Thursday Night Jazz: Patrick Breiner’s Sonic Postcards

In this special Thursday Night Jazz performance, The Pittsburgh Composers Quartet will collaborate with four City of Asylum writers-in-residence in an exploration of the power of small thoughts. In March of 2020, saxophonist Patrick Breiner began writing “sonic postcards.” These short, sometimes sentimental, melodic compositions were each written with a specific person in mind, recorded in Voice Memo, and then shared through the magic of the internet with only that person.

A Note from Patrick Breiner: “I’m bad at staying in touch in everyday life. Counterintuitively, spending time on tour (every day in a different city) sparks a desire in me to write postcards. To family, to friends, sometimes to people I hardly know. There’s something so nice about getting mail. And there’s always a depth of meaning beyond just the words we scribble. Sonic postcards helped me bridge a gap in a time when I honestly thought, Well… I may just be playing saxophone by myself for the rest of my life. We’re excited to uncover previously unimagined meanings to these little missives. And we hope they might mean something to you, too.”

For this program, City of Asylum writers-in-residence Jorge Olivera Castillo, Anouar Rahmani, Oleksandr Frazé-Frazénko, and Olena Boryshpolets will each choose a sonic postcard (or multiple) and will create a poem imagining to whom (or to what) that postcard was sent. Additionally, Patrick will use original postcards from each of the writers as prompts to which he’ll compose melodic or sonic responses.

Featured Musicians:

Patrick Breiner: tenor saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet

Ben Opie: alto saxophone, bass clarinet

Mark Micchelli: piano, preparations

Adam Kantz: drums, percussion

About the Artists:

Patrick Breiner is a saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer in Pittsburgh, PA. He helped found the Tough Pill concert series on third Thursdays at the Government Center, which is rapidly closing in on its three year anniversary! Sonic collaborations include: Battle Trance (New Amsterdam / NNA Tapes), VAX (pronounced “fasjsh”), and the Pittsburgh Composers Quartet. In addition to his musical undertakings Patrick is sometimes a theater / dance / puppetry performer and collaborator. Patrick is a Vandoren Artist.

About Your Visit: 

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