Immerse Yourself in the Unexpected at Octave 9

By Leilani Polk

If you haven’t experienced a concert in Octave 9: Raisbeck Music Center, we can’t recommend it enough. Our Octave 9 Series showcases a range of boundary-pushing artists in the intimate, immersive space, each using the venue’s state-of-the-art audio and visual technology in subtle, unusual and extraordinary ways. The season so far has been nothing short of breathtaking, from Pacific Northwest composer and musician Gabriella Smith with frequent collaborator and Artist in Focus, cellist Gabriel Cabezas, recreating the sublime atmospheres of their 2021 album, Lost Coast; to Alex Weston’s moody multimedia Memory Gaps, inspired by Cecelia Ruiz’s The Book of Memory Gaps, that found Weston on piano accompanied by a Seattle Symphony string quartet while illustrations from the book were projected onto the venue’s 360-degree screens and animated live by Joshua William Gelb.  

The final three programs on the horizon — each performed twice, at 7 & 9pm on Fridays — promise more luminous sound worlds that will dazzle the senses while exploring Octave 9’s creative possibilities.  

Composer, pianist, singer-songwriter and producer/director Natalie Tenenbaum is a Juilliard graduate whose cross-disciplinary works encompass classical music, improvisational jazz, electronic music and vocals paired with “muscular, fluid technique that defines her as she delivers hailstorms of notes with a clarity and resonance that reinvent each piece she’s playing” (The Arts Desk). Her program, The Piano // Re-Imagined, is a piano recital unlike any you’ve encountered, in which she remixes classical works by Bach, Stravinsky, Debussy, Liszt and others with original post-classical and jazz-infused music, and performs on a grand piano while executing live electronics beneath her own lighting design (March 27). Listen to Tenenbaum’s 2024 album Standard Repertoire Vol. 1 to get a feel for her style. 

Through Her Window, Part II finds Principal Oboe Mary Lynch VanderKolk leading the second part of a program spotlighting works written for and with her as part of Through Her Window. Her ongoing commissioning and performance project brings together some of the most eloquent female-identifying musical voices of our time, with the goal of expanding the canon, sharing stories and reflecting on life in the world today. This program will include world premiere Seattle Symphony co-commissioned works for oboe, flute and piano by Alyssa Mercedes Mena, Danae Venson, Elise Winkler (a graduate of the Merriman-Ross Family Young Composer's Workshop) and Yuxan Lin, all curated by renowned composer, flutist and founder of Imani Winds, Valerie Coleman. VanderKolk will be joined by Principal Flute Demarre McGill and guest pianist Paige Roberts Molloy (April 24).  

Finally, in June, the current Octave 9 Series season closes with The Music of Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate. A classical composer and pianist, Tate (Chickasaw) expresses his Indigenous culture in symphonic music, ballet and opera. This program includes three chamber music works inspired by Pacific Northwest tribes — Abitahánta': The Hunter Who Was Not So Great, Pisachi (Reveal) and MoonStrike — and integrates nature art and narration by the composer, with music by a Seattle Symphony string quartet composed of Emerson Millar and Jacqueline Audas (violins), Ursula Steele (viola) and Katherine Audas (cello) (June 12). 

The upcoming 2026/2027 Octave 9 Series looks to be another stunner. Among the offerings are Etudes and Devotions, a program of Samuel Adams’ recent collaborations, featuring pianist Conor Hanick performing Adams’ new Etudes, and percussionist Mari Yoshinaga with an orchestra quartet giving the U.S. premiere and Seattle Symphony co-commission of his Devotions, which integrates electronics with percussion and strings; The World of György Kurtág, a kaleidoscopic centenary celebration of renowned Hungarian composer György Kurtág, with the world premiere of an accompanying animated film by composer and animator Lembit Beecher; The Elwha River, a musical portrait of the resilient Elwha River habitat, its people and its history by composer Annea Lockwood and flutist Claire Chase; and performances by The Brandee Younger Trio, with the eponymous harpist and composer — who unites spiritual jazz and classical music with the soulful pulse of R&B and hip hop — expanding her sonic palette with electronic textures, extended techniques, an Afrofuturist palette and new visual design by bassist and collaborator Rashaan Carter. 

Check out the full 2026/2027 Octave 9 Series in the new season brochure, page 28, or CLICK HERE to see the entirety of what's to come at Octave 9 from now through June 2027. 

Principal Oboe Mary Lynch VanderKolk’s position is generously supported by anonymous donors.