John Coolidge Adams

Biography

Born in a amatrice family from Jazz - his/her father plays of the saxophone and his/her mother sings - John Adams learns from his father the Clarinette, and plays in groups and local orchestras of the area of East Concord in the New Hampshire where the family lives.

He takes his first theoretical courses of music at eleven years, then studies the direction of orchestra during the courses of summer of the Dartmouth College. He studies the music with the Harvard College of 1965 to 1971, then with the academy of San Francisco. He will give then to the academy of the courses of music and gives concerts of music of Before guard. It is interested then in the technological news of electronic music and takes courses of video. John Adams joined, as from 1977, with its part Phrygian Gates , the current of repetitive Musique minimalist and , that it enriches thereafter by a symphonic component requiring a rich person orchestration sometimes.

As from 1978, he sees himself recognized with Shaker Loops , a septet for cords, like an important type-setter. He meets Edo de Waart and then becomes to advise Symphony orchestra of San Francisco for the new musics. The following year, it occurs for the first time at New York with the Musée Guggenheim supported by Steve Reich. Its first major work to meet a broad audience and a success international is Nixon in Clouded in 1987.

Principal works

Christian Zeal and Activity (1973)
China Spoil and Phrygian Gates for piano, (1977)
Common Tones in Simple Time (1979)
Shaker Loops for orchestra, (1978 revised in 1983)
Harmonium , (1981)
Grand Pianola Music , (1982)
Harmonielehre (1984-1985)
The Chairman Dances (1985)
Two Fanfares for Orchestra (1986)
Nixon in Clouded , opera (1985-1987), creates with Houston on a setting in scene of Peter Sellars
Fearful Symmetries , (1988)
The Wound Dresser and Eros Piano (1989)
The Death off Klinghoffer , opera (1990-1991), based on the history of the taking of hostages of the Achille Lauro, creates with Brussels with also a setting in scene of Sellars
El Dorado (1991)
Hoodoo Zephyr (1992)
Chamber Symphony (1992)
Violin Concerto (1993)
John' S Book off Alleged Dances (1994)
I Was Looking At the Ceilling and Then I Saw the Sky , opera in two acts (1995)
Lollapalooza (1995)
Hallelujah Junction for two pianos, Slonimsky' S Earbox and Gnarly Short props (1996)
Naive and Sentimental Music , symphony in three movements (1999)
El Niño , oratorio of the Nativity (2000), dedicated with and put in scene by Peter Sellars during his creation at the Theater of Châtelet to Paris.
American Berserk for piano (2001)
One the Transmigration off Drunk , part for magnetic band, voice and orchestra, written in 2004 in homage to the victims of the September 11th, 2001

Sources

Booklet of the box The John Adams Earbox at Nonesuch Records.

External bonds

Biography and discussion with John Adams

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