This event has been postponed. If you have any questions, please email Don Metz at metzdj@buffalostate.edu.
The Friends of Michael Colquhoun will present a retrospective of flutist/composer Michael Colquhoun’s improvised music ranging from 1981 to 2015. His music will be performed by three of his most recent ensembles, Unusually Different, BuffFluxus, and Old Songs New.
Colquhoun's compositions draw upon both the Classical and Jazz traditions, and often involve a mixture of composed and improvised elements working together to produce a coherent whole.
Michael Colquhoun's works have been published by McGinnis and Marx Music Publishers, and performed by Los Caribes, the New Music Consort, the Talking Drums, the New Jazz Orchestra of Buffalo, the Schanzer/Speach Duo, the Buried Treasures Ensemble, the East Buffalo Media Association, Unusually Different, BuffFluxus, the Maelström Percussion Ensemble and many others. Some of his works for flute alone have entered the standard repertoire for the instrument. These works are in performance continuously throughout the world. Colquhoun is currently active as a solo recitalist, as a teacher and composer, and as Adjunct Professor of Music at Canisius College and Hilbert College. He is also a member of numerous free improvisation ensembles. He has earned his Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo where he studied with Robert Dick, Morton Feldman, Lejaren Hiller, and Leo Smit.
BuffFluxus is a Buffalo based ensemble founded by Michael Basinski and Don Metz performing in the Fluxus tradition of the 1960’s and 70’s. BuffFluxus performs the work of artists such as Jackson MacLow, Yoko Ono, Dick Higgins, and Allison Knowles, as well as contemporary works written in the Fluxus style. The goal of the Fluxus movement was an anarchist “anti-art” philosophy, which put the value and creation of art back in the hands of the people. The goal of BuffFluxus is to make these radical artistic principles relevant for the 21st Century listener.
Old Songs New is a duo consisting of Michael Colquhoun on flutes and Don Metz on classical guitar presenting Jazz Standards and Bossa Nova songs. Their most recent project was music of the great Brazilian Bossa Nova composer the Antonio Carlos Jobim who fused Choro style bistro songs and Portuguese Fado with modern Jazz harmony and voicing. After decades of highly produced arrangement of large ensembles, Old Songs New returns these songs to the lovely original simplicity of guitar and flute.
“Unusually Different” blends composed music with improvisation via experimental arrangements of original music and other sounds previously found on Earth presented with creative fearlessness. Drawing on the influences of Sun Ra, Ornette Coleman, Robert Dick, Art Ensemble of Chicago, Jimi Hendrix, Louis Armstrong, Edgard Varèse, John Coltrane, Butch Morris, John Cage, and James Brown, the ensemble delivers rich vibrations from the future the past and beyond.
After returning to Buffalo following a long touring history with the Sun Ra Arkestra, Unusually Different founder Rey Scott desired a smaller group of performers with immense mass. Scott recruited an ensemble comprised of some of Buffalo’s finest wind instrumentalists: Steve Baczkowski – saxophones Dave DeWitt – trombone, horn, tuba, Michael Colquhoun – flutes, chain saw, Ellen Barnum – bassoon, Kenny Foster – clarinets, and Scott himself on Saxophones Clarinets and Flutes.