Red Cedar Chamber Music’s ‘Global Consortium’ continues through Oct. 19

Red Cedar Chamber Music’s “Global Consortium” will continue through Oct. 19 with multiple performances that include guest composers and performers.

Red Cedar Chamber Music’s directors and core ensemble, violinist Miera Kim and cellist Carey Bostian, will be joined by clarinetist Jean-François Charles and setar player Ramin Roshandel to present MainStage concerts at 7:30 p.m. Friday Oct. 17, at Opus Concert Café, 199 3rd Ave. SE, Cedar Rapids and at 3 p.m. Sunday Oct. 19, at Voxman Recital Hall, 93 E Burlington St., Iowa City.

The Iowa City event is free. Tickets for the Opus Concert Café event are available at artsiowa.com and are $30.

Both guest artists are composers as well as performers. Each has been commissioned by Red Cedar to create a new work for this program. Roshandel has composed “Coping Mechanisms,” a multi-movement work that is an homage to the great Persian musical tradition that he grew up in and explores the relationship between good and evil. Yalda is the Persian name for the winter solstice, or the longest night of the year. In Persian culture, Yalda is when light (good) overcomes dark (evil).

Charles has composed “The Blues and the Material Truth,” a suite of five blues, each inspired by a different aspect of his experience ranging from a French alpine flower to the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

“Initiation Blues is about coming of age; the Quasimodo Blues and Esmeralda Blues touch on the topics of exclusion, love and survival: they are echoes of my work on the soundtrack to the 1923 movie ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame,’ Charles said. ”Candide Blues is an homage to Grant Wood, who, after his European travels, decided that Iowa was the best place to develop his personal style. Finally, Plantation Earth is an homage to Rahsaan Roland Kirk, an incredible artist whose each breath was about music. Overall, the music fits in the tradition of the Third Stream, creating hybrids of classical and jazz idioms.“

As Jamshid Jam, Roshandel and Charles have developed a unique sound combining the traditions of Persian classical music and live electronic music. They have been creating this new shared musical language since their first concert in December 2019. They have been invited to perform in Chicago, Iowa City, Ames, Omaha, New-York City, Warrensburg and Tucson.

For the core ensemble, this project is part of an ongoing effort to learn about different musical traditions and styles. From their recent three-year commissioning project of duos inspired by folk music from around the world to last spring’s Crossover Quartet program, the ensemble is committed to bring the best in music from around the world to Red Cedar audiences.

Remaining performances of the “Global Consortium” are:

All performances are free unless noted. To find out more about “Global Consortium” and all Red Cedar Chamber Music events, visit redcedar.org/performance-schedule/ or email mierakim15@gmail.com.