This event has been moved to Church of Christ at Dartmouth College.
Johnny Gandelsman: This Is America Part IV
Performance
Johnny Gandelsman

This Is America: Part IV

featuring a Hop Commission and Resident Artist
July 20, 2024

In the final concert of his residency, Gandelsman premieres the Hop commission 'Flamenco Suite'.

This is America comes as a response to the turbulent year of 2020 and celebrates America's rich cultural tapestry as seen through the perspectives of contemporary US-based composers.

Over the course of a year-long residency at the Hop, violinist and former member of Silkroad Ensemble Johnny Gandelsman performs the entire anthology for the first time and expands the project with four new Hop-commissioned pieces. Flamenco Suite composer Gonzalo Grau will be in attendance to shed light on his new work. 

The concert features flamenco dancer and rising star Mariana Gatto.

This event has been moved to Church of Christ at Dartmouth College. If you currently have tickets to this event, no action is needed from you at this time. 

Funded in part by the Marion and Frederick B. Whittemore '53 T'54 Distinguished Artists Series Fund and the Roesch Family Fund. Photos: courtesy of the artists

Johnny Gandelsman
Grammy award-winning violinist and producer Johnny Gandelsman's musical voice reflects the artistic collaborations he has been a part of since moving to the United States in 1995. The New Yorker has called Johnny "revelatory," placing him in the company of "radically transformative" performers like Maurizio Pollini, Peter Serkin and Christian Zacharias. As a founding member of Brooklyn Rider and a former member of the Silkroad Ensemble, Johnny has closely worked with such luminaries as Bela Fleck, Martin Hayes, Kayhan Kalhor, Yo-Yo Ma and Mark Morris. Gandelsman integrates a wide range of creative sensibilities into a unique style amongst today's violinists. Johnny's recording of the complete Bach Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin, which reached #1 on the Billboard Classical Chart, and made it onto NY Magazine and NY Times Best of the Year lists. A passionate advocate for new music, Johnny has premiered dozens of new works and has been producing records since starting his label, In a Circle Records in 2008. Recent credits include the Silkroad Ensemble's critically-acclaimed recording of Osvaldo Golijov tone poem in voices Falling out of Time (In a Circle Records); Brooklyn Rider's Healing Modes and The Wanderer (In a Circle Records); and Sing Me Home, a Grammy-award winner for Best World Music album (Sony). Johnny also produced music for Ken Burns, Lynn Novick and Sarah Bottstein's film The US and the Holocaust. Johnny was born in Moscow into a family of musicians. His father Yuri is a violist, his mother Janna is a pianist, and his sister Natasha is a violinist as well. He lives in New York.

Mariana Gatto traces her origins to the Gypsy communities of Bulgaria. As a disciplined and determined dancer who began performing flamenco in adult venues at age six, she rapidly became passionate about ballet, flamenco and other forms of dance and the performing arts. Awards include the Grand Prix at the Vienna International Ballet Experience and international scholarships.

Miss Gatto has performed alongside renowned flamenco dancer and choreographer Rafael Amargo in Dionisio: la vid y mil noches in Barcelona, in Sonia Dorado's Spain Spectacular at Teatro Calderón in Madrid, in Nélida Tirado's Dime Quién Soy at Jacob's Pillow and Queen's Theatre, in Jesús Muñóz's Flamenco en Cabaret in Albuquerque, in Omayra Amaya's Tiempo Flamenco at The Dance Complex in Boston, in Farruca with cellist José López

"Marqués" at the Former Spanish Ambassador's Residence in DC, and with the Gipsy Kings in their US tours. Currently she teaches flamenco at Séber Method Academy in DC and ballet at CityDance Conservatory in Maryland.

Gonzalo Grau
The composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Gonzalo Grau began his musical studies at the age of three in Caracas. Along his musical journey he developed skills in many instruments, from the viola da gamba and the cello to the flamenco cajón and his principal instrument, the piano. His varied credits include performances with Venezuelan music projects like Maroa, Schola Cantorum de Venezuela, Camerata de Caracas and the Simón Bolivar National Youth Orchestra, jazz icon Maria Schneider and the Latin jazz giant Timbalaye. As a music director he leads two projects of his own, Plural (Latin jazz-Flamenco-Venezuelan fusion) and La Clave Secreta (salsa fusion), nominated for the 2008 Grammy in the Best Tropical Album category.

Wearing his composer and arranger hat, Grau's achievements include composition collaborations alongside Osvaldo Golijov for the opera Ainadamar and La Pasión Según San Marcos. Original works include the overture Pregunta y Respuesta, commissioned by the Atlanta Symphony; Café con Pan, commissioned by the Chicago Symphony for the MusicNow concert series; a Double Concerto for Yo-Yo Ma, Johnny Gandelsman and the Orchestra of the Americas; and a concerto for Venezuelan cuatro and orchestra, commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Gustavo Dudamel.

Rhiannon Giddens
The acclaimed musician Rhiannon Giddens uses her art to excavate the past and reveal bold truths about our present. A MacArthur "Genius Grant" recipient, Giddens co-founded the Grammy Award-winning Carolina Chocolate Drops, and she has been nominated for six additional Grammys for her work as a soloist and collaborator. Giddens's forthcoming album, They're Calling Me Home, is a twelve-track album, recorded with Turrisi in Ireland during the recent lockdown; it speaks of the longing for the comfort of home as well as the metaphorical "call home" of death, which has been a tragic reality for so many during the COVID-19 crisis.  

Giddens's lifelong mission is to lift up people whose contributions to American musical history have previously been erased, and to work toward a more accurate understanding of the country's musical origins. Pitchfork has said of her work, "few artists are so fearless and so ravenous in their exploration," and Smithsonian Magazine calls her "an electrifying artist who brings alive the memories of forgotten predecessors, white and black." www.rhiannongiddens.com

Dana Lyn
Brooklyn-based musician Dana Lyn has performed at New York's Lincoln Center, Beacon Theater, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Carnegie Hall and Town Hall, as well as folk festivals and dive bars the world over. A violinist/fiddler, violist, pianist and enthusiastic bass player, she is at home in a wide range of musical genres and has worked with Tony Award-winning musicians Stew and Heidi Rodewald, actor-directors Ethan Hawke and Vincent D'Onofrio, Imani Uzuri, Somi, D'Angelo and the Vanguard, 2017 MacArthur Fellow Taylor Mac, Bruce Springsteen, the Elysian Fields, Irish poet Louis de Paor, Killer Mike and the Walkmen. As a composer, she has received commissions from the Brooklyn Rider, the National Arts Council of Ireland, the Inception Orchestra, the Apple Hill String Quartet, the Portland Chamber Music Festival, A Far Cry, the Irish Arts Center, Palaver Strings and the New Orchestra of Washington, among others. Her arrangements for fiddler Martin Hayes and the Brooklyn Rider were featured on WNYC's New Sounds and she contributed string arrangements to Catherine Russell's Grammy-nominated record Alone Together and Cherish the Ladies' PBS special An Irish Homecoming. danalynmusic.com

Tomeka Reid 
Described as a "New Jazz Power Source" by the New York Times, cellist and composer Tomeka Reid has emerged as one of the most original, versatile and curious musicians in Chicago's bustling jazz and improvised music community over the last decade. Her distinctive melodic sensibility, always rooted in a strong sense of groove, has been featured in many distinguished ensembles over the years. Reid has been a key member of ensembles led by legendary reedists like Anthony Braxton and Roscoe Mitchell, as well as a younger generation of visionaries including flutist Nicole Mitchell, vocalist Dee Alexander, and drummer Mike Reed. She co-leads the adventurous string trio HEAR IN NOW, and in 2013 launched the first Chicago Jazz String Summit. In the Fall of 2019 Tomeka Reid received a teaching appointment at Mills College as the Darius Milhaud chair in composition. www.tomekareid.net

Akshaya Avril Tucker 
Akshaya Avril Tucker is a composer, cellist and Odissi dancer, whose work is inspired by the music and dance traditions of South Asia. Her recent commissions include solo works for Johnny Gandelsman and Robert Howard, and chamber works for invoke and Density512. Her music has been performed by the Refugee Orchestra Project at National Sawdust, and by Vent Nouveau, Johnny Gandelsman and Joshua Roman. She is a current Composer Fellow at the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music. Akshaya holds an MM in Composition from the University of Texas at Austin and a BA in Music from Brown University. In 2018, she received honorable mentions from National Sawdust's Hildegard Competition and the ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards. In 2017, she received a Rainwater Innovation Grant from the University of Texas to collaborate with Hindustani vocalist Saili Oak. Akshaya has performed Odissi dance worldwide with Nataraj Dance Company under Guru Ranjanaa Devi. She is Programs Manager at Shastra, an organization dedicated to connecting the musical communities of India and the West. www.akshayatucker.com

Akshaya Tucker, Pallavi - A Meditation on Care
About recovery. It takes inspiration from two sources: one is a bhajan (devotional song) about the biggest moment of transformation in our lives. The first line of this song roughly translates from the Hindi to, "One day, Mother [Goddess] Kali, we will go together in light." "Ek din Kali Maa" has been present, always, for my family as we've grieved our own dear ones; and present again in 2018. If the music in Pallavi feels like a dear friend giving you a hug as you listen, then I will be very happy!  I created a fantasy on this melody, treating it like the theme in Odissi 'Pallavi' form. The Pallavi genre within Odissi dance repertoire is the second inspiration behind the piece. Pallavi's are named for their Raag, and are abstract pieces that contain no particular narrative. They involve the repetition of one melody over evolving musical and gestural elements. For me, dancing a Pallavi provides a sense of care and well-being. They are pure sweetness; a means of becoming absorbed by the raag; and feeling proud and comfortable in my own skin as a woman. This Pallavi extolls the strength of women, especially my mom. The performer is welcome to direct this musical spirit of restoration to whoever needs it in their own life.  I had an image of balancing, physically, emotionally—even on different strings of the instrument!—that worked its way into the violin writing. There are certain other particularities of learning Odissi dance that came into the music as well. I've used some rhythmic manipulations that dress up the melody in a new suit of clothes each time it appears, as you find frequently in Odissi music. The violin also occasionally imitates the timbre of the buzzing cassette tapes we practice dance to. These are some not particularly high-tech recordings made in India during the 1980s, by friends of my dance Guru—the instruments included a voice, pakhawaj (two-headed drum), drone and flute or sitar. The static was always noticeable during the opening alap (slow improvisation on the raag), and, true to form, it appears at the opening of this piece too.

Tomeka Reid, Rhapsody
Rhapsody for solo violin was commissioned for violinist Johnny Gandelsman. Composed during the pandemic in 2021, the piece opens with an emotionally reflective yet lyrical statement that returns in various forms throughout the composition. Initially, the statement seems to ask a question. It repeats itself higher yet, there is still no response. Continuing, the theme becomes a bit manic and anxious. Throughout, there is a sensation of “wheels spinning while stuck in place” and the piece ends with a sort of resolve that is neither sad nor without hope.

Dana Lyn, A Current Took Her Away
The "her" in this case is a plankter (singular for plankton). Plankton are micro-organisms whose main function is to convert sunlight into chemical energy; they are the base of the marine food chain. Decreasing sea ice has caused plankton blooms to happen earlier and further north each year, affecting the feeding and migration cycles of all of the animals that depend on them for survival. This piece is describing a lone plankter, drifting along a warmer-than-usual Arctic current, for much longer than expected.

Gonzalo Grau, Flamenco Suite 
Hop Commission and World Premiere

Rhiannon Giddens, New To the Session
I began my fiddling journey as an apprentice to a dance musician, and pretty late in life, as violinists go—so my repertoire and style are rhythmic and melodically simple, and always with a dancer in mind. They say write what you know—so when this opportunity came to create a piece for Johnny Gandelsman, I was thrilled to see what came out of my strings and off my bow. It’s called New to the Session because as a beginner fiddler I would sit in on Irish sessions sometimes and feel like I was in a whirlwind—no more than twice through each tune and it seemed like everybody knew everything but me; I wanted to capture a bit of that feel with the journey through the melodies.

"Rich in diversity but united by interpretative beauty and belief…potentially one of the important recordings of our time"

Gramophone

“Intoxicating…kaleidoscopic invention...Gandelsman is attuned to the precise nature of each artist, and tailors his sound to each one…quietly impressive"

The New York Times
Artist in Residence: Johnny Gandelsman
Johnny Gandelsman

The Hop will present his entire This is America anthology for the first time, including four Hop commissions with guest composers visiting for each concert. Gandelsman will expand the original 24-...

Learn More

Contact Us

Visiting Information

40 College St, Hanover, NH 03755

Directions to Venue

Other Information

Parking can be found along College Street.
There are 4 handicapped parking spaces in the church parking lot.
For wheelchair access and information, please contact the Box Office at 603.646.2422.