Eighth Blackbird, a four-time GRAMMY Award-winning Chicago-based music ensemble presents Ayanna Woods in a livestream concert 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 30th. This event is part of the 2021 Eighth Blackbird Chicago Artists Workshop (CAW) livestream performing arts series showcasing Chicago-based artists as well as visiting artists from beyond city limits. All CAW events are hosted at the Eighth Blackbird production space located at 4045 N. Rockwell St. For more information visit www.eighthblackbird.org.
Woods’ music explores the spaces between acoustic and electronic, traditional and esoteric, and the wildly improvisational and mathematically rigorous. This program will feature two pieces from Woods’ in-progress 3x5 series: a collection of short open-instrumentation pieces whose scores fit on 3x5 cards. These short pieces began as a compositional challenge to transform a small seed within intense constraints. The program will also feature Woods joined by guitarist Sam Hasting and members of Eighth Blackbird for a set of songs from her EP under her band Yadda Yadda.
Woods’ pieces have been performed by the Wet Ink Ensemble, members of Fifth House Ensemble, the Chicago Children’s Choir, and others. She is a ravenous collaborator across genres. As a writer, producer, and arranger her work can be found in film scores for Manual Cinema, Revive LLC, the viral web series “Brown Girls” and her Ayanna’s band “Yadda Yadda.” She is a recipient of Third Coast Percussion's 2017 Emerging Composers Partnership, a 2017 3Arts Make A Wave grant, and a 2020 DCASE Individual Artist Program grant.
Tickets
Eighth Blackbird's Chicago Artists Workshop Series presents Ayanna Woods in a live stream concert 7 p.m., Wednesday, June 30. The concert will be staged at the Eighth Blackbird production facility located at 4045 N. Rockwell St. There is also limited in-person seating. Suggested ticket price per household is $20, but options include choosing a price as well as contributing as a supporter. The event includes interviews and a Q&A with the artists. For tickets and more information visit www.eighthblackbird.org/cawcalendar/ayannawoods
About CAW
“Eighth Blackbird Presents: The Chicago Artists Workshop'' (CAW) live 2020-2021 concert series debuted in October 2020, and continues through June 2021 Artists/dates/times are subject to change. For tickets or more information visit www.eighthblackbird.org. CAW is made possible in part with support from the National Endowment for the Arts.
About Eighth Blackbird
Eighth Blackbird is “one of the smartest, most dynamic contemporary classical ensembles on the planet” (Chicago Tribune). Launched in 1996 by six committed Oberlin Conservatory undergraduates, this Chicago-based super-group has earned its status as “a brand-name…defined by adventure, vibrancy and quality…” (Detroit Free Press).
Eighth Blackbird has since evolved from ensemble to institution, currently realizing its mission through five initiatives: Eighth Blackbird, the award-winning sextet; Blackbird IV, a piano/percussion duo featuring founding members Lisa Kaplan and Matthew Duvall; the Blackbird Creative Lab, the organization's mentoring arm; Blackbird Productions, a designation for wide-ranging creative projects; and the Chicago Artists Workshop, a streaming platform created to support artists.
Recent achievements include a fourth GRAMMY Award, the inaugural Chamber Music America Visionary Award, an Ensemble of the Year Award from Musical America, and the prestigious MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions. In 2017, the company launched the Blackbird Creative Lab, a tuition-free summer training program, alumni network, and career support platform for emerging professionals focused on cutting edge musicianship, dynamic performance aesthetic, and savvy entrepreneurship.
Set to celebrate its 25th Anniversary in 2021, Eighth Blackbird continues to fuel the modern canon it helped engine with hundreds of commissioned and premiered works by dozens of composers including Viet Cuong, Pamela Z, Bryce Dessner, Jennifer Higdon, Amy Beth Kirsten, David Lang, Andy Akiho, Missy Mazzoli, Nico Muhly, and Steve Reich, whose commissioned work, Double Sextet, went on to win the Pulitzer Prize (2009). A long-term relationship with Chicago’s Cedille Records has produced ten acclaimed recordings and four impressive GRAMMY Awards for Best Small Ensemble/Chamber Music Performance. Eighth Blackbird's most recent album, “Singing in the Dead of Night” by Lang, Julia Wolfe, and Michael Gordon, was released by Cedille in June 2020.
The group's latest venture is the inaugural 2020–2021 Chicago Artists Workshop series, a full season of 18 live-streamed concerts and events with a stellar lineup of featured artists as well as a residency program offering studio space and technical support to area artists. For more information about Eighth Blackbird visit www.eighthblackbird.org and visit them on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter #eighthbl