In Residence at MIT
February 18-23, 2025
Performance: Saturday, February 22, 7:30PM
Thomas Tull Concert Hall, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
21 Amherst Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
About
Kinetic Ensemble visits MIT to celebrate creative collaboration and new beginnings, and to explore music inspired by human invention, cultural heritage, and the natural world. Founded and directed by Natalie Lin Douglas (Associate Professor of Music at MIT), Kinetic premieres two new works composed by MIT faculty members Miguel Zenón (GRAMMY® winner; Guggenheim and MacArthur Fellow) and Evan Ziporyn (Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor; Director of Center for Art, Science and Technology), and present the Boston premiere of The Wilderness Anthology for string orchestra and soundscapes by guest composer Patrick Harlin, whose interdisciplinary work combines the fields of musical composition and soundscape ecology.
Kinetic’s residency will include an interactive open rehearsal demonstration illustrating the ensemble’s intensely collaborative approach to music-making, masterclasses for MIT’s student musicians, and a public concert in the newly completed Thomas Tull Concert Hall featuring the works of Zenón, Ziporyn, and Harlin. Additionally, guest composer Patrick Harlin gives a presentation on his research into soundscape ecology and how that has shaped his creative output.
The residency is part of the MIT Arts Festival, and the new music building’s opening celebrations.
— curated by Natalie Lin Douglas, violinist and Artistic Director, & Mary Grace Johnson, violinist
Program
Patrick Harlin: The Wilderness Anthology for string orchestra (2022)
Miguel Zenón: Yo Soy la Tradición for saxophone and string orchestra (2025, World Premiere)
Evan Ziporyn: Three Inventions (2025, World Premiere)
Featured Composers
Patrick Harlin’s “aesthetics capture a sense of tradition and innovation…” (The New York Times). His music is permeated by classical, jazz, and electronic music traditions, all underpinned with a love and respect for the great outdoors. His works have been performed by the St. Louis Symphony, the Kansas City Symphony, Kinetic Ensemble, Collegium Cincinnati, and Calidore String Quartet, among others. Harlin is the inaugural composer in residence with the Lansing Symphony Orchestra (2019–2023). His interdisciplinary research in soundscape ecology—a field that aims to better understand ecosystems through sound—has taken him to imperiled regions around the world, including the Amazon rainforest and the Book Cliffs of Utah. His baseline recordings for ecological impact studies are also the fodder for artistic inspiration. This work has been supported by a Graham Sustainability Institute Doctoral Fellowship, a Theodore Presser Award, and private support, among others. These pieces draw parallels between the sounds of the natural world and those of the concert hall, seeking to bring awareness to the importance of sound in our environment. Harlin grew up in Seattle, holds a doctorate in music composition from the University of Michigan, and currently resides in Ann Arbor.
Multiple GRAMMY® Nominee and Guggenheim and MacArthur Fellow Miguel Zenón represents a select group of musicians who have masterfully balanced and blended the often-contradictory poles of innovation and tradition. Widely considered one of the most groundbreaking and influential saxophonists and composers of his generation, he has also developed a unique voice as a conceptualist, concentrating his efforts on perfecting a fine mix between jazz and his many musical influences.
Born and raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Zenón has released fifteen recordings as a leader, including the GRAMMY®-nominated Música De Las Américas (2022), El Arte Del Bolero (2021) and Sonero: The Music of Ismael Rivera (2019) and Yo Soy La Tradición (2018). He has worked with luminaries such as The SFJAZZ Collective, Charlie Haden, Fred Hersch, Kenny Werner, David Sánchez, Danilo Perez, The Village Vanguard Orchestra, Kurt Elling, Joey Calderazzo, Steve Coleman, Ray Barreto, Andy Montañez, Jerry Gonzalez & The Fort Apache Band, The Mingus Big Band and Bobby Hutcherson.
Zenón has been featured in publications such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe and The Chicago Tribune. In addition, he topped both the Jazz Artist of the Year and Alto Saxophonist of the Year categories in the 2014 JazzTimes Critics Poll and was selected as Alto Saxophonist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association in 2015, 2018, 2019 and 2020 (when he was also recognized as Arranger of the Year). In 2023 he was recognized by the same organization as the Composer of the Year.
As a composer he has been commissioned by SFJAZZ, NYO Jazz, The New York State Council on the Arts, Chamber Music America, Logan Center for The Arts, The Hyde Park Jazz Festival, The John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, MIT, Spektral Quartet, Miller Theater, The Hewlett Foundation, Peak Performances, PRISM Quartet and many of his peers. Zenón has given hundreds of lectures and master classes at institutions all over the world and is a faculty member in the Music & Theater Arts Department at MIT, as well as the current Visiting Scholar for the Harmony and Jazz Composition Department at Berklee College of Music.
In April 2008 Zenón received a fellowship from the prestigious John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Later that year he was one of 25 distinguished individuals chosen to receive the coveted MacArthur Fellowship, also known as the “Genius Grant.” In 2011 he founded Caravana Cultural, a program which presents free-of-charge Jazz concerts in rural areas of Puerto Rico. In 2022 he received an Honorary Doctorate from La Universidad del Sagrado Corazón in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the highest honor bestowed by the institution.
Evan Ziporyn is a composer/clarinetist who has forged an international reputation through his genre-defying, cross-cultural works and performances. At MIT he is Inaugural Director of the Center for Art, Science and Technology (CAST), founder & Artistic Director of Gamelan Galak Tika, and curator of the MIT Sounding performance series.
His music has been commissioned and performed by Yo-yo Ma’s Silkroad Ensemble, Brooklyn Rider, Maya Beiser, Roomful of Teeth, Bang on a Can, Kronos Quartet, Wu Man, the American Composers Orchestra, Sentieri Selvaggi, the American Repertory Theater, Steven Schick, So Percussion, Gamelan Sekar Jaya, Sarah Cahill, and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project. They have been presented at international venues including Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, London’s Barbican Center, the Holland Festival, Brussels Ars Musica, the Singapore Festival, the Sydney Olympics, the Bali International Arts Festival, and Big Ears. His opera A House in Bali (directed by MIT colleague Jay Scheib) was featured at BAM Next Wave in 2010; that same fall his works were featured at a Carnegie Hall Zankel Making Music composer’s portrait concert. His multimedia interactive stallation, Arachnodrone (a collaboration with Ian Hattwick, Christine Southworth & Isabelle Su) is currently exhibited at the MIT Museum, following its 2018 debut at Palais de Tokyo in Paris.
From 1992-2012 he was a founding member of the Bang on a Can All-stars (Musical America’s 2005 Ensemble of the Air), finishing his tenure with the group with an appearance on an episode of PBS’ Arthur. His long-time work with the Steve Reich Ensemble led to sharing a 1999 GRAMMY® for Best Chamber Performance for their recording of Music for 18 Musicians. He is also the featured multi-tracked soloist on Reich’s Nonesuch recording of New York Counterpoint. Other awards include a 2012 Massachusetts Arts Council Fellowship, the 2007 USArtists Walker Award and the 2004 American Academy of Arts and Letters Goddard Lieberson Fellowship.
His puppet opera Shadow Bang, a collaboration with master Balinese dalang Wayan Wija, was premiered at MassMOCA and was the centerpiece of the 2006 Amsterdam GrachtenFest. Recordings of his works have been released on Sony Classical, Cantaloupe Music, Islandia Music, New Albion, New World Records, Koch, Innova, CRI, and numerous independent labels. He has collaborated with some of the world’s most creative and vital living musicians, including Brian Eno, Paul Simon, Ornette Coleman, Iva Bittova, Maya Beiser, Thurston Moore, Meredith Monk, Bryce Dessner, Philip Glass, Terry Riley, Louis Andriessen, Shara Worden, Sandeep Das, Kelley Deal, Cecil Taylor, Henry Threadgill, Wu Man, Matthew Shipp, Wayan Wija, Kyaw Kyaw Naing, and Ethel.
Recent projects include 2023’s telematic Poppy 88, two 2022 solo albums, Bowie Symphonic: Blackstar (w/Maya Beiser), and daily podcast music for acclaimed filmmaker Caveh Zahedi. His compositions and arrangements were featured throughout Ken Burns’ Vietnam; his arrangements were also featured on Silkroad Ensemble’s GRAMMY®-winning CD, Sing Me Home. Other recent recordings include Terry Riley’s Ki, Eviyan: Nayive (w/Iva Bittova & Gyan Riley), and collaborations with DuoJalal, Czech composer Beata Hlavenkova, and Polish jazz masters Waclaw Zimpel and Hubert Zempel. His performance with the MIT Wind Ensemble of Don Byron’s Clarinet Concerto, commissioned by MIT, and released on Sunnyside Records, received a 5-star Downbeat review.
