Brown Arts

Tanya Tagaq and Kronos Quartet: In Concert

MUSIC
March 17, 2024
Tanya Tagaq invites her long-time collaborators to premiere their new collaborative work.

In celebration of Kronos Quartet: Five Decades

Also featuring Nancy Mike, Cynthia Pitsiulak, Charlotte Qamaniq, Varna Marianne Nielsen

Sunday, March 17, 2024, 7:00pm
Main Hall, The Lindemann Performing Arts Center
Join us for a post-concert conversation with the artists followed by a reception

*Ticket proceeds from Brown Arts Institute programming support artistic productions created by the various artistic communities on Brown’s campus and in Providence.

About the Concert

Tanya Tagaq, in celebration of Kronos Quartet: Five Decades tour, invites her long-time collaborators Kronos Quartet to premiere their new collaborative work, commissioned by Brown Arts Institute. The evening’s program also includes performances by Tagaq with a groundbreaking Inuit throat singing choir featuring Nancy Mike, Cynthia Pitsiulak, Charlotte Qamaniq, and Varna Marianne Nielsen, music performed by Kronos Quartet, as well as Tagaq/Kronos collaborations Sivunittinni (2015, composed by T. Tagaq for Kronos Fifty for the Future, arranged by Jacob Garchik) and Colonizer (arranged by T. Tagaq, performed with Kronos Quartet on her album Tongues, 2022).

Content Reflection
Tagaq innovates upon traditional and experimental vocal forms, combining growls, breathy moans, and ghostly chants with elements of spoken word, punk, industrial, metal and electronica. Her performances are visceral and elemental and as Tagaq has said from the stage "you don't have seat belts, but buckle them in your head."

About the Artists

Headshot of Tanya Tagaq
Courtesy of the artist

Tanya Tagaq

From Ikaluktutiak (Cambridge Bay, Nunavut), internationally-celebrated artist Tanya Tagaq is an improvisational singer, avant-garde composer and bestselling author. A member of the Order of Canada, Polaris Music Prize and JUNO Award winner and recipient of multiple honorary doctorates, Tagaq is an original disruptor, a world-changing figure at the forefront of seismic social, political, and environmental change.

Headshot of Kronos Quartet
Photo Credit: Lenny Gonzalez
Kronos Quartet

For 50 years, San Francisco’s Kronos Quartet—David Harrington (violin), John Sherba (violin), Hank Dutt (viola), and Paul Wiancko (cello)—has reimagined what the string quartet experience can be. One of the most celebrated and influential groups of our era, Kronos has given thousands of concerts worldwide, released more than 70 recordings, and collaborated with many of the world’s most accomplished composers and performers across many genres. Kronos has received more than 40 awards, including three Grammys and the Polar Music, Avery Fisher, and Edison Klassiek Oeuvre Prizes.

Through its nonprofit organization, Kronos Performing Arts Association (KPAA), Kronos has commissioned more than 1,000 works and arrangements for quartet. KPAA also manages Kronos’ concert tours, local performances, recordings, and education programs, and produces an annual Kronos Festival in San Francisco. In its most ambitious commissioning effort to date, KPAA has recently completed Kronos Fifty for the Future. Through this initiative, Kronos has commissioned—and distributed online for free—50 new works for string quartet designed for students and emerging professionals, written by composers from around the world.

Headshot of Nancy Mike
Courtesy of the artist
Nancy Mike

Nancy Mike is a throat singer, accordion player, visual artist and author originally from Pangnirtung, Nunavut. She is a mother of four beautiful children; a nurse; former member of the Iqaluit-based band, ‘The Jerry Cans.’ Nancy has performed many of her songs in Inuktitut and is passionate about preserving her Inuktut language. Nancy is committed to representing Inuit and to challenging common misperceptions she encounters about life in the Arctic in all of her artistic projects.

Headshot of Cynthia Pitsiulak
Courtesy of the artist

Cynthia Pitsiulak

Cynthia Pitsiulak, a twice Juno nominee currently lives in Iqaluit, Nunavut. Pitsiulak is a multidisciplinary artist, specializing in throat singing, painting, acting, television and radio production. Originally from Kimmirut, Nunavut, Pitsiulak has traveled and performed around the world sharing her artistic talents. She is best known for her work with her duo Silla, and former trio Silla and Rise.

Headshot of Charlotte Qamaniq
Courtesy of the artist
Charlotte Angugaattiaq Qamaniq

Charlotte Angugaattiaq Qamaniq is a North Baffin Inuk performance artist, actor, and contemporary and traditional throat singer hailing from Iglulik, Nunavut. She is best known for her work in the throat singing duo Silla, in twice Juno nominated band Silla and Rise, and Juno nominated Iva and Angu.

Headshot of Varna Marianne Nielsen
Courtesy of the artist
Varna Marianne Nielsen

Varna Marianne Nielsen is a multi artist from Greenland, her focus is to compose music, in a fusion of electronic music, sounds of nature and improvised Greenlandic drumsinging. For 25 years, she has been engaged in performances as a singersongwriter, vocalist and her Indigenous heritage. She has gained experience as an actress. Her interest in research within her ancestors' practice, has led her into filmmaking, which she is directing and composing music for.

 

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