2011/12 Music Series

Bobby Previte
Tuesday, January 24, 2012, 12:30 pm


Free and open to the public

Free event

Event Summary

New York-based drummer Bobby Previte has worked with an unlikely array of leading lights in music over the past thirty years that includes John Adams, Johnny Copeland, Lejaren Hiller, Lenny Kaye, John Lurie, Michael Tilson Thomas, Tom Waits, Zeena Parkins, and So Percussion. Join us for this very special presentation.

Bobby Previte delivers a multi-instrument and multi-disciplinary workshop for students at all levels as well as professional musicians, artists, and the general public. The workshop consists of a lecture and demonstration, through recorded music, of many of the concepts discussed in the lecture. Topics will include: possible goals and directions of a life in music, and of musical education; the different techniques needed to reach those different goals; the folly of goals, practicing regimens, the idea of practice being music and not “something else;” the attainment of one’s own sound and voice in music and the enjoyment of same; the relevance of other disciplines to the musician; the use and misuse of imitation; the seductive power of beauty and it’s dangers; detachment as a state of grace; the un-setting of one’s mind; the stages of hearing—how to hear, how to listen; the importance of context; the power of expectation; the surprising freedom in limitation; risk taking; true free thinking; John Cage, Igor Stravinsky, Claude Debussy, Miles Davis, The Band, William Faulkner, Alfred Hitchcock, Led Zeppelin, Gregory Bateson, Joe Montana, George Balanchine, Johannes Vermeer, Mies van der Rohe, Brunelleschi’s Dome, and Napoleon.

Composer and percussionist Bobby Previte has worked for and with an unlikely array of leading lights in music over the past thirty years including John Adams, Terry Adams, Robert Altman, Johnny Copeland, Lejaren Hiller, Charlie Hunter, Lenny Kaye, John Lurie, Sonny Sharrock, Michael Tilson-Thomas, Tom Waits, and Victoria Williams, among others. Previte studied music at the State University of New York, Buffalo, where his instructors included Morton Feldman and John Cage; he completed his B.A, cum laude, in 1973, under the mentorship of percussionist Jan Williams. While still a student, Previte performed with Williams’ percussion ensemble in the “Evenings for New Music” series under the direction of Lucas Foss, and as a guest artist with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Michael Tilson-Thomas. Since moving to New York City in 1979, Previte has played hundreds of concerts and recorded dozens of records as a performer and bandleader. He has presented his work around the world at festivals including Montreux, North Sea, Frankfurt, Tokyo, Rio de Janiero, Sydney, Hong Kong, Berlin, and Paris. From 1999-2005 Previte toured the quintet Bump the Renaissance with Ray Anderson (trombone), Marty Ehrlich (woodwinds), Wayne Horvitz (keyboards), and the legendary bassist Steve Swallow. In 2007 he recorded with a new incarnation of Bump the Renaissance featuring Ellery Eskelin, Steve Bernstein, Bill Ware, Brad Jones, and Jim Pugliese. Other collaborations have included multiple European and American tours with Groundtruther—featuring eight-string guitarist Charlie Hunter and Previte on electronic drums—a duo with multi-instrumentalist and composer Elliott Sharp, and the Pan-Atlantic Band, an acoustic quintet featuring some of the great improvisers of Europe. Previte’s collaboration with writer/director Andrea Kleine and designer Anna Kiraly produced “The Separation” an examination of religion in society, scored for early music choir, pipe organ, and electric band. Based on both a re-arrangement of the 15th century composer Guilliaume Dufay’s “Missa Sancti Jacobi” and a re-imagination of Olivier Messiaen’s “La Nativité du Seigneur,” the work premiered in 2007 at the Walker Art Center, with subsequent performances at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center in Buffalo. Previte has given master classes at The Eastman School of Music, The New School University, The School of Jazz, Perth, Australia, The State University of New York, Buffalo, the Istanbul Conservatory, and the Lucerne School of Music. He has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundations for the Arts, the United Kingdom Arts Council, NYSCA, ASCAP, Franklin Furnace, the American Music Center, the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and the Jerome Foundation as well as eleven MacDowell Colony fellowships. His music can be heard on the Gramavision, Enja, Sound Aspects, Koch, Palmetto, Tzadik, Thirsty Ear, Veal, Ropeadope and Sony labels.