Went tonight to see the Asphalt Orchestra at Lincoln Center Out Of Doors. Asphalt is a 12-piece marching band (piccolo, soprano, alto, and tenor saxes, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, sousaphone, and 3 drummers) whose repertoire includes arrangements of everything from bjork to Zappa to nancarrow.   The music is interesting, challenging, and incredibly fun.  The first two of those I could say about a lot of new music concerts I have been to. The third, way less so.

I am aware among my peers of a general desire to find new ways to engage an audience, to get out of the  you sit-we play-you-clap mold.  For some this has meant writing more pop-influenced music, for others it’s meant playing in more relaxed venues where people can drink and chat and move around, for still others it’s meant using technology to make their music interactive.  For the asphalt orchestra, the plan is one of elegant beauty: move from place to place and play music so great that people want to follow you in order to hear it. Walk away from the audience, around them, right into them, parting them with a trombone slide like Moses did to the red sea with his staff. Seriously, I wish I had a bird’s eye view of this concert I just saw, throngs of people clumsily getting out of the way of a charging tuba player, rearranging themselves as they try to predict what the best vantage point for hearing the music will be when the players come to a halt. People were involved!

But don’t get me wrong. This was no novelty act. These were 12 trendous musicians playing intricate, gorgeous arrangements of unusual music.  Their rendition of conlon nancarrow’s study no. 20, composed for player piano because the composer deemed it too rhythmically complex for human fingers, was a rare musical moment, at once tender and delightfully off-kilter.  I’m looking forward to hearing more from them, including more newly commissioned stuff (Goran Bregovic’s Champagne was aptly named – a celebration!)

Oh, and I’d be remiss not to mention the outfits.  A picture’s worth a thousand words: