NYU Percussion Ensemble Performs a Concerto by The Police Drummer Stewart Copeland

The NYU Percussion Ensemble will be joined by Stewart Copeland, drummer, composer, and co-founder of The Police, for a rare performance of Copeland’s 2011 concerto, Gamelan D’Drum, on December 7 at 8 p.m. ET in NYU’s Iris Cantor Theatre, 38 Houston Street in Greenwich Village.

Copeland will address the audience before the New York premiere of a new arrangement of his composition for gamelan and percussion by Sean Statser. Jonathan Haas, music professor and director of Percussion Studies at NYU Steinhardt, will conduct. Tickets to the Percussion Ensemble performance with guest Stewart Copeland are $5 and $10.

On Sunday, December 6, Copeland will hold a percussion master class for NYU faculty and students. In addition, he and D’Drum member Ed Smith will coach the Percussion Ensemble during its final rehearsal.

The concerto is an extraordinary opportunity for the NYU Percussion Ensemble, explains Haas.

“The students have spent a considerable amount of time studying for this,” Haas says. “They had a video session with Ed Smith, and he will be here to continue coaching them. We are going to take over the entire Cantor stage. It will be stunning.”

Gamelan D’Drum is a 32-minute, three-movement concerto commissioned by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra for the local ensemble, D’Drum, and orchestra. It premiered in February, 2011.

The three-year journey from commission to performance, which included trips to Indonesia to acquire the specially built instruments, became a documentary, Dare to Drum. A portion of the film will be screened before the NYU Percussion Ensemble’s performance.

The composition requires musicians to play a range of unique instruments that were owned by the late Ron Snider, a member of D’Drum and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. Snider’s daughter gave them to Haas.

Statser’s new arrangement premiered at the Aspen Music Festival in August.

Peggy McGlone
(212) 998-6829