Dr. Schimmel’s Busy East Coast Fall Tour
Dr. Schimmel gave six concerts at the Park Avenue Armory, Sept 13, 14, 15, 26, 27 and 29. This was a residency that was part of the Music Under Construction series. It featured the music of Kurt Weill and the collaborations with soprano Lauren Flanigan, violist Julie Goodale and pianist Christopher Cooley.
On Sept 16 and 17, he performed with The New York Philharmonic in a concert titled “La Dolce Vita”, which featured music from the Italian Cinema
On September 18, 19 and 20, Dr. Schimmel appeared at The Philadelphia Fringe Festival performing Luciano Berio’s “Sequenza 13 (Chanson)” in a staged environment conducive to the time when it was written in the 1990’s (Grunge, Nirvana, Gainsbourg etc). All of the other Sequenzas (14 in all) were performed as well and the audience could move from station to station at will. David Patrick Stearns of the Philadelphia Inquirer stated: “Accordionist Bill Schimmel gave Sequenza #13 such richness you wanted repeated performances. With music this challenging, that’s saying a lot”
Dr. Schimmel’s future performances include:
On October 16 and 17, Dr. Schimmel will be featured in Elliot Sharp’s new opera “Port Bou”. The performances will take place at The Issue Project Room in Brooklyn. It is about the last day of philosopher Walter Benjamin.
On October 23, He will perform in Chaya Chernowin’s Winter Songs at Miller Theatre at Columbia University with the International Contemporary Ensemble ICE.
On November 10, He will be the featured guest with The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble at the William Paterson College in New Jersey. He will premiere his own works: Concerto for Accordion and mallet instruments and New York Classical for Accordion and Vibes along with his Accordiomass.
On December 6, he will appear with Christina Fontinelli at her yearly Christmas in Italy at New York’s Skirball Center performing his own “reality” on Rossini’s La Danza.
On December 7, He will perform new works by Columbia University composers at Issue Project Room in Brooklyn.
On December 9, he will perform the same program as on November 10 – at Connecticut
College.
Dr. Schimmel and Micki Goodman’s new Video Small Hotels can be seen on YouTube.
William Schimmel is a virtuoso accordionist, author, philosopher and composer. He is one of the principle architects in the tango revival in America, the resurgence of the accordion and the philosophy of Musical Reality (composition with pre-existing music). He received his diploma from the Neupauer Conservatory of Music and his BM, MS and DMA degrees from the Juilliard School. He has taught at the Juilliard School , Brooklyn College CUNY, Upsala College, New School University, Neupauer Conservatory (dean) and has lectured on accordion related subjects at Princeton , Columbia , Brandeis, University of Missouri , Duke University, Manhattan School of Music, the Graduate Center CUNY, Santa Clara University, The Janacek Conservatory in Ostrava, Czech Republic and at Microsoft.
Dr. William Schimmel has performed with virtually every major symphony orchestra in America (and the Kirov ) including a longstanding relationship with the Minnesota Orchestra, as well as virtually every chamber music group in New York including Ensemble Sospeso and the Odeon Jazz Ensemble.
Pop star colleagues range from Sting to Tom Waits, who has made the legendary statement: Bill Schimmel doesn’t play the accordion, he is the accordion”.
He is founder of the Tango Project, which, in addition to his hit recordings with them, has appeared with Al Pacino in the film: Scent of a Woman, for which Pacino won an Oscar. The Tango Project also won the Stereo Review Album of the Year Award, received a Grammy nomination and rose to number I on the Billboard Classical Charts. He can be heard in other films including True Lies, Kun Dun and many others including films that he both scored and performed and a series of films for the Nature Conservancy which have won numerous prizes in documentary categories.
He is an authority of the music of Kurt Weill, having recorded all of Weill’s music that employs the accordion.
He is a prolific composer with many commissions from concert music to Broadway and off-Broadway. He has written countless accordion pieces for himself and others including a test piece for the Coupe Mondiale, the accordions’ most prestigious world competition. His Portrait No I for orchestra was conducted by the late Leopold Stockowski.
Dr. Schimmel’s theatre works in collaboration with Micki Goodman have made accordion history.
For further information: billschimmel@billschimmel.com
