Members of acclaimed Chicago-based Ensemble Dal Niente—Connie Volk, flute, and Katie Jimoh, clarinet—join faculty soprano Carrie Shaw in performing works for voice and winds by Volk, Luis Naòn, Jérôme Combier, and a newly commissioned work by Sky Macklay.
Program
Ich und du, Baum und Regen (2009): Farzia Fallah (b. 1980)
Ultimos Movimientos (2014) *US premiere*: Luis Naon (b. 1961)
I. Puntuaciones
II. Materia Es el Motivo
III. Onán en la Escritura
IV. Madre Materia
V. Métrica
VI. Pasan los Muertos
VII. Hastío de la Trama
Katherine Jimoh, clarinet
(Recorded sounds, Francoise Kubler, soprano, and Armand Angstert, clarinet)
Mnemonic Songs (2024): Sky Macklay (b. 1988)
Newly commissioned arrangement
I. Opening Prayer
II. Auricularia auricula
III. Laetiporus sulphureus
IV. Tremella mesenterica
V. Pleurotus ostreatus
VI. Morchella esculenta
VII. Cantharellus cibarius
VIII. Omphalotus illudens
IX. Boletus edulis
X. Psilocybe cubensis
Constance Volk, flute
Katie Jimoh, clarinet in Bb and bass clarinet
PAUSE
not quite existing leaves little to fake (2024): Constance Volk
Constance Volk, flutes
Katherine Jimoh, clarinets
The Last Ebb (2019) Jerome Combier (b. 1970)
I. du silence (ground)
II. long sole sound (roundelay)
III. The last ebb (cradle song)
IV. The summer rains on my life (passacaglia)
Constance Volk, flute and bass flute
Katie Jimoh, clarinet in Bb and bass clarinet
Biographies
Ensemble Dal Niente
Ensemble Dal Niente performs new and experimental chamber music with dedication, virtuosity, and an exploratory spirit. Flexible and adaptable, Dal Niente’s roster of 27 musicians presents an uncommonly broad range of contemporary music, guiding listeners towards music that transforms existing ideas and subverts convention. Audiences coming to Dal Niente shows can expect distinctive productions—from fully staged operas to multimedia spectacles to intimate solo performances—that are curated to pique curiosity and connect art, culture, and people.
Katherine Jimoh, clarinetist, vocalist, pianist, singer-songwriter and goldsmith lives in Chicago and works as a freelance musician and jeweler. She is a member of Ensemble Dal Niente, University of Chicago’s Grossman Ensemble and Chicago Wind Project. Working side-by-side with living composers while surrounded by colleagues who specialize in new music provides constant inspiration and creativity.
Katherine leads her four-piece band, Katet as singer-songwriter and pianist. When tonality is achieved in an utterly unpredictable way, Katherine feels satisfied with her songwriting. Complex harmonies matched with mixed meters, drones and simple vocal lines equals Katet.
Constance Volk is a musician, a painter, and an illustrator. She is a member of Ensemble Dal Niente, the Grossman Ensemble and the Chicago Wind project. She has collaborated with Lookingglass Theater, Eighth Blackbird, and Third Coast Percussion. She has exhibited paintings at Bridgeport Art Center, Miller Beach Arts and Creative District, and Rendezvous Arts. Her illustrations are featured with ‘Density Seeds’, an offshoot of the ‘Density 2036’ solo flute repertoire project. Constance is the creator of ‘Connie’s Characters’, a series of mix and match coloring books full of wacky weirdos. Her paintings, poster art, coloring books and music can be found at constancevolk.com
Carrie Henneman Shaw joined the Voice Program as an artist in residence in Autumn 2020. As a singer, Carrie engages in a wide variety of musical projects, but she focuses on early and contemporary music.
A sample of her work includes an upcoming solo recording on Naxos Records of early 18th-century French song; creating music for a live-music-for-dance project with James Sewell Ballet; and collaborating on a recording with the band Deerhoof. Carrie is a two-time winner of a McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians, and she is a member of two groups that focus on music by living composers, Ensemble Dal Niente, a mixed chamber collective, and Quince Ensemble, a treble voice quartet.
She appears in numerous recordings ranging from medieval sacred music to a video-game soundtrack, and before coming to the UW, she has been maintaining a full university studio for the six years and participating in educational residencies for composers and performers around the country, including UC-Berkeley, Stanford, New York University, the University of Chicago, and beyond.