As part of its free 12@Hotchkiss Series, the Washington College Department of Music presents New Morse Code, featuring cellist Hannah Collins and percussionist Michael Compitello, in performance Friday, April 3, at noon in Gibson Center for the Arts.
Compitello is the director of percussion at Cornell University where he directs the Cornell Steel Band and a West African dance-drumming ensemble. Collins performs and teaches in New York City as a member of Ensemble ACJW and is a fellow of The Academy, a program of Carnegie Hall, the Juilliard School, the Weill Music Institute, and the NYC Department of Education.
As New Morse Code, the two musicians are establishing a reputation for bold and engaging performances and innovative collaborations with colleagues such as pianist-composer Paul Kerekes, steel pan virtuoso and composer Andy Akiho, Hawaiian composer and visual artist Tonia Ko, and Pulitzer Prize-winning violinist, vocalist and composer Caroline Shaw. The resulting repertoire reflects both their own and their friends’ creative voices.
New Morse Code also creates music for larger interdisciplinary projects. In 2012, for example, Compitello and Collins worked with an artistic team from the Yale Schools of Music and Drama to create Basement Hades: Songs of the Underworld, a contemporary retelling of the Orpheus myth. The duo inspires young listeners through its outreach initiative New Morse Kids.
For more information on the Music Department’s schedule of concerts and events, visit washcoll.edu/concert.
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