Music ensemble ‘wild Up’ to present a three-day residency at Purdue University Feb. 6-8

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. –The adventurous music ensemble wild Up will present a collection of residency activities at Purdue University in February — which will include: Historical Beers with wild Up at the 1869 Tap Room in the Purdue Memorial Union on Feb, 6; a meditation workshop at the Córdova Recreational Sports Center on Feb. 7; lectures with several Purdue University classes on Feb. 6 and culminating with a performance of wild Up’s “Future Folk” at Loeb Playhouse on Feb. 8. 

Founded in 2010 and led by artistic director and conductor Christopher Rountree, wild Up is the go anywhere, play anything music collective that has collaborated with orchestras, composers, rock bands, and cultural collectives around the globe — embracing unusual venues, programs, and repertoire. They’ve recorded with Björk’s preferred backup choir in Iceland, jammed with chamber-pop band San Fermin beneath a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton, performed scores by Oscar-nominated composer Mica Levi, collaborated with members of Jane’s Addiction, and recorded an afrobeat opera about the end of the Mayan calendar. Wild and wildly successful, the ensemble was named the Best Classical Music of 2012 by the Los Angeles Times. Also, wild Up was the first-ever ensemble in residence at UCLA’s Hammer Museum and has since filled the same role with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra — as comfortable teaching a class on composition as they are a class about creativity and consciousness. 

“Historical Beers with Historical Music”: Feb. 6, 5:30-7:30 p.m., 1869 Tap Room in Purdue Memorial Union. All tickets $15 and can be purchased in advance through convocations.org/tickets or by calling the Purdue University box office at 800-914-SHOW. Led by Archie Carey, the founder of SolArc Brewing (wild Up’s bassoonist), explore the intersection of the traditions of experimental music and experimental fermentation. Carey and SolArc specialize in the gruit: “People generally think of gruits as un-hopped beers. But we like to think of them as beers that are free to contain a larger number of ingredients than your modern American brews, beers not limited by the archaic strictures implemented by 16th century imperialists with monopolies on hop growing,” Carey said. “So, we let our imaginations run - as, I'm sure, did the world's earliest brewers.”

Meditation workship: Feb. 7, 9:30-10:30 a.m., Córdova Recreational Sports Center. Free and open to the public, membership not required to participate in the session. Join us for a 60-minute meditation session led by wild Up’s founder and artistic director, Christopher Rountree, and wild Up’s bassoonist, Archie Carey. 

Pre-show activities: Feb. 8, 6:30 p.m., 1869 Tap Room in Purdue Memorial Union. Conversation and thought-provoking activities before the show. Free and open to Feb. 8 ticket holders.

Post-show meet-up: Feb. 8. immediately following the performance join members of wild Up for a gathering at 1869 Tap Room in Purdue Memorial Union. Free and open to Feb. 8 ticket holders. 

Performance of wild Up’s “Future Folk”: Feb. 8, 7:30 p.m., Loeb Playhouse in Stewart Center. Tickets range in cost from $21 to $30.

With “Future Folk,” wild Up creates a communal concert of sound/noise/experience that celebrates old-world ways of living in the modern era. The audience and wild Up will explore the music from ancient India, modern California, postwar New York, and from American composers that envision a future form of music rooted in folk ethos.  

Tickets are $30 for adults and $21 for children 18 years and younger, Purdue students and Ivy Tech Lafayette students. Tickets are available at the Stewart Center box office at 765-494-3933 or 800-914-SHOW. Group tickets are also available to groups of 10 more. Call 765-496-1977 for more details or visit https://purdue.edu/convocations/group-sales/.

Initiated in 1902, Purdue Convocations was one of the first professional performing arts presenters in the United States. Each year, Convocations offers the region 30-40 performances of widely varying genres: Broadway-style shows, theater, dance, children's theater, world music, jazz, and chamber music, along with rock, pop, country and comedy attractions. With a vision for connecting artists and audiences in artistic dialogue and for drawing in academic discourse, Purdue Convocations aims to promote frequent exposure to and familiarity with human cultural expression in a multitude of forms and media. 

Source: Abby Eddy, Purdue Convocations director of marketing, 765-494-9712, aeeddy@purdue.edu 

Note to Journalists: Publication-quality photos are available at http://www.convocations.org/press.