Sophie Dunér / Mark Kostabi / Gene Pritsker ‘Eclectic Songs'

Sophie Dunér:

Hailed by Fanfare Magazine and Cadence Jazz Magazine as “a first class creator” and “a genuine triple threat,” Sophie Dunér is a jazz singer and composer who travels and performs internationally as her blend of jazz (influenced by world music & contemporary classical writing) receives demand – from the infamous CBGB´s in NYC to Buenos Aires Festival de Música Contemporánea de La Plata to Festival O/Modernt in Sweden. Her exhilarating music for vocals and string quartet, as well as for improvising cello, is exemplified in her two most recent albums: The City of My Soul, produced by Michael Haas (PARMA Recordings 2013) and The City of Dizzy (CD Baby 2016). During spring 2018, she was a featured composer for the UK based DONNE: Women in Music as part of their Celebrating Women Composers project, and was also featured in Limelight Magazine.

Mark Kostabi:

Born in Los Angeles in 1960, artist and composer Mark Kostabi, whose visual art is in the permanent collections of over 60 major museums including MoMA, The Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim, is also well known for having designed album covers for Guns N’ Roses (Use Your Illusion I and II) and the Ramones (Adios Amigos). His music has been performed internationally by Ornette Coleman, Jerry Marotta, Tony Levin, Tony Esposito, Mark Egan, Greesi Desiree Langovits, Paul Kostabi, Keith LeBlanc, Gene Pritsker, Dave Taylor, Peter Jarvis, Tommy Campbell, John Lee, Giacomo Franci, Rein Rannap, Paul Nowinski, Dick Griffin, Kathleen Supove, Kristjan Järvi, and Kostabi himself as pianist. Kostabi's music has been performed in Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, the Colosseum in Rome and the Estonia Concert Hall in Tallinn.

His musical collaborations with the late, distinguished Estonian composer Lepo Sumera led to an album titled Songs for Sumera, performed by members of the Estonian National Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Kristjan Järvi and released by Amiata Records.

Kostabi's music is frequently performed in New York by members of Composers Concordance, of which he is also chairman of the board. Kostabi is the subject of numerous films, including Bottom Line: The Kostabi Phenomenon, Con Artist, Jedermann, Full Circle: The Kostabi Story and My Italy.

Gene Pritsker:

Composer Gene Pritsker has written over six hundred seventy compositions. All of his compositions employ an eclectic spectrum of styles and are influenced by his studies of various musical cultures. He is the founder and leader of Sound Liberation, an eclectic hip hop-chamber-jazz-rock-etc. ensemble and co-director of Composers' Concordance and Eclectic Music eXtravaganza. Gene's music has been performed all over the world by many ensembles and performers, including the Adelaide Symphony, MDR Symphony, China Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Brooklyn, Shanghai, and Berlin Philharmonics. The soloists are Sarah Chang, Anne Akiko Meyers, Tim Fain, Simone Dinnerstein, and Lara St. John. He has worked closely with modern jazz great Joe Zawinul and has orchestrated major Hollywood movies, including Cloud Atlas, for which he also composed his ''Cloud Atlas Symphony.’ The New York Times calls him "audacious" and "multitalented" while the Music Connoisseur writes ”dissolving the artificial boundaries between high brow, low brow, classical, popular musics and elevates the idea that if it's done well it is great music, regardless of the style or genre."

Classical Music Sentinel summarized that "His expressive reach is so wide as to encompass everything from ethno/techno, rock/jazz fusion, classical opera and more, and it all seems to be effortlessly integrated within his anima and comes out through different facets of his persona. You could almost see him as a modern day renaissance man."

http://www.genepritsker.com/