Founded in 1973, Vancouver New Music engages communities in the exploration, creation, and experience of progressive and outstanding new music. VNM is dedicated to exploring and contextualizing new music and sonic art, through concert presentations, festival, community, and workshop events. VNM regularly commissions and premieres new works by Canadian composers, presents leading and emerging electroacoustic and electronic music artists, international composers and performers, sound installations and music theatre. VNM presents an annual festival that focuses each year on a theme within the new music landscape, and explores the interaction of contemporary music with other disciplines such as theatre, installation and media arts. Other activities include lectures and workshops with visiting artists, ensemble workshops and presentations open to the community, and other sound art and new music related community events.
Saturday, November 16, 2019 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm – For this second instalment of VNM’s PARALLELS series we welcome Okkyung Lee, a South Korean New cellist and improviser currently based in New York. Lee will collaborate with local electronic musicians to create a unique, site specific performance piece. Lee’s broad array of inspirations — that include noise, improvisation, jazz, western classical, and the traditional […]
Thursday, October 18, 2018 @ 7:15 pm – 10:30 pm – Seven world-class string quartets will perform at Vancouver New Music’s 2018 Festival. Quartetti features a line-up of versatile contemporary string quartets from Canada, the US and Europe. Of special note, Vancouver’s Black Dog String Quartet will take the stage all three nights, performing works by Navajo/US composer Raven Chacon, and participants from Chacon’s Native American […]
Saturday, April 21, 2018 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm – Grammy-award winning ensemble Third Coast Percussion closes VNM’s 2017-18 concert series with their first ever performance in Vancouver. This breathtaking program includes internationally-acclaimed composer Augusta Read Thomas’ Resounding Earth. Written specially for Third Coast Percussion, Resounding Earth brings together over 125 bells from around the world to create a beautiful and completely unprecedented sound world. […]
Saturday, March 17, 2018 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm – Sumire Yoshihara (percussion) and Kazue Sawai (17- and 5- string koto) are among the most respected and iconic performers of Japanese contemporary music. Bridging ancient and new sounds, this amazing duo will present a selection of Japanese contemporary music showcasing a range of wonderfully poetic approaches in a program that includes solo and duo works […]
Saturday, February 24, 2018 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm – Through musical explorations of sonic textures and gestures, spectralism embodies a fascinating and exceptionally resonating sound world. Presenting seminal works by spectral composers rarely performed in Vancouver, Spectralism harnesses the sounds of Plastic Acid Orchestra, led by Bryan Deans, and guest conductor Giorgio Magnanensi, to present works by Italian pioneer Giacinto Scelsi, French visionary Gérard […]
Saturday, February 10, 2018 @ 8:00 pm – 9:00 pm – Virtuoso guitarist Paolo Angeli (Italy) returns to Vancouver for a special, solo performance for prepared Sardinian guitar and voice. Eighteen strings, little hammers, propellers, springs, separated output for each string, objects stolen from everyday life. Every performance is lived through the practice of free improvisation, and represents for Paolo the chance to mould the sounds […]
Saturday, November 25, 2017 @ 8:00 pm – 10:00 pm – Kicking off the new Parallels series, Parallel 01 presents acclaimed New York-based pianist Uri Caine performing original compositions and improvisations in concert with a string quartet, and members of the Vancouver Electronic Ensemble. In advance of the concert, a 2-day open rehearsal will take place on November 23 and 24 from 6-10PM. The open rehearsal […]
Friday, November 3, 2017 @ 7:30 pm – This fall, we welcome the world to Vancouver for ISCM World New Music Days 2017! As part of the celebration, VNM presents a selection of recent works for string orchestra by four composers, representing four different countries. The program will feature Linda Catlin Smith’s Orient Point (Canada), Michiko Fukazawa’s Lemminkainen’s Mother (Japan), Jay Schwartz’s Music […]
