Madison Square Park Conservancy is hosting a series of free concerts this month by Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect from within its public art installation, "Ghost Forest" by Maya Lin. Each performance is designed to complement the installation and its themes with nature-inspired works by Claude Debussy, Aaron Copland, Duke Ellington, Caroline Shaw, and more. Head over to the park each Wednesday at 6pm beginning July 7 for the following:
July 7: A string quartet together with horn will conjure the range of emotions surrounding climate change and our fragile relationship with the environment with a rich program of works by Samuel Barber, Béla Bartók, Aaron Copland, Caroline Shaw, and others.
July 14: An ensemble with horn, flute, violin, viola, and cello, performing a program evocative of the natural world and our relationships with it, including Olivier Messiaen’s “Interstellar Call,” Reena Esmail’s Rivers, and additional works by Aaron Copland, Kaija Saariaho, and others.
July 21: Cello, violin and viola performing excerpts from Bach’s Goldberg Variations, India Gailey’s Mountainweeps, John Luther Adams’ Three High Places, and other works that span from bucolic to devastating, provoking reflections on the state of the earth.
July 28: An ensemble with percussion, violin, and cello creates an evocative soundscape with works by an eclectic group of composers including Ravel, Fauré, Debussy, Ellington, and Ensemble Connect alumnus Andrea Casarrubios.
August 4: This unique program explores the ambient sounds and tranquil tones of mallet percussion, featuring vibraphone and marimba. There’s music by Ellington and the late Chick Corea, plus one of Satie’s Gnossiennes, and John Psathas’s Fragment—a gentle work with a simple melody.
August 11: The ensemble performs Dutch composer Hans Abrahamsen’s wind quintet Walden, inspired by Thoreau’s iconic journal of life in the woods and his desire to rediscover humanity’s lost unity with nature. There are also selections from Hannah Lash’s Leander and Hero—a work detailing the life of two migratory birds and the effects of changing weather patterns—plus works by Beach, Piazzolla, Still, and others that take listeners on a meditative journey and encourage them to contemplate their relationship with the environment.