On Saturday, May 16, the International Contemporary Ensemble was to perform works by members of the Iranian Female Composers Association (IFCA) at Joe’s Pub, but due to the COVID-19 crisis, a live event is unfortunately not possible. To celebrate our collaboration with IFCA, we are streaming our Mostly Mozart Festival IFCA Composer Portrait performance from August 5, 2019 at New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Bruno Walter Auditorium. Tune-in live at ICE’s YouTube channel! (Video will be available on Friday, May 22, 7pm EDT).
When Niloufar Nourbakhsh decided to fully dedicate herself to a lifetime of composition, she found few mentors to look up to in Iran. After moving to the US, she discovered many other Iranian female composers working throughout the world and eventually connected with Anahita Abbasi and Aida Shirazi, forming IFCA in 2017. IFCA acts as a platform to support, promote, and celebrate Iranian women in music through concerts, public performances, installations, interdisciplinary collaborations, and workshops.
The association was established in an entirely virtual space, which has resulted in a welcoming network, a site of connection and community. Those relationships are heard with this program curated by Aida, Anahita, and Niloufar as a three-part event featuring a documentary portrait video of each founding member, one of their works, followed by a work by another IFCA member.
P.S. You’ll see more on YouTube from International Contemporary Ensemble including a digital interactive concert co-presented by the Library of Congress and Portland Ovations on May 28th, 7pm EDT, featuring World Premieres by Suzanne Farrin and Ashley Fure. Learn more here.
Performances and commissioning activities during the 2019-20 concert season are made possible by the generous support of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Howard Gilman Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, A.N. and Pearl G. Barnett Family Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Paul M. Angell Family Foundation, Aaron Copland Fund for Music Inc., Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts, Amphion Foundation, Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung, The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, Pacific Harmony Foundation, Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, mediaThe foundation inc., The Casement Fund, BMI Foundation, as well as public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council for the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, and the Illinois Arts Council Agency. The International Contemporary Ensemble is the Ensemble in Residence of the Nokia Bell Labs Experiments in Art and Technology. Yamaha Artist Services New York is the exclusive piano provider for ICE.