09.10.2003 - Einlass: 21:00:00 Beginn: 21:30:00
Waati - Reinhardtstr. 30, 10117
ROVA SAXOFONE 4-tet
Rova Saxofone Quartet - Bruce Ackley - Saxophone
Rova Saxofone Quartet - Larry Ochs - Saxophone
Rova Saxofone Quartet - Jon Raskin - Saxophone
Rova Saxofone Quartet - Steve Adams - Saxophone
The Rova Saxophone Quartet was founded in the San Francisco Bay Area in October 1977 by Jon Raskin, Larry Ochs, Andrew Voigt and Bruce Ackley. The ensemble performed its first concert at the 3rd Annual Free Music Festival at Mills College in Oakland, California, in February 1978. Inspired by a broad spectrum of musical influences- from Charles Ives, Edgard Varese, Olivier Messiaen and John Cage to John Coltrane, Anthony Braxton, Steve Lacy and Ornette Coleman- Rova began writing new material, touring, recording (its first album Cinema Rovaté was released on Ochs' Metalanguage label) and collaborating with such like-minded colleagues as guitarist Henry Kaiser and Italian percussionist Andrea Centazzo. Early in its history, Rova performed both at the Vancouver New Music Society (1978) and the Moers International Festival of New Jazz in Germany (1979). Over the next few years Rova performed widely throughout North America and Europe, and in 1983 it became the first new music group from the U.S. to tour the Soviet Union. Saxophone Diplomacy, a documentary video of the tour, was aired on PBS stations throughout the U.S. Rova returned to the USSR again in November 1989 and released a CD of music recorded on the tour, This Time We Are Both (New Albion Records). In between those visits, in 1986, Rova (which had incorporated as a not-for-profit organization the previous year) hosted the Ganelin Trio, the first Soviet jazz group to appear in the U.S. The trio performed with Rova at its first Pre-Echoes series of collaborative events which would later include concerts with Anthony Braxton, John Zorn, Terry Riley and others.
Founding member Andrew Voigt left Rova in August 1988 and was replaced by Steve Adams, formerly with the Boston-based Your Neighborhood Saxophone Quartet. Highlights of Rova's prolific career in the '90s include appearances at the Yokohama Jazz Promenade in Japan; Vancouver, Canada's DuMaurier Jazz Festival; the San Francisco Jazz Festival and the Festival Internationale Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville (Quebec, Canada); concerts with Alvin Curran in Switzerland, Croatia, Germany, Portugal and the U.S.; appearances in Chicago, Milwaukee and Toronto for the New Music Across America Festival; the triumphant 30th anniversary presentation of John Coltrane's Ascension in San Francisco; and the creation of Orkestrova to perform large ensemble pieces composed by Rova. As well, members of the quartet itself have been commissioned to write music for Rova by both Meet the Composer / Commissioning Music USA and Chamber Music America.
In 1999, Rova began presenting 2 annual events in the San Francisco Bay Area. New Music on the Mountain presents 3 or 4 acts outdoors at Mt. Tamalpais every September. Rovate presents special collaborations between Rova and guest artists including Sam Rivers, Wadada Leo Smith, Gerry Hemingway, Satoko Fujii and Nels Cline, as well as commissioning up and coming local composer to write new music for Rova.
In June 2002, Rova will be the featured guest-group at Meet the Composer's national event held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, entitled THE WORKS, a two-day festival of live music and discourse. This honor has gone to Rova as the group most often awarded commissioning money by this national organization based in New York City. (Twenty compositions commissioned since 1989.)
Rova: liner Notes by Art Lange for new Victo CD