Lenox — At the 67th GRAMMY Awards in February, the Akropolis Reed Quintet became the first group of its kind to win a GRAMMY. Their single “Strands,” from the album “Are We Dreaming the Same Dream?,” earned recognition from the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences in the category of Best Instrumental Composition. The ensemble will appear at Tanglewood’s Linde Center for Music and Learning on Saturday, March 29.
But what kind of group is Akropolis? Plenty of ensembles claim to be unbounded by category, and many of them truly are. But Akropolis is unconstrained by genre, convention, or tradition. Still, they self-identify as a “classical chamber music” group.
I spoke with Akropolis clarinetist Kari Landry last month by telephone. We talked about the group’s recent GRAMMY win and their program for the 29th, which includes some of the most popular pieces they have commissioned. Our conversation has been edited for clarity and length.
I want to start with your recent GRAMMY win.
All right.
You probably don’t mind talking about that.
No! Absolutely!
How does that win differentiate you from other classical music ensembles?
It was obviously this massive thing for us. We were so, so proud of the album and that project with composer Pascal Le Boeuf and drummer Christian Euman. And to be recognized—not just in the classical chamber music field for this but the music and recording industry at large—is a massive honor and accomplishment for us and, I think, a great testament to just how incredible Pascal’s music is, but also how I think it really connects with the wider music-listening audience.
And so, for us as this atypical reed quintet instrumentation, it’s just massively affirming and we’re very grateful that people have been so supportive of us. So it’s a huge bump for us—I think it’ll be especially a massive bump for wind players, for reed players out there to see that you can do something on your own and form something that may not be a traditional instrumentation, but still be able to make and perform and record and share music at the absolute highest level. So I think that we’re not only seeing an immediate bump from it, but I really hope it will have a ripple effect across the industry at large.
Well, clearly this is not the first time your group has received such broad recognition. You’ve had three albums that charted on Billboard.
Right, yeah.
So how does that differentiate you from other groups?
Well, for us, I think we’ve always wanted to make music that really directly connects with people but also reflects our community and tries to meet people where they’re at but also tell stories of what’s happening today. And I think through our commissioning and the fact that we’re this new instrumentation, I think that’s why we’re able to achieve that—because we work with people who are alive and have lived experiences that are happening right now. And so I think that automatically connects with people and audiences who are hungry for these stories of today to be told.
We’ve been able to cut through a lot of the noise in the industry because our music is something that people can latch onto, not only emotionally, but sonically. We’re always trying to find an accessible sound with our chamber music and to showcase these instruments in a way that really connects with people. That’s why we’ve been able to have such a wonderful fan base of people who have always loved listening to us and have supported us.
It sounds like you must commission works from composers who also are interested in making music that’s accessible to broad audiences. Is that fair to say?
Yeah. That’s something we are drawn to in composers that we work with. And I think that, just in general, we also try to work with many different kinds of composers from many different lived experiences, so that we can create things that connect with a variety of people in communities. We’ve created 200-plus commissions now, and with every single one, we continue to push ourselves as to what the sound of the Reed Quintet can be and what chamber music can be. That expands who you can reach with your music as well.
So how have you involved small business owners in the creation of new music?
That was a really amazing project that we did on our last album, the album before this GRAMMY-winning album. The album was called “Hymns for Private Use,” and it had two pieces on it, one by Nico Muhly that we teamed up with soprano Shara Nova to make this amazing piece. And then the second track on that album was this massive work by composer Annika Socolofsky, where we decided that we wanted to somehow incorporate the story of small businesses into the music. And we decided to do this by selecting seven small businesses that we had either community or personal connections to. We then did many hours of interviews with these small business owners. And then Annika, the composer, wove together this amazing tapestry for us to perform alongside. And so the whole piece is roughly 20 minutes, and it’s basically this through story and conversation that you get with these seven small business owners sharing their stories.
It’s surprising how many connection points and strands that everybody shares in having a small business and what it means to have their community behind them. And this was just a great way for us to really connect with our community in a way where we could have them directly involved in the music making. We got to premiere and perform these pieces directly in some of the businesses where we had concerts, and that was really moving. Then we got to work with a filmmaker to make this wonderful documentary that shared the visual stories of all of these business owners. And so it was just a very wonderful creative project that had such a great message behind it of the impact that small businesses have on all of us. And Akropolis also really connects to that because we’re a small business ourselves and it’s very much an enterprise for us. So it was a wonderful story that we loved being able to tell.
Is there anything in the standard repertory that’s scored for your combination of instruments?
Sure. There’s actually a wealth of arrangements that have been done either by other arrangers and reed quintets out there in the world, or there’s been several arrangements that we’ve done ourselves or had commissioned for ourselves. And so we have a fabulous arrangement of George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris” that we play quite a lot. And Ravel’s “Le Tombeau de Couperin,” and several Rameau harpsichord suites work tremendously for the Reed Quintet.
I think when we approach more traditional repertoire and arrangements, we look for shared bits of DNA in either what the composers value or what kind of energy and kinetic force the pieces have. We have a deep love for how we can combine the very classical traditions and rigorous training of our instruments and showcase that in just the highest level we possibly can and bring a lot of older sounds to new life as well. It’s an important part of what we do.
How does the instrumentation change from piece to piece? Do you double on instruments and change that up?
Occasionally. Our oboe player, Tim, he’ll play English horn on several pieces. I believe on the concert at Tanglewood, he’ll be playing English horn on the Nina Simone tune “For All We Know.” And then Matt Landry, our saxophonist, he’ll play both alto and soprano saxophone, and everybody will hear both those saxophones at the concert. And then as far as the bassoon and bass clarinet, those two pretty much stick to the bassoon and bass clarinet. And then myself on B-flat clarinet, I’ll play both B-flat and A clarinet a lot at both concerts. So at any given point, you’ll see several other instruments up on the stage.
Do you play jazz transcriptions?
Occasionally, we do—specifically for the project that won the GRAMMY with Pascal Le Boeuf and Christian Euman, we have that album as a touring program that we play with the seven of us. And on that touring program, we’ll play a few jazz charts that have been arranged for the seven of us. And in addition to that, we’ll play some other pieces that Pascal was influenced by when writing “Are We Dreaming The Same Dream?,” like Gershwin’s “An American in Paris.” So we have a few little things that we pepper in, but that’s very specific to that program because that program is really a classical-jazz crossover program, and Pascal and Christian are primarily jazz artists. But on the average Akropolis concert, you will not hear a jazz chart.
Can you give us an idea of what you’re actually going to have on your program on the 29th?
Yes. We’re starting the concert with one of our absolute favorite pieces for Reed Quintet that’s really become a staple way of how we introduce ourselves to new audiences. It’s called “Splinter,” and it’s by a Chicago-based composer named Marc Melitz. And the piece is inspired by minimalism, but also rock and roll. It’s very groovy, very rhythmic, and we find it’s often one of the best ways we can introduce ourselves to a new audience through this piece of music. It’s one of our all-time favorites, and we’ve been playing it for many years.
After that, we’re playing a relatively new work that we commissioned by LA composer Derrick Skye. And this piece was made possible thanks to a large grant from Chamber Music America. Chamber Music America has this wonderful classical commissioning program that is very competitive to get, but if you do receive one of these grants, it helps you create a new masterwork for your instrumentation.
And so we were really fortunate to be awarded one of these with Derrick. It’s really quite a lengthy piece—about 20 minutes—and it’s called “A Soulful Nexus.” And it has two main influences to it really, because these are Derrick’s primary influences and what he’s most talented in as a composer. The first is Persian classical music, and this is Derrick’s training and his background and his DNA as an artist. So the piece has a lot of direct Persian classical music woven throughout it. And when we give the concert, we’ll share with the audience everything that goes into Persian classical music, but essentially it’s a different scalar system. So you’ll hear notes in between notes that are woven throughout the piece and some improvisatory elements that are written out for us but are meant to sound improvisatory, alluding more to the style of Persian classical music.
And Derrick’s hope in using this language alongside something that might be more familiar is that by the end of the piece, these notes between notes are just as beautiful, if not accepted by the audience at large. And the piece is just stunning. And the other main influence in “A Soulful Nexus” is electronic dance music. So it has really a lot of grooves to it. It’s very, very catchy with how he weaves these two elements together. And that’s why it is a nexus of these two styles coming together, which is just Derrick’s personality and training in a nutshell. We premiered the piece last fall, and it’s been on almost every single concert we’ve given ever since, because it’s just so cool and groovy and truly unique. I don’t think there’s anything else in our repertoire that sounds quite like it. And audiences, I think, haven’t heard anything like it quite yet, which is what also makes it really special.
And then after that, we’re playing a transcription of a song made famous by Nina Simone. It’s called, “For All We Know.” It’s a beautiful little tune that really features Matt Landry on saxophone doing the vocals that Nina sang. And that piece is a very touching tune, where it alludes to living in the moment, cherishing each day, because for all we know, tomorrow may never come. It’s a beautiful track that we love to highlight on our concerts.
And then the concert is closing with another big commission that we did a few years back by French hornist and composer Jeff Scott. Jeff is a dear friend of ours, and we asked him to write a piece that was about our hometown of Detroit, Mich. And we brought Jeff out and showed him around the city and took him to the Charles H. Wright Museum of African-American History. And he was immediately struck by this story in Detroit of these neighborhoods called Paradise Valley and Black Bottom, that in the 1940s, through ’50s roughly, were razed or demolished, and they don’t exist anymore.
Jeff grew up in Harlem and a very similar thing happened to his neighborhood and where he grew up. So he wanted to help shine a light on all the wonderful arts and culture and communities and businesses and people that existed that really don’t exist anymore.
If you come to Detroit, there are highways now where all these businesses and clubs and venues and thoroughfares used to be. So the piece directly pays homage to this culture, and it’s become just an amazingly popular work, especially among reed quintets over the last several years. We recorded it on our “Ghost Light” album, along with poetry by Detroit author and historian Marsha Music, who grew up in these neighborhoods and experienced what happened to them firsthand. And so it’s just a wonderful piece to close the concert. The final movement is really inspired by “Jump Jazz,” which was performed in the Paradise Theater in Detroit at the time, and it’s just a massive celebration of that music in that era. And so it’s one of our favorite ways to close the show. And that’s everything that we’re playing.
I know you get submissions from all over the world. Are Berkshire Edge readers free to submit new works to your group?
Yeah. Because we’re a reed quintet, we often have a lot of people that send us music and share ideas with us. And I think that because our ensemble is living and our repertoire is living, we always welcome people sharing their thoughts and ideas with us, because the ensemble type has not been around for that long, and so it’s up to all of us to shape it right now, which I think is super, super cool. So yeah, if people want to send stuff our way, feel free.
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Hear the Akropolis Reed Quintet at Tanglewood’s Linde Center for Music and Learning on Saturday, March 29, 7 p.m. Tickets and more information are available here.
