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.
Composer Arvo Part turns 85 this Friday. Few composers of our time have managed to garner both such exuberant critical acclaim and the emphatic love of audiences as Part has. Steve Seel honors Part with performances of his "Magnificat" and "Berlin Mass" on this edition of the program, in addition to works by Johann Johannsson, Marc Mellits, Kate Moore, and others.
Classical MPR's Steve Seel spoke with Kyu-Young Kim, artistic director and principal violin with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, about the plans for the virtual fall season, and what audiences can expect to hear and see.
In classical music today, the guitar has become just as commonplace an instrument as the violin and the piano. What might surprise you though is the inroads the electric guitar has made. Steve Seel features both acoustic and electric guitars in a host of new works on this week's program, including pieces by Chris Brubeck (son of jazz great Dave Brubeck), Elena Kats-Chernin, Judd Greenstein, and others.
This week's program features reflections on the "sharing of wisdom" from one to another, and the value of individual and collective memory. Steve Seel showcases a stirring work from Israeli composer Shulamit Ran on the lessons of the Holocaust, plus Michael Torke's "Four Proverbs" and Judd Greenstein's "In Teaching Others We Teach Ourselves." We also hear music from Tan Dun, Huang Ro, Michael Kurth, and others.
Composer Adam Schoenberg says his American Symphony was inspired by the 2008 presidential election, "where both parties asked the people to embrace change and make a difference." While not a patriotic work, he says, "it's about our collective ability to restore hope within ourselves and our neighbors, both here and around the world." Steve Seel features the work as part of an all American hour on this week's episode.
Composer Kyle Sanna says that the best still photographs tell a story about motion. He wanted to pay tribute to that quality in music, and he called his piece, "Sequence for Minor White" - named after one of the most influential American photographers of the mid-20th century. Steve Seel features that work on this week's episode, played by the quartet Brooklyn Rider. In the second hour, Steve explores works that embody a sense of stillness and motion at the same time.
Guest host Valerie Kahler features pieces that explore themes of "above and below" on this week's episode, including Jeffrey Mumford's "her eastern light amid a cavernous dusk," Michael Daugherty's "The Marfa Lights," Arvo Part's "Tabula Rasa," and Nico Muhly's "Choral Pointing Downwards."
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.