Biophony Solstice 2024
Music for Sunrise and Sunset at Brooklyn Botanic Garden
June 20, 2024
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
990 Washington Avenue
Sunrise Performance: 5:00am at Cherry Esplanade
Sunset Performance: 7:30pm at Plant Family Collection
Free with Garden admission.
Biophony Solstice is a site-specific commissioning project by Metropolis Ensemble and Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Banner image by Phong Tran (2023).
Metropolis Ensemble / Sandbox Percussion / Erik Hall
Sandbox Percussion Summer Seminar / Mannes School of Music at The New School
Andrew Cyr / Benjamin Wallace / Ledah Finck / David Leon
Photos by Michael Stewart, courtesy of Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
About the Project
Metropolis Ensemble and Brooklyn Botanic Garden presents Biophony: Solstice in sweeping sunrise and sunset performances of minimalist Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt's lyrical gem, "Canto Ostinato."
This World Premiere arrangement (2023–24 Metropolis Ensemble commission) from composers Benjamin Wallace, Ledah Finck, and David Leon features 52 musicians: pianist Erik Hall, Sandbox Percussion, strings, keyboardists and wind players from Metropolis Ensemble, and percussionists from the Sandbox Percussion Summer Seminar / Mannes School of Music at The New School.
This immersive event is the culmination of Biophony, a four-season collaboration between Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Metropolis Ensemble.
As Heard on NPR Morning Edition and WNYC New Sounds with John Schaefer
"Since recording the piece alone at home I've dreamed of performing it live with other musicians. I couldn't have asked for a more exciting or ideal opportunity than this. Metropolis Ensemble and Sandbox Percussion are world-class musicians and thinkers, and I'm simply honored and invigorated to be working on the piece in their company.
Canto Ostinato’s score allows for ample decision-making within a certain framework. In previously realizing the piece, I constructed a small world out of a mere three keyboard instruments. This time the palette comprises several keyboards, extensive mallet percussion, woodwinds, and strings, and rather than just fall straight into fanfare, we want to use these many tones to go deep into the inherent beauty of the piece."
—Erik Hall
“Floresta: Soundbath” at Brooklyn Botanic Garden in July 2023 with Angélica Negrón, Darian Donovan Thomas, and Raquel Acevedo Klein. Photo: BBG / Elizabeth Reina-Longoria
The Experience
On the longest day of the year, the sun will rise at 5:45am to an intimate presentation of "Canto Ostinato" with Sandbox Percussion and pianist Erik Hall at Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s famed Cherry Esplanade. After the sun arcs the stunning 52-acre gardens, the day will end with an epic 52-musician rendition of “Canto Ostinto” in the rolling hills of the Plant Family Collection as the sun sets, celebrating the start of summer in the Northern Hemisphere.
“Biophony: Solstice” is the fifth and culminating partnership and collaboration between Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Metropolis Ensemble; previous projects include the "Biophony: SoundGarden" installation in the conservatory gardens in 2023; “For the Birds” opening celebration in June 2022; and “Biophony Festival,” an outdoor musical adventure across the gardens, in both May 2022 and September 2021. Thousands of visitors have experienced these performances from BBG's "Art in the Garden" series.
As Seen on Talkhouse with Erik Hall
“It was new to me; it was new to Andrew; it was new to Sandbox. It will likely be new to the vast majority of our concert audience. For lovers of Reich, Glass, and Riley, there is simply zero reason to miss Simeon ten Holt. And in the streaming age, I’m frankly amazed and refreshed to find that there is still 50-year old music out there for one to discover and receive as if it were written for them alone.”
“Simeon ten Holt’s Canto Ostinato seems to have its own gravitational pull, drawing in performers and listeners alike. Drawing on a ten-year plus history of collaboration between Sandbox and Metropolis, we are thrilled to be working closely with pianist and composer Erik Hall to develop a large-scale World Premiere arrangement for 50+ percussionists, keyboards (modular synths and Rhodes), strings, and saxophones for Brooklyn Botanic Garden. We are looking forward to celebrating this work’s immersive kaleidoscopic sound and ecstatic music making potential as the sun rises and sets on the summer solstice!”
—Andrew Cyr (Metropolis Ensemble) and Jonny Allen (Sandbox Percussion)
The Music
In early 2023, Erik Hall released an acclaimed interpretation of Simeon ten Holt's blissfully adventurous magnum opus “Canto Ostinato,” the second album in a trilogy of reinterpretations that began in 2020 with the release of Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians. Metropolis Ensemble founder and conductor Andrew Cyr discovered the piece through a feature in The New York Times that included Hall, who had recently released Canto Ostinato via Austin record label Western Vinyl. They ultimately linked up, with Cyr finding the ideal time and backdrop to showcase the piece in a live setting.
Written for four pianos from 1976 to 1979 by the late Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt, Erik’s take on the piece is freshly framed as an intimate, hour-long solo performance consisting of multi-tracked grand pianos, electric piano, and organ. Canto Ostinato is inherently vast, and its score gives great creative license to the performers. Comprising 106 sections, complete freedom is given to repeat each one as many or as few times as desired. Additional leeway is given with regard to dynamics, articulation, and even instrumentation.
For this singular Brooklyn event, the ensemble will consist of 32 percussionists, 4 keyboards, and 16 strings and saxophones. Working collaboratively over 9 months, a team of composers (Benjamin Wallace, Ledah Finck, and David Leon) partnered with Erik Hall, Jonny Allen (Sandbox Percussion), and Andrew Cyr (Metropolis) to develop the expanded arrangement, which gives artists complete freedom in the dynamics, articulation, and instrumentation used in the performance.
Recent Press
Audience Feedback
“The early morning Solstice concert and event was SPECTACULAR! I delighted in the beautiful music, birds chirping, and a glorious sunrise in such a special garden.”
“The morning solstice concert was amazing… no pun intended it was stellar!”
“Downright magical… I was so grateful for the experience and the sense of community with other attendees taking in this work of art.”
“I’ve been to the garden a number of times before today, but this performance of Canto Ostinato was very special.”
“To be in nature and to see a performance with a fifty-piece orchestra performance was fantastic!”
Featured Artists
Erik Hall
From an early age Erik Hall played piano, guitar, and drums. He was a percussionist in the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra and studied music and audio engineering at the University of Michigan. Erik composed and produced the film score for The Night Clerk (2020) and contributed music to The Mountain, which premiered worldwide at the Venice International Film Festival and in the US at Sundance. In 2020 Erik released his solo re-creation of Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians, which won the 2021 Libera Award for Best Classical Record. He followed in 2023 with a multitracked reinterpretation of Simeon ten Holt’s Canto Ostinato. More »
Sandbox Percussion
Described as “exhilarating” (The New York Times) and “utterly mesmerizing” (The Guardian), Grammy-nominated ensemble Sandbox Percussion is dedicated to artistry in contemporary chamber music. The ensemble was brought together in 2011 by a love of chamber music and the simple joy of playing together; today, Sandbox Percussion captivates worldwide audiences with visually and aurally stunning performances. Sandbox members have collaborated with Metropolis since 2014, including Ian Rosenbaum, Jonny Allen, Terry Sweeney, and Victor Caccese. More »
Metropolis Ensemble
Metropolis Ensemble is a Grammy-nominated nonprofit organization dedicated to commissioning and producing ambitious creative projects in contemporary music. With a particular focus on expanding opportunities for emerging professional musical creators and performers through collaboration, Metropolis partners with world-class musical artists and institutions to create, commission, and produce site-specific performances, new works, recordings, and digital experiences. Founded by Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr in 2006, NYC-based Metropolis Ensemble gathers independent expert musicians for each project, inspiring audiences through the creation of new instrumentations and dynamic collaborations. More »
Andrew Cyr
Artistic Director and Producer / A champion of new work, Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr has led premiere performances at venues ranging from Cité de la Musique (Paris, FR), The Met Museum, Celebrate Brooklyn(!), Kimmel Center’s Verizon Hall, New Victory Theatre, Hamer Hall (Melbourne, AU), Radio City Music Hall, BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House, and The Tonight Show. Cyr's work as conductor has been described by Esa-Pekka Salonen as "precise, rhythmically incisive and fluid; he made complex new pieces sound natural and organic.” Cyr’s passion for creating new platforms for outstanding composers and performing artists led him to found Metropolis Ensemble in 2006. More »
Benjamin Wallace
Composer and Arranger / Described as "Brilliant, humorous, and rhythmically complex," (Tacoma Symphony) Ben Wallace is a composer, percussionist, and keyboard player hailing from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Ben's music spans a wide range of styles from chamber and orchestral, to disco and samba, and occasionally into the video game remix world. He is a founding member of DiscoCactus, a VGM remix band, and INVISIBLE ANATOMY, an ensemble of hybrid composer/performers. More »
David Leon
Composer and Arranger / David Leon is a Miami-born saxophonist, woodwinds player, composer, and improviser living in Brooklyn, New York. His work is guided by a persistent search for vitality through autonomy, contradiction, hyperbole, and humor. Most recently, David was named a 2024 Music Composition Fellow by the CINTAS Foundation, an organization supporting Cubans in the arts. He was also awarded a Roulette 2024 Jerome Commission to support the creation of a hybrid work of chamber music and wordless puppet theatre, A Divine Echo, which premiers at Roulette Intermedium in May 2024. More »
Ledah Finck
Composer and Arranger / Ledah Finck is a violinist, violist, improviser, and composer based in NYC. A passionate performer, creator, and curator of contemporary classical and experimental music, she is a co-founder of the Bergamot Quartet, as well as Tropos and earspace ensemble. As a composer, she has been commissioned by Imani Winds, Alarm Will Sound/Now Hear This, Ayane and Paul, the Bridge Ensemble, and The Peabody Community Chorus among others. Her music embodies a desire to create and share a sound-world in which the classical tradition, the folk music with which she grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and an extensive improvisatory sensibility can be in productive dialogue. More »
Mannes School of Music
Mannes School of Music at The New School has transformed the traditional music conservatory by integrating rigorous classical training with real-world experience and cross-disciplinary learning. Work hands-on with award-winning faculty to develop as an artist at one of the best music schools in New York City. Sandbox Percussion hosts a summer seminar for percussionists in partnership with the Mannes School, and this year’s participants are featured in the Biophony Solstice project at Brooklyn Botanic Garden. More »
