PRISM Quartet Tooka-Ood

Zasch by Bradford

Terrance Ellis

Bradford Terrance Ellis’s Tooka-Ood Zasch features the four founding members of the PRISM Quartet—Reginald Borik, Michael Whitcombe, Matthew Levy, and Timothy Miller—on both saxophones and EWIs (electronic wind instruments), playing over a soundtrack of percussion textures. Composed and recorded in 1990, the work highlights the quartet’s versatility as they move between acoustic and electronic instruments. Tooka-Ood Zasch opens with an African hand drum pattern that recalls the massive jam sessions held in San Francisco Bay area parks. Over this music, PRISM’s EWIs interject comical vocal samples, a series of absurd expressions (including “Tooka-Ood Zasch,” “The Hyundai painting party,” and “Lovey”) used by the composer and his inner circle of friends during their days as students at UCLA in the early 1980s. The second section is tongue-in-cheek, intentionally dated

“funk” music which Ellis came to love as an adult. The work’s third section utilizes modulated piano samples to suggest Indonesian gamelan music. Tooka-Ood Zasch closes with a soothing rhythmic undercurrent featuring a tenor solo by PRISM’s Matthew Levy over a vocal, chorale-like background.

Tooka-Ood Zasch by Bradford Terrance Ellis

1989

2018

Bradford Terrance EllisA graduate of the UCLA School of Music with degrees in piano performance and composition, Bradford Terrance Ellis has worked extensively on music for film and television, as well as multimedia projects and live theatre productions. His embrace of modern technology coincided with the development of the Synclavier™ (an early digital synthesizer, sampling system, and music workstation), which he used to compose Tooka-Ood Zasch for the PRISM Quartet in 1990. Ellis has composed, orchestrated, and performed on numerous motion picture and television soundtracks, collaborating with composers Jack Nitzsche (Revenge, Mermaids, Indian Runner), Harry Greggson-Williams (Spy Game, Man on Fire), J. Peter Robinson (The Bank Job, Wayne’s World, Charmed), Michael Hoenig (Max Headroom, Dark Skies), and Joseph Vitarelli (The Last Seduction, John Adams). Ellis’s multimedia collaborations include a recent series of music videos by Jane Maru featuring ambient composer/poet Harold Budd. Ellis has performed live with the Daniel Lentz Group and was the featured soloist with the LA Philharmonic in the premiere of An American in Los Angeles, Lentz’s concerto for keyboard and orchestra.

PRISM Quartet Intriguing programs of great beauty and breadth have distinguished the PRISM Quartet as one of America’s foremost chamber ensembles. “A bold ensemble that set the standard for contemporary-classical saxophone quartets” (The New York Times), PRISM has performed in Carnegie Hall on the Making Music Series, in Alice Tully Hall with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and throughout Latin America, China, and Russia under the auspices of the United States Information Agency and USArtists International. PRISM has also been presented to critical acclaim as soloists with the Detroit Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra, and conducted residencies at the nation’s leading conservatories, including the Curtis Institute of Music and the Oberlin Conservatory. Two-time recipients of the Chamber Music America/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming, PRISM has commissioned nearly 300 works, many by internationally celebrated composers, including Pulitzer Prize-winners Julia Wolfe, William Bolcom, Jennifer Higdon, Zhou Long, and Bernard Rands, and MacArthur “Genius” Award recipients Bright Sheng, Tyshawn Sorey, and Miguel Zenón. PRISM’s discography includes releases on Albany, BMOP/Sound, ECM, innova, Koch, Naxos, New Dynamic, New Focus, and its own label, XAS Records. The Fifth Century, PRISM’s ECM recording with The Crossing under Donald Nally, was awarded a 2018 Grammy for Best Choral Performance. In 2016, PRISM was named by its alma mater, the University of Michigan, as the first recipient of the Christopher Kendall Award in recognition of its work in “collaboration, entrepreneurship, and community engagement.” The PRISM Quartet performs exclusively on Selmer saxophones.

Below, left to right: Matthew Levy, Reginald Borik, Michael Whitcombe, Timothy Miller

PRISM Quartet founding members 1984 – 1993

Tooka-Ood Zasch (1990): 9:30 by Bradford Terrance Ellis (b. 1963)

PRISM QuartetReginald Borik soprano saxophone, EWI*Michael Whitcombe alto saxophone, EWI

Matthew Levy tenor saxophone, EWI Timothy Miller baritone saxophone, EWI

*EWI: Electronic Wind Instrument

Bradford Terrance Ellis synclavier

Recorded October 15, 1990Metamusic Studio, Los Angeles, CA

Producer: Bradford Terrance EllisRecording Engineer: Pamela Neal

Editing/Mixing/Mastering: Bradford Terrance Ellis

XAS Records is the label of the PRISM Quartet©π PRISM Quartet, Inc. 2019

All Rights Reservedwww.prismquartet.com

XAS 104