Blaise Bryski comes to San Francisco from Ithaca, NY, where he teaches at Cornell University and Ithaca College. Mark Winges is a long-time San Francisco resident, where he is resident composer for Volti. They first met as undergrads at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of music, and have maintained a musical partnership and personal friendship over the years despite living on opposite sides of the country.
Just as different nights present different faces, Mark’s Nocturnes are varied in mood, texture, and sound. Some of them are inspired by Fauré, whose Nocturnes are also widely varied. Red Sky Opening is a longer, single-movement work with contrasting sections of slow / fast, loud / soft music. More Hand Jive is a three-movement work that includes sections where the performer is given skeletal material on which to improvise. The outer movements also have an overall sound that reflects Mark’s and Blaise’s shared interest in rock and jazz.
Blaise’s performing experience is wide and varied. He has a doctorate in 18th-century performance practice and has played new music with Ensemble X at Cornell and the Green Umbrella series in Los Angeles. He has worked as an opera coach. He is also long-time member of David Borden’s Mother Mallard, the world’s oldest synthesizer band, which performed most recently at the Berlin Atonal Festival. This breadth has informed the countless discussions about music that Blaise and Mark have had over the years. Mark likes to cite Blaise as “the guy who taught me how to write for the piano, and convinced me to do so”.