Steve Seel possesses a broad knowledge of many musical genres, having hosted radio programs ranging from classical to jazz and even avant-garde music at public radio stations around the country. Steve came to Minnesota Public Radio in 1999 to be a part of its nationally-syndicated classical music programming. In 2005, he became one of the founding voices on MPR's eclectic station The Current, and has hosted various time slots from mornings to late nights, and conducted in-depth interviews with pop music luminaries ranging from Brian Eno to David Byrne to Tori Amos. Steve is an avid reader of political and social commentary as well, and he emcees The Current's popular Policy and a Pint community series, featuring discussions with noted scholars, politicians, community leaders, authors and big thinkers on important issues of the day. Steve is also a basement composer obsessed with all things both minimalist and slow, and might actually be incapable of writing anything that exceeds 75 beats-per-minute.
Were you around for the "Be-Ins" of the 1960s? You might remember them as gatherings of hippie culture, some specifically devoted to opposing the Vietnam War and racism. Bass clarinetist and composer Evan Ziporyn takes a look back at those counter-culture gatherings of old, in a work called "Be-In" on this week's episode. Steve Seel also features music by Michael Torke, Philip Glass, Terry Riley, and more.
The 13th-century poet Rumi was the inspiration for the work that's the centerpiece of the first hour of this week's show: "Dance" by composer Anna Clyne. Steve Seel also showcases works by Missy Mazzoli, Harold Budd, Lou Harrison, and Clint Mansell.
Philip Glass wrote his Piano Concerto No. 3 for pianist Simone Dinnerstein, who is universally known for her interpretations of Bach. In 2016, Glass saw Dinnerstein perform a concert of his piano etudes, and he instantly knew she was the pianist for whom he wanted to write his new work. Steve Seel features that concerto as the centerpiece of the first hour of this week's show, which also features works on the subject of birds by composers John Luther Adams and Somei Satoh.
While Michael Gandolfi's "Imaginary Numbers" uses mathematical concepts as the centerpiece of the first hour, music about time and its passing make up a philosophical second hour on this week's program. Steve Seel shares Jason Thomas' "Time's Timeless," Maria Huld Markan Sigfusdottir's "Clockworking" and Bartosz Chajdecki's "Clockwork," and Norman Dello Joio's "Meditations on Ecclesiastes" offers a path to meaning amidst our powerlessness to stop time.
Steve Seel offers up an essay on poets and poetry for this week's episode, featuring such works as Lou Harrison's "Air for the Poet," John Corigliano's "Soliloquy" for clarinet, and Jennifer Higdon's "Scenes from the Poets Dreams." Plus, John Adams' choral symphony "Harmonium," with sung text based on the poetry of Emily Dickinson and John Donne, is the centerpiece of the first hour.
This week's episode features composers honoring the past in some way: from salutes to earlier composers (Lukas Foss' "For Aaron," Thomas Canning's "Fantasy on a Hymn Tune of Justin Morgan") to tributes to American history (John Cage's "Aparatment House 1776"). Steve Seel also features works by Peter Sculthorpe, Erkki-Sven Tuur, and more.
It's a meditation on "vastness" this week, as Steve Seel showcases music exploring the sky, the sea, and the horizons where they meet. Works include John Adams "The Dharma at Big Sur," Elena Rueher's "Let's Sit Beneath the Stars" from her String Quartet No. 1, Max Richter's gorgeous "Written on the Sky II," and works from Nico Muhly, Osvaldo Golijov, and more.
It's a program of doubles, duos, and diptychs this time out, as Steve features a set of "music for two" in the second hour of this week's program - including music from David Borden, Kenneth Fuchs and Michael Fine, and performances by Double Edge, the Cobalt Duo, and more. Steve also showcases more new music from Dobrinka Tabakova as well as Einojuhani Rautavaara, Lou Harrison, and Ola Gjeilo.
Steve Seel shares a particularly "cosmic" Earth Day edition of the program this time out, with an ode to our planet's place in the universe and the inter-connectedness of all things. Composer Terry Riley contributes the work that the episode is named for, and Steve also features pieces from Urmas Sisask's "The Milky Way" to Nimrod Borenstein's "The Big Band and Creation of the Universe."
On this week's show, Steve Seel features modern works that utilize elements from previous centuries to sound timeless -- or at least disconnected from the present moment in inventive and sometimes eerie ways. Composers featured include Michael Nyman, Caroline Shaw, Michi Wiancko, and many others.
Derek Bermel describes his "A Shout, a Whisper, and a Trace" as an ode to Bela Bartok, coming to New York as a refugee and finding alienation in a foreign land. Steve Seel also features music by Colin Jacobsen ("The Flowers of Esfahan"), Bryce Dessner ("Music for Wood and Strings"), Meredith Monk (from "The Games") and much more.
This week Steve Seel offers two hours of contemplative modern works, including Aaron Jay Kernis' "Air" for cello, Jacob Cooper's intensely moving and emotional "Stabat Mater Dolorosa," two intimate chamber works by Richard Danielpour, and more from the new choral release from British/Bulgarian composer Dobrinka Tabakova.
In the grand tradition of works like Benjamin Britten's "Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra" comes Steve Reich's "The Four Sections" - a kind of minimalist take on the time-honored tradition of showcasing what the different sections of the orchestra can do (with a title that's suitably minimalist as well). Steve Seel features Reich's majestic orchestral work this week, as well as pieces by John Adams, Judd Greenstein, Paul Bowles, and more.
Sometimes, good things come in small packages, and that's what Steve Seel features on this week's edition of the show: miniatures, from Mark Mellits, Anna Meredith, Vivian Fung, and others. Plus, the premiere of new music by the British/Bulgarian composer Dobrinka Tabakova.
His day job is drummer for the band Wilco. But Glenn Kotche has also distinguished himself as an accomplished composer of classical music, writing for ensembles including the Kronos Quartet and Eighth Blackbird, in addition to performing the percussion instruments on his own pieces himself. In this edition of Extra Eclectic, Steve Seel features Glenn Kotche with both Kronos and Eighth Blackbird in one grand ensemble. That plus music by John Cage, Evan Ziporyn, Nico Muhly, and more.
If there's one thing that has changed definitively in classical music, it's that there are plenty of composers who are as much at home in rock n' roll for their "day-jobs" as classical. It's true for composers from Bryce Dessner (guitarist for the band The National) to Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead, who's classical bona fides are not only strong, but Grammy winning as well. Steve Seel features music by both on this week's program.
"For most people today, the spiritual dimension has been lost. My intention is to provide food for the soul, and this is what I preach in my works," says Latvian composer Peteris Vasks. His Violin Concerto, "Distant Light," provides ample food for the soul on this week's program. Steve Seel also features spiritual-themed works from Terry Riley ("Sun Rings: One Earth, One People, One Love") and James Wilson ("The Green Fuse"), and music by Evan Ziporyn, Daniel Wohl, and Sarah Kirkland Snider.
Composer John Adams wanted to depict "the current pounding and smashing" the cliffs of California's rocky coastline in his work The Dharma at Big Sur. But rather than open with aggressive music, his work for violin and orchestra almost sounds like a meditative religious epiphany. Steve Seel features Adams' music on this week's show, in addition to works by John Cage, Lou Harrison, Douglas Knehans, and more.
From the classic 20th-century minimalism of Steve Reich's "Pulse" and the electronica-tinged "Scale of Volitility" by Emilie Levianaise-Farrouch, to Bryce Dessner's dramatic, sweeping "Concerto for Two Pianos" written for Katia and Marielle Labeque, Steve Seel has the gamut of sounds from minimalism to "maximal-ism" mapped out on this week's program. Steve also features works by Keith Jarrett, John Cage, Lou Harrison, Terry Riley, and more.
It's a program of winds and windy music this time out - in the first hour, Steve Seel features music from wind instruments, from Joseph Schwantner, Marc Melits, Christopher Theofanidis and others, and in the second hour, it's music on "windy" themes, including John Luther Adams' "Canticles of the Holy Wind," Ludovico Einaudi's "Cold Wind," and more.