MUSIC

The Music of Michael Ranta & Sarah Hennies

THURSDAY, JANUARY 18, 2024
8:00 PM

Roulette In Person & Live Stream
509 Atlantic Avenue (entrance on Third Avenue), Boerum Hill, Brooklyn

$25 advance; $30 door; $20 students/seniors advance; free live stream
TICKETS + INFORMATION

Michael Ranta is an expatriate American percussionist who worked with many of the luminaries of 20th Century avant-classical music, but whose own compositions are rarely encountered. Not tonight, though, when they’ll be brought to life by clarinetists Madison Greenstone and Katie Porter and percussionist Sarah Hennies: master musicians all. Hennies’s mastery extends to composition, with pieces (unlike Ranta’s happily not rarely encountered — at least not around here) sounding like they’re written by a percussionist, but maybe not the way you’d expect: they explore the relationships of different pulses proceeding simultaneously, not so much escaping time as rendering its impact indeterminate. The ensemble will premiere a new Hennies composition tonight.

MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: In person, good cocktails and even good food at Grand Army Bar. Streaming at home, have a Steel Drum: pour 1 oz. white Rum, 1/2 oz. each of white Overproof Rum, Maraschino liqueur, and lime juice, and 1/8 tsp. Absinthe, with 1 dash orange bitters, into an ice-filled cocktail shaker. Shake. Strain into a chilled Martini glass or coupe. Garnish with a lime wheel.