The Department of Music at the University of California, Davis,
and the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts
present the Taproot New Music Festival January 30–February 2,
2020.
Featured Ensembles
Quince
Ensemble
Comprised of vocalists Liz Pearse (soprano), Kayleigh Butcher
(mezzo soprano), Amanda DeBoer Bartlett (soprano), and Carrie
Henneman Shaw (soprano), Quince thrives on unique musical
challenges and genre-bending contemporary repertoire.
Spektral
Quartet
The four-time Grammy-nominated Spektral Quartet actively pursues
a vivid conversation between exhilarating works of the
traditional repertoire and those written this decade, this year,
or this week. Spektral Quartet includes Clara Lyon (violin),
Maeve Feinberg (violin), Doyle Armbrust (viola), and Russell
Rolen (cello).
Empyrean Ensemble
UC Davis Music Professor Mika Pelo, director
Ensemble-in-residence at UC Davis, the Empyrean Ensemble presents
engaging, thought-provoking, eclectic programs, enabling
audiences to experience new musical sensations delivered with
high artistry by its seven extraordinary core players—the finest
new music performers in California.
New Taproot music festival offers a lineup of new music groups
and commissioned works over four days. “The festival is
rooted in this place and produces unique works,” said Sam Nichols, festival coordinator, composer and
music department faculty member. “The different groups and people
come together and meet one another and share. We didn’t just want
groups parachuting in and performing what they might perform
elsewhere and then leave.”
