Overview
WQXR presents Beginner’s Ear, one hour of lunchtime bliss with guided meditation and a live performance by world-class musicians every Friday from January 17 through March 6.
On January 31, the hypnotic music of Julia Wolfe, Philip Glass, Hannah Lash and Julián De La Chica becomes a vehicle for deep inward exploration in this special one-hour event combining guided meditation and live music. The performer is Lisa Moore, whose playing was singled out by the New York Times for its “life and freshness” and “fragility and tenderness.”
Lisa is joined by the Colombian composer and sound artist Julián De La Chica, “an extraordinarily deep thinker … able to take a listener into mysterious by-ways using very slender means.” (Stephen Mould) Join in a simple mindfulness practice to clear mental static, then allow the sounds of Lisa’s piano transport you on a sonic journey.
Hosted and moderated by New York Times contributing critic Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim. Meditation led by Thomas Droge, founder of the Pathfinder Institute.
Beginner’s Ear was created by New York Times contributing critic Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim as a way to dissolve the mental static that so often gets in the way of a clear connection to a musical performance. Each 60-minute session begins with a mindfulness teacher leading participants in a 15-minute guided meditation. Out of the resulting deep stillness, a 30-minute musical performance emerges, unfolds in the space, and recedes back into the rich calm. The event wraps up with a short conversation, moderated by Corinna, about aspects of mindful listening.
Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim is a writer, music critic and the founder of Beginner’s Ear. Thomas Droge is an author, teacher, and Chinese medicine practitioner with deep roots in the Daoist tradition, as well as the meditation consultant for Beginner’s Ear.
Described as “brilliant and searching… beautiful and impassioned…lustrous at the keyboard” by The New York Times, Lisa Moore’s performances combine music and theatre with expressive and emotional power – whether in the delivery of the simplest song, a solo recital or a fiendish chamber score. Pitchfork writes “She’s the best kind of contemporary classical musician, one so fearsomely game that she inspires composers to offer her their most wildly unplayable ideas”.
Born in Australia and raised in Canberra, London, and Sydney, Lisa Moore is based in New York City and has released ten solo discs with music ranging from Leoš Janáçek to Philip Glass. Her 2016 CD The Stone People (Cantaloupe), featuring the music of John Luther Adams, Martin Bresnick, Missy Mazzoli, Kate Moore, Frederic Rzewski, and Julia Wolfe, made The New York Times Top Classical Albums of 2016 and the 2017 Naxos Critics’ Choice.
Julián De La Chica is a Colombian composer, pianist, and record producer based in Brooklyn, NY, whose influences range from minimalism & post-minimalism to the alternative electronic scene. His work is often inspired by everyday images, the search of personal spiritual reflection, and the inner darkness. It mixes piano, strings, and classical singers, with electronic keyboards and controllers, crossing over from classical to ambient, electronic music.
