News

This page contains postings on compositions, performances and press.


Latest Events

Friday-Saturday, April 6-7, 2024, Fly through the night, and land near dawn - Nancy Karp + Dancers, 2024 Season, performed by the Friction Quartet and David A. Jaffe.

Friday-Saturday, February 23, 2024, Cluck Old Hen Variations - San Pancho Music Festival, Plaza del Sol, San Francisco, Nayarit, Mexico; performed by Karen Bentley Pollick.

Friday-Sunday, Oct 28-30, 2022, Fly through the night, and land near dawn - Dance performance by Nancy Karp+Dancers, with three works by David A. Jaffe, performed by the Friction Quartet and David A. Jaffe; Paul Dresher Performance Studio, Oakland, CA.

Thursday, May 20, 2021, Cape Symphony Up Close - Interview and virtual performance of "Cluck Old Hen Variations," by EmmaLee Holmes Hicks. Interview by Jung-Ho Pak, Artistic Director and Conductor.

Monday, December 28, 2020, Just Plain Folks 2020 Awards ceremony. "Whoop For Your Life!" for orchestra, finalist for "Best Soundtrack."

Sunday, July 7, 2019, Certificate ceremony for "Honourable Mention" in the Classic Pure Vienna International Composition Competition, for "Cluck Old Hen Variations," at Mozarthaus, Vienna-Bösendorfersaal, Domgasse 5, A-1010 Vienna, Austria.

Saturday, June 8, 2019 June Days & Folk Music Society of Northern New Jersey 50th Anniversary Concert, Bloomingdale, NJ, 4-9 PM. Reunion of Bottle Hill bluegrass band, including David A. Jaffe, fiddle.

Sunday, December 30, 2018 Festival Sinergiarte, Plaza del Sol, San Francisco, Nayarit, Mexico, 7 PM. "Impossible Animals" and other works, performed by Karen Bentley Pollick.

Saturday, October 13, 2018, Newberry Library, 60 W Walton St, Chicago, Illinois, 1 PM-4 PM. World premiere of new work, commissioned by Access Contemporary Music for Open House Chicago. Work will be played througout the afternoon, with ten minute breaks between performances. Free of charge.

Thursday, September 6, 2018, Chapel of Good Shepherd Center, 4649 Sunnyside Ave N, Seattle, WA. Wayward Music Series presents an array of electro-acoustic music for violin and electronics by Karen Bentley Polick, including Impossible Animals.

Friday, July 6, 2018, Bucharest, Romania. Music Hall of the Cantacuzino Palace, The George Enescu National Museum - Violin recital and international interpretation workshop, Karen Bentley Pollick. Includes "Cluck Old Hen Variations."

Tuesday, July 3, 2018, Bucharest, Romania. The International Center for Research and Education in Innovative Creative Technolgies – CINETic - presents a concert of electronic music with violin (also performed recently at Stanford University’s Center for Computer Reseach in Music and Acousics.) Includes "Impossible Animals," performed by Karen Bentley Pollick.

Sunday, May 13, 2018, 2:00 PM, Mother's Day Fiddle Concert at Salvation Cafe, Newport, Rhode Island. EmmaLee Holmes-Hicks performs Cluck Old Hen Variations" along with other fiddle trio works billed as "a Mother’s Day Brunch and toe-tapping tunes on the special day." Info here.

Saturday, April 8, 2018, Concert at the home of Harry Bernstein, Berkeley, California, including performances by David A. Jaffe, mandolin; Karen Bentley Pollick, violin; Jonathan Salzedo, harpsichord. Includes premiere of violin/harpsichord version of "Three Musicians (after the Picasso paintings)". See contact page for info on tickets.

Saturcday, April 7, 2018, Cañada College Main Theatre, 4200 Farm Hill Blvd, Redwood City, California. Redwood Symphony performs "How Did It Get So Late So Soon," with Karen Bently Pollick, violin. Tickets here.

Wednesday, March 21, 2018, invited speaker at Cañada College STEM lecture series. Presenting a talk entitled "Silicon Valley Breakdown - composing a life with music and machines."

Saturcday, February 3, 2018, 7 PM; Music Mansion 88 Meeting Street, Providence, Rhode Island. Verdant Vibes Benefit Concert, featuring "Cluck Old Hen Variations," performed by EmmaLee Holmes-Hicks violinist/fiddler. Info here.

Wednesday, June 21, 2017, Garden of Memory, a columbarium walk-through event at the Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Avenue, Oakland, California. 5-9 PM. I will be performing "Cluck Old Hen Variations," "Ellis Island Sonata," "Improvisation for Violin and Voice (one player)," and other works.

Saturday, April 8, 2017 at 7:30 pm - Hillside Concerts presents the "preview" of a piano/violin version of "How Did It Get So Late So Soon?" (movements 2 and 3) with Karen Bentley Pollick and pianist Marja Mutru. Also "Cluck Old Hen Variations" with film by Fred Kolouch, and other works. Berkeley, California

Wednesday, December 21, 2016 at 7:30 pm - Karen Bentley Pollick performs Violin, Viola & Video Virtuosity 2016, includes "Cluck Old Hen Variations" with film by Fred Kolouch, and other works. Seattle, Washington, Chapel of Good Shepherd Center, 4649 Sunnyside Avenue North, 4th Floor, corner of 50th Street in Wallingford, Seattle.

Wednesday, November 9, 2016, University of Colorado Composer Seminar lecture, Boulder, Colorado

Saturday, November 12 & Sunday, November 13, 2016 - Boulder & Broomfield, Colorado. US Premiere of violin concerto "How Did It Get So Late So Soon? - an homage to Dr. Seuss" (2016), Karen Bentley Pollick, Violin, Boulder Chamber Orchestra, Bahman Saless, conductor.

Thursday, September 22, 2016 at 7:00 pm - Permainu Muzika/Music of Changes Festival, Klaipėdos koncertų salė, Šaulių g. 36, Klaipeda, Lithuania. Karen Bentley Pollick performs Violin, Viola & Video Virtuosity 2016, includes "Cluck Old Hen Variations" with film by Fred Kolouch, and other works.

Saturday, August 27, 2016 at 8:00 pm - Tytuvenai Festival, Lithuania.
World Premiere of Violin Concerto "How Did It Get So Late So Soon?"(2016), Karen Bentley Pollick, Violin; Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre Orchestra, Robertas Šervenikas, conductor.

May 28, 2016, Bruce Beasley's Sculpture Studio. U.S. Premiere of "Congregations," for eight cellos, by Celloscape Collective.

Fricay, March 5th, 2016, 7:30 PM. Chapel Performance Space, at the Historic Good Shepherd Center, 4649 Sunnyside Ave. N., 4th Floor, Seattle, WA. "Music in the Space Between Us," for eight strings and Radiodrum controlled Trimpin percussion, featuring Andrew Schloss, the Lafayette String Quartet and others; "Impossible Animals," for two voices, with Karen Bentley Pollick and David A. Jaffe, voices; "Cluck Old Hen Variations," for violin, with Ann Elliott-Goldschmid.

— Events in 2015: Yi David Yang and Jack Van Geem perform "Library of Babel," S.F. Conservatory of Music (Feb. 22); Lecture/concert at CCRMA, Stanford University (March 4); New Music Works performs "Dybbuk" (Oct. 24); Lecture/concert on Mills College's Songlines series (Nov. 23), including performance of "Cluck Old Hen Variations."

— Events in 2014: US premiere of "Fox Hollow," in Lafayette, Danville and Berkeley, California (Feb 21-24); "Cluck Old Hen Variations" performances: Vilnius, Lithuania (June 16), SPECTRUM in New York, with premiere of film by Fred Kolouch (Oct 5), Detroit Institute of Arts (Oct 10), CCRMA, Stanford (Nov 20); World premiere of "Eight O's in Woolloomooloo" for baroque strings and voice, S. F. Early Music Society, Berkeley, California (Dec 4).

— Events in 2013: Lectures at U.C. Berkeley (March) and Sonoma State (April); premiere of "NotomotoN Unstrung", for mandolin and computer-controlled percussion, at U.C. Irvine (April); World premiere of "The Library of Babel," at the Zeltsman Marimba Festival, Arcata, California (July); University of Victoria Orion Fellow for 2013, with World premiere of "Fox Hollow" for string quartet and Canadian premiere of "The Space Between Us," "May All Your Children Be Acrobats," and 8 other works (November), Victoria, B.C., Canada.

Commission from Nancy Karp + Dancers dance company

NANCY KARP + DANCERS
40th Anniversary Season

A new full evening work in celebration of our 4 decades of dance making...

Featuring music by David A. Jaffe and production design by Jack Carpenter, NANCY KARP + DANCERS returns to live performance in celebration of its 40th Anniversary with a new multidisciplinary work that embraces the interconnectedness of the natural world - an apt metaphor for our present times.

The concert features three works by David A. Jaffe: Fox Hollow, String Quartet for Two Instruments and the newly-commissioned “fly through the night, and land near dawn, five dances of migration” a name taken from the dance itself. The new work is scored for mandolin/mando-cello (one player), violin and cello. The music will be performed by the Friction String Quartet, with guest David A. Jaffe on mandolin/mando-cello.

Mark Your Calendar!

When:
Friday, October 28 | 8 PM with Opening Reception
Saturday, October 29 | 8 PM
Sunday, October 30 | 3 PM with Closing Reception

Where:
Paul Dresher Performance Studio, Oakland, California

Tickets Available:
August 15, 2022


Dancer: Sonsherée Giles || Photo Credit: John Hefti

Commission from Joanna Hood: "Northwest Passages, 13 climate alarms from the arctic," for 13 violas

In

Commissioned by Joanna Hood, I have just completed a new work for the intriguing and challenging combination of 13 violas, all of which often are playing separate parts.

Sought for five centuries by European explorers as a sea route to China, the Northwest Passage was finally achieved by Roland Amundsen in 1906 and represented both a triumph of navigation and a shrinking of the globe. Today's situation is more ominous, with melting ice forging unprecedented new "passages" through the Arctic, as temperatures rise at nearly twice the global average, threatening ancient ways of life and signaling a global crisis.

"Northwest Passages, thirteen climate alarms from the Arctic" is a musical soundscape that invokes the Arctic panorama, its contemporary disruption and the urgency of addressing it. Its thirteen diverse sections, presented as one continuous movement, represent my latest exploration of same-instrument orchestration (along with works for 5 double basses, 8 cellos, 8 guitars and 10 flutes.) The unique timbre of thirteen distinct viola parts enables massive textures suggesting the vastness of the landscape, as well as glacial layering, sliding, splitting, melting and deformation. In addition, the instruments merge in various combinations, with solo passages from the 13th viola (performed by Viola 1) providing a lone personal voice.

The sections are titled as follows:

  1. Shrinking Ice Sheets

  2. Sea Level Rise

  3. Warming Ocean

  4. Narwhal

  5. Global Temperature Rise

  6. Polar Bear

  7. Caribou

  8. Extreme Events

  9. Beluga

  10. Melting Sea Ice

  11. Feedback Loop

  12. Glacial Retreat

  13. One Planet

Scores Now Available via UCLA eScholarship

The UCLA eScholarship web site now has several complete scores, available for perusal or download. These include “Antiphon,” for spatially separated Eb clarinet and violin; “How Did It Get So Late So Soon?,” a concerto for violin and small orchestra; and “Fox Hollow,” for string quartet. The web site is https://escholarship.org/uc/ucla. Type in “David A. Jaffe” where it says “Discover UCLA scholarship” to bring up these scores.

Honorable Mention at Classic Pure Vienna International Composition Competition 2019

In

Cluck Old Hen Variations, for solo violin, by David A. Jaffe was awarded Honorable Mention at the Classic Pure Vienna International Composition Contest for 2019. The certificate is being presented on July 7, 2019 at the Mozarthaus in Vienna, Austria.

Classic Pure Vienna is a competition organization based in Vienna, which aims to support new composers and young musicians of our time from all over the world.