WMI PLUS At Home - Oran Etkin
WMI PLUS At Home experiences bring music from around the world into the comfort of your home. Renowned artists share their lives, instruments, and stories from their personal environments, bringing an intimacy and uniqueness to each event. These talks are led by fellow musicians, journalists, and ethnomusicologists. Live captioning will be provided during the event.
We are thrilled to provide these events for FREE. If you are able to make a donation of any amount while registering for this event, it will help us to keep the music playing. Thank you!
Monday, November 20, 2023 – 6 PM EDT
WMI PLUS At Home Experiences are free of charge, but you must register to reserve your space. You will receive an order confirmation once your registration is complete that includes the link to the event. Only registered participants will receive email instructions on how to join the event via Zoom online. Live captioning provided.
Our next WMI Plus At Home Session features Grammy-Award-Winning composer, clarinetist, and educator Oran Etkin in conversation with Brazilian pianist, arranger, composer, and producer Benjamin Taubkin. They’ll discuss their shared passion for and commitment to engaging in a musical dialogue with artists from other cultures to build bridges between people from around the globe.
Oran Etkin has been described as “Ebullient” by The New York Times, and voted #1 rising star clarinetist in DownBeat Magazine’s Critic’s Poll. His music can be heard on concert stages worldwide and on numerous recordings, including a Grammy Award Winning anti-bullying compilation. He is on the faculty of The New School University and has also appeared as a guest lecturer at Harvard University. French newspaper Libération chose his Paris concert as one of the top 6 musical events of the year, hailing it as “a concert of weightlessness, class spark, inspiration and sharing. Magic uninterrupted…for such is the music of Etkin: sensitive to the exchange with the audience.”
Whether standing in front of an orchestra or sitting crosslegged on the floor surrounded by a gaggle of children, Etkin’s work is is about imagination, expression, playfulness and emotion. It draws its strength from the conviction that the tru power of music lies not just in the individual’s pursuit of technical mastery but in the joyful and soulful creation of community!
Brazilian music and its dialogue with other cultures have been the field of activity for pianist, arranger, composer and producer, Benjamin Taubkin. Taubkin has regularly performed solo piano with symphony orchestra and at festivals in cultural centers in Brazil, Latin America, Canada, the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. He also held concerts and artistic residencies in Morocco, Austria, Korea, Venezuela and Argentina.
He created several soundtracks for documentaries, including Eu Mayor, Carvos and Genesis – educational material with Sebastião Salgado. Taubkin coordinated and programmed several initiatives in public and private institutions such as the State Department of Culture, Itaú Cultural, Mercado Cultural da Bahia, and SESC, among others. He is a member of the European Forum of World Music Festivals and the Ibero-American Association for the Development of Music.
WMI PLUS and WMI PLUS At Home experiences are supported by a grant from Con Edison and world music lovers like you. We thank you!
