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love fail premieres at Yale

Lang’s newest work, love fail, premieres June 29 at the New Haven International Festival of Arts and Ideas. Performed by the legendary vocal ensemble Anonymous 4, love fail is an evening-length work that weaves together snippets of medieval courtly love narratives, short stories by MacArthur Fellow Lydia Davis, scraps from the libretto of Wagner’s opera Tristan and Isolde, and text by Lang himself.

Out of these sources, Lang has conjured a single story, in which two unnamed lovers meet each other, love each other, and lose each other—not necessarily in that order…

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‘the little match girl passion’ version for chorus receives German premiere

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Click to watch Paul Hillier conduct the little match girl passion (chamber version)

On Saturday September 15, Paul Hillier and Rundfunkchor Berlin give the German premiere of David Lang’s Pulitzer Prize-winning composition, the little match girl passion in its arrangement for full chorus.

the little match girl passion, the winner of the 2008 Pulitzer Prize in music is a 35-minute work for a quartet of singers each playing percussion instruments, co-commissioned by the Carnegie Hall Corporation and The Perth Theater and Concert Hall…

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David Lang is Musical America’s 2013 Composer of the Year

Musical America, now in its third century as the indispensable resource for the performing arts, announced the winners of the annual Musical America Awards, recognizing artistic excellence and achievement in the arts.

The announcement coincides with the publication of the 2013 Musical America International Directory of the Performing Arts, which, in addition to its comprehensive industry listings, pays homage to each of these artists in its editorial pages.

The annual Musical America Awards, sponsored by Deutsche Grammophon will be presented in a special ceremony at Lincoln Center on Thursday, December 6…

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David Lang Profile in New York Times

DAVID LANG first heard Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde” at the San Francisco Opera in 1974, as an undergraduate student and aspiring composer. This was the first opera ticket — standing room — that he had paid for with his own money, and he arrived well prepared, with a copy of the score and a flashlight to study it by.

“It was a really big deal for me,” Mr. Lang, now 55, said recently, sitting on a sofa in his light-flooded SoHo loft while two parakeets called noisily for attention from another room…

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David Lang appointed Carnegie Hall Composer-In-Residence

David Lang has been appointed as holder of the Richard and Barbara Debs Composer’s Chair for Carnegie Hall’s 2013–2014 season. Full details about the concert activities associated with his residency will be shared in late-January as part of Carnegie Hall’s full 2013–2014 season announcement. But we can reveal that a key element of his season-long appointment includes a special collaborative workshop in November 2013, offering commissioning opportunities for composers and chamber ensembles.

Creating New Music will invite several young composers and chamber ensembles to work together on the creation and performance of new works specially commissioned by Carnegie Hall…

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‘the little match girl passion’ performed by The Crossing at Met Museum: New York Times review

A Haunting Tale, Perfect for Christmas
The Crossing in ‘The Little Match Girl Passion,’ at the Met

Tina Fineberg for The New York Times

Members of the Crossing, a choir of 24, at the Metropolitan Museum.

By Published: December 24, 2012

At holiday time, the Metropolitan Museum of Art draws countless visitors to its Medieval Sculpture Garden to see the splendidChristmas tree and 18th-century Neapolitan crèche

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Shelter CD in stores and online!!

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It’s been a long time coming, but Shelter is finally here!

The latest collaborative work by Michael Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe is a modern oratorio that reunites the Bang on a Can founders with Deborah Artman (author of the libretto for 2001’s Lost Objects). Produced by Michael Riesman, this premiere recording was performed by Ensemble Signal under the baton of conductor Brad Lubman, and features solo voices Martha Cluver, Mellissa Hughes and Caroline Shaw

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shade EP

Fueled by inspired performances from Mammoth Trio (pianist Lisa Moore, cellist Ashley Bathgate and violinist Elly Toyoda) and the NYC-based Contemporaneous ensemble (conducted by David Bloom), shade presents premiere recordings of two works by Lang. The title work, shade, is a virtuosic and emotionally wide-ranging concerto for piano trio and string orchestra. The second work, wed, is an arrangement for string orchestra of a short tragic work Lang originally composed for string quartet…

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before and after nature
words and music by David Lang
video and projections by Tal Rosner
performed by the Bang on a Can All-Stars with SATB chorus
duration: 60 minutes

Lead Commissioner: Stanford Live and LA Master Chorale
premiere TBD fall 2025
We are currently seeking additional commissioning support for interested presenters and/or ensembles

contact: email hidden; JavaScript is required and email hidden; JavaScript is required

Based very loosely on things I have thought about after reading the books ‘The End of Nature’ by Bill McKibben, ‘After Nature’ by Jedidiah Purdy, and ‘The Revolt Against Humanity’ by Adam Kirsch, my piece will look at different ways to define and understand nature, now that it has been forever changed by human behavior…

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Biography

“With his winning of the Pulitzer Prize for the little match girl passion (one of the most original and moving scores of recent years), Lang, once a postminimalist enfant terrible, has solidified his standing as an American master.”

— The New Yorker

Passionate, prolific, and complicated, composer David Lang embodies the restless spirit of invention. Lang is at the same time deeply versed in the classical tradition and committed to music that resists categorization, constantly creating new forms…

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