Called “contemporary chamber trailblazers” by the Boston Globe, Hub New Music is a “nimble quartet of winds and strings” (NPR) forging new paths in twenty-first-century repertoire. The ensemble’s ambitious commissioning projects and “appealing programs” (New Yorker) celebrate the rich diversity of today’s classical music landscape.
Founded in 2013, Hub New Music has grown into a formidable international touring ensemble driven by an unwavering dedication to building community through new art. Over the last decade, Hub has commissioned dozens of new works and continues to usher in fresh and culturally relevant pieces for its distinct combination of flute, clarinet, violin and cello. Hub is proud to collaborate with today’s most celebrated emerging and established composers, and is equally proud to count many of them as friends.
Recent and upcoming performances include concerts presented by the Kennedy Center, Seattle Symphony, Morgan Library, Suntory Hall (Tokyo), the Williams Center for the Arts, Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center, King’s Place (London), Soka Performing Arts Center, Arizona Friends of Chamber Music, and the Celebrity Series of Boston. In 2023-24, the group is in residence at Indiana University, Princeton, Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and SUNY Purchase.
Hub continues its 10th Anniversary Commission Project in 2023/24 with new works by Andrew Norman, Tyshawn Sorey, Angélica Negrón, Marcos Balter, Donnacha Dennehy, Nico Muhly and Jessica Meyer. As part of the project, Hub also launched a fellowship in collaboration with the Luna Lab, awarded to recent alumna Sage Shurman. The coming season also brings continued performances of Gala Flagello’s concerto The Bird-While and Carlos Simon’s Requiem for the Enslaved. Upcoming commissions include Nina C. Young’s to hear the things we cannot see, and major new works from Christopher Cerrone and Pamela Z.
Hub New Music’s recordings have garnered consistent acclaim. In 2022, Hub recorded Carlos Simon’s Requiem for the Enslaved (Decca Classics), which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition. This season, Hub releases its fourth album, a distance, intertwined with Silkroad’s Kojiro Umezaki (shakuhachi) and the Asia-America New Music Institute on In a Circle Records. Hub’s debut album, Soul House, released on New Amsterdam Records, was called “ingenious and unequivocally gorgeous” (Boston Globe) and “intensely poignant” (Textura).
As educators, Hub is dedicated to empowering future generations of artists. The ensemble was recently in residence with the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Nancy and Barry Sanders Composer Fellowship program, working with ten outstanding high school aged composers. In 2023/24, Hub is ensemble-in-residence at SUNY Purchase, and has been guests at leading institutions such as Princeton, University of Michigan, University of Texas, CCM, University of Southern California and Indiana University.
Hub New Music is Michael Avitabile (flutes), Gleb Kanasevich (clarinets), Meg Rohrer (violin/viola) and Jesse Christeson (cello). The ensemble’s name is inspired by its founding city of Boston’s reputation as a hub of innovation. Hub New Music is exclusively represented by Unfinished Side.