.” He has received critical acclaim for his work that has been premiered and performed by major orchestras across the country and in Mexico.
This weekend, audiences will hear the West Coast premiere of Schoenberg’s new work, “Scatter,” the first concerto of his career, presented by the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the eclectic PROJECT Trio, Saturday, Nov. 12 at the Alex Theatre in Glendale and Sunday, Nov. 13 at UCLA’s Royce Hall.
The concerto is part of the orchestra’s “Mozart & Mendelssohn” program, which will also feature Mozart’s “Prague Symphony No. 38” and Mendelssohn’s “Scottish Symphony No. 3.” The program will be led by guest conductor Alexandre Bloch, the principal guest conductor of Düsseldorf Symphoniker and music director of Orchestre National de Lille, in his Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra debut.
Schoenberg wrote “Scatter” for Brooklyn-based PROJECT Trio, a virtuosic, genre-crossing ensemble with nu-metal in its repertoire, whose recordings have been at the top of Billboard’s classical and jazz charts in Canada and the Unites States, and who the Wall Street Journal lauded for its “first-rate” musicianship and “subversive humor.”
Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra audiences may have seen PROJECT Trio during the group’s five-year stint in the company’s family artist-in-residence program; Saturday’s performance marks the first time the trio will have performed on the orchestra’s main stage.
“Scatter” is rooted in a first meeting between Schoenberg and trio members Peter Seymour (double bass), Greg Patillo (flute), and Eric Stephenson (cello), facilitated by conductor Jacomo Bairos, a mutual friend.
“We quickly realized that A, we got along as people,” Schoenberg said, “and B, my aesthetic and their aesthetic would probably line up well.”
It was Seymour who asked Schoenberg to write a concerto for the group. The work was subsequently co-commissioned by the Iris Orchestra in Tennessee, where “Scatter” premiered, as well as South Carolina’s Charleston Symphony, Amarillo Symphony in Texas and the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra.
Schoenberg said that PROJECT Trio’s signature instrumentation presented his first challenge. “It became, how can I write a concerto that is inspired by this group and by these three instruments [bass, flute and cello] that one wouldn’t normally put together?”
Schoenberg’s nontraditional answer: a triple concerto consisting of a single movement in three sections in which the trio would not only solo, but would play with the orchestra.
“The bass player is playing the bass part, the cellist is leading the cello section, the flute player is leading the winds,” Schoenberg said. “I also have them play just as a trio a good amount of time... Yeah, it’s a little unusual.”
Weaving electronics into “Scatter” as part of its overall form and structure was another first for the composer.
“One of the percussion players has a laptop and a keyboard, and they trigger all of these samples that I created,” he said. “It’s a very atmospheric type of electronic sound.”
The electronics, he said, serve essentially “as architectural pillars to help the audience, the orchestra and the ensemble know that, OK, we’ve just finished the main section, now we’ve moved on to the second, and now we’ve moved on to the third.”
PROJECT Trio will play the piece from memory.
“They had about three months to memorize the piece before the actual premiere,” Schoenberg said. “They needed to dive into that world that I set up and have it become part of their DNA.”
“I think when performers are up there with no music in front of them, it adds to the excitement, even the pageantry, of the piece,” Seymour said. “The PROJECT Trio’s signature, huge-energy style of performance is something not usually seen at a classical concert, and this is an incredible piece of new American classical music.”
Now, having performed the concerto multiple times, “we’ve truly ingested it,” Seymour said, “and it can really just flow out of us. It’s all about fun and sharing music, really enjoying the collaboration with the fabulous Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and letting all of the music just happen.”
Schoenberg, meanwhile, has a full plate, with commissions through the 2019-20 season.
“So I sort of know what I’m doing for the next four years,” he said.
These include a two-piano concerto commissioned by the prestigious Dranoff International 2 Piano Foundation for its 2017 final-round competition in Miami, and a violin concerto for noted violinist Anne Akiko Meyers, who will premiere the piece in 2018.
Upcoming albums include Schoenberg’s chamber works featuring the Blakemore Trio and the Kansas City Philharmonic’s performance of his orchestral works. The latter will feature Schoenberg’s most performed piece, “Finding Rothko,” and his biggest, “Picture Studies,” inspired by Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition.”
In addition, Schoenberg is a professor at Occidental College, where he runs the composition and film scoring programs. Among his film scores is the 2012 indie film “Graceland,” in collaboration with his father, pianist and film composer Steven Schoenberg. He has also collaborated with his wife, screenwriter and librettist Janine Salinas Schoenberg.
“I almost travel one week out of the month,” Schoenberg said, “but I’m scaling back a little because I love being a dad (to a 3-year-old and a toddler), and I love my wife and my family and I love teaching. I don’t know how people do it,” he said. “I’m still trying to figure that out.”
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What: “Mozart & Mendelssohn,” Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra.
When: 8 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 11 (Alex Theatre), 7 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 12 (UCLA).
Where: Alex Theatre, 216 N. Brand Blvd., Glendale (Saturday); UCLA’s Royce Hall, 340 Royce Drive, Westwood (Sunday); Pre-concert talks will be held one hour before curtain.
Cost: Tickets start at $27.
More information: Call (213) 622-7001 or visit laco.org.
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LYNNE HEFFLEY writes about theater and the arts.