Guy Klucevsek Begins Weeklong Residency at THE STONE Tonight

John Zorn's renowned THE STONE presents Guy Klucevsek | A 40 Year Composer Retrospective - a weeklong residency performed and curated by composer/accordionist Guy Klucevsek. For six consecutive nights, some of today's top artists from both the jazz and new music scene join Klucevsek in performing his pieces written over the past four decades (1972-2014), including three world premieres and seven New York premieres.

This residency marks the collaborative culmination of a decades-long relationship between Klucevsek and Zorn that was born in 1984. "After hearing Zorn's Rugby for the first time, every idea I had about performing and composing was challenged," says Klucevsek. "Though my pieces sound nothing like Zorn, their episodic structure and mixture of popular music sources with art music techniques came directly out of my experiences with Zorn and the free improve scene of the 80s."

Surveying his last 40 years of writing, Klucevsek has composed over 100 pieces for solo accordion, and more than 30 pieces on commission from dance and theatre companies. His music entertains and engages even as it addresses musical ideas of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. While occasionally referencing the traditional accordion repertoire, Klucevsek's music incorporates a dash of Eastern European paprika and dance rhythms, a sprinkle of Tex-Mex accordion and flamenco guitar, and a peppering of post-modern avant-garde music. "There is always something happening beneath the simple melodies and harmonies - tremolos, counterpoint, polymeter - to add density," explains Klucevsek of his own compositions.

Klucevsek is a major contributor to the accordion renaissance of the last 25 years. "I began playing in 1952, when the accordion was the most popular instrument in America," says Klucevsek. "The most amazing thing about being an accordionist for 40 years has been to experience the dramatic shifts in public opinion about the instrument."

About Guy Klucevsek

Guy Klucevsek is one of the world's most versatile and highly respected accordionists. He has performed and/or recorded with Laurie Anderson, Bang On a Can, Brave Combo, Anthony Braxton, Anthony Coleman, Dave Douglas, Bill Frisell, Fred Frith, Rahim al Haj, Robin Holcomb, Kepa Junkera, the Kronos Quartet, Natalie Merchant, Present Music, Relâche, Zeitgeist, and John Zorn. He is the recipient of a 2010 United States Artists Collins Fellowship, an unrestricted $50,000 award given annually to "America's finest artists." In November/December 2014, he was awarded a fellowship to the MacDowell Colony to pursue his creative work.

He has created a unique repertoire for accordion through his own composing and by commissioning over 50 works from composers including Mary Ellen Childs, William Duckworth, Fred Frith, Aaron Jay Kernis, Jerome Kitzke, Stephen Montague, Somei Satoh, Lois V Vierk, and John Zorn. He has composed over 20 dance scores for choreographers including Karen Bamonte, Martha Bowers, Angela Caponigro, David Dorfman, Anita Feldman, Victoria Marks, Stuart Pimsler, and Mark Taylor.

Performances include the Ten Days on the Island Festival (Tasmania), the Adelaide Festival (Australia), the Berlin Jazz Festival, Lincoln Center, Spoleto Festival/USA, BAM Next Wave Festival, Cotati Accordion Festival, San Antonio International Accordion Festival, Vienna International Accordion Festival, and the children's television show "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood."

Klucevsek has released over 20 recordings as soloist/leader on Tzadik, Winter & Winter, innova, Starkland, Review, Intuition, CRI, and XI. Stereo Review cited his Starkland recording, Transylvanian Softwear, as "a recording of special merit" (1995). He can also be heard on John Williams's orchestral scores for the Steven Spielberg films, "The Terminal," "Munich," "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," and "The Adventures of Tin-Tin," and on A. R. Rahman's score for "People Like Us."