Lukas Ligeti

Ligeti is of Hungarian ancestry and is the son of the noted composer György Ligeti (1923–2006). He holds a master's degree from the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna, where he studied composition with Erich Urbanner and jazz drums, and a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Ligeti has done numerous cross-cultural collaborations and exchanges with non-Western musicians, experimenting with both ancient African traditional instruments and modern music technology.{{Cite journal|last=Ligeti|first=Lukas|date=2003|title=On My Collaborations with Non-Western Musicians and the Influence of Technology in These Exchanges|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41700067|journal=The World of Music|volume=45|issue=2|pages=137–141|jstor=41700067|issn=0043-8774}}

He travels frequently to Africa and has performed with musicians from Côte d'Ivoire (where he founded the experimental intercultural group Beta Foly), Egypt (with musicians from Nubia and the Orchestra of the Cairo Opera House), Zimbabwe (with Batonka musicians), Uganda (with Ndere Troupe), Kenya, South Africa, Lesotho (with lesiba performers), Mozambique and several other African nations.

His group, Burkina Electric, based in Burkina Faso, brings together electronica and Burkinabe popular music.{{Cite journal|last=Bräuninger|first=Jürgen|date=2006|title=Introduction: UNYAZI|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4540602|journal=Leonardo Music Journal|volume=16|pages=62–63|doi=10.1162/lmj.2006.16.62|jstor=4540602|s2cid=57563218|issn=0961-1215}}

From 1994 to 1996 he was visiting composer at the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford University.

In 2006 he was visiting professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. In 2008 he was a guest professor at the University of Ghana, where he collaborated with composer and musicologist J.H. Kwabena Nketia.

He resided in Southern California and was on faculty at the Department of Music at the University of California, Irvine,{{Cite web|title=Lukas Ligeti {{!}} Department of Music {{!}} Claire Trevor School of the Arts|url=https://music.arts.uci.edu/faculty/lukas-ligeti|access-date=2020-12-03|website=music.arts.uci.edu}} where he taught in the PhD program in Integrated Composition, Improvisation, and Technology (ICIT) until 2021.{{Cite web|title=Lukas Ligeti {{!}} ICIT|url=https://music.arts.uci.edu/icit/lukas-ligeti/|access-date=2020-12-03|language=en-US}} He currently teaches at the University of Pretoria in South Africa.{{Cite web|title=Lukas Ligeti Biography|url=https://www.lukasligeti.com/information/biography|access-date=2021-11-10|website=Lukas Ligeti}}

Ligeti creates music ranging from the through-composed to the free-improvised, often exploring polyrhythmic/polytempo structures, non-tempered tunings, and non-Western elements.Ligeti, Lukas (2016). [https://escholarship.org/content/qt5zq0v7sg/qt5zq0v7sg.pdf Polymeters, Body, and Mind: One Musician’s Creative Experiments with (Dis)embodied Rhythm]. In Proceedings of A Body of Knowledge - Embodied Cognition and the Arts conference. CTSA UCI 8-10 Dec 2016. Retrieved December 3, 2020Netshivhambe, Evans Ntshengedzen (2007). [http://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/bitstream/10539/5003/1/EVANS_NETSHIVHAMBE_Corrected_Thesis_Final.pdf Lukas Ligeti as a Unique Elecroacoustic Composer-performer: With specific reference to the instrument ‘Marimba Lumina’]. University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.

Compositions have been commissioned and/or performed at concerts and festival worldwide by the London Sinfonietta, the Amadinda Ensemble Budapest, Icebreaker, the London Composers' Ensemble, the Synergy Percussion Sydney, the Ensemble Modern, Kronos Quartet, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Bang on a Can, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Orchestre National de Lyon, Eighth Blackbird, American Composers Orchestra, MDR Orchestra Germany, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Håkan Hardenberger, Colin Currie, New York University, Subtropics Festival/Historical Museum of Southern Florida, Vienna Festwochen, Radio France, Tonkünstler Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic´s Ensemble 10/10, Present Music, Ensemble Mise-En, [https://www.contemporaneous.org/ Contemporaneous], Ensemble “die reihe”, Third Coast, Kroumata Percussion Groups, and a consortium that includes marimbists such as Eric Beach (So Percussion) and Ji Hye Jung, among others.

He has also composed for dance, film and gallery settings. He has collaborated with choreographers such as Karole Armitage{{Cite web|title=Karole Armitage by Lukas Ligeti - BOMB Magazine|url=https://bombmagazine.org/articles/karole-armitage/|access-date=2020-12-03|website=bombmagazine.org|date=October 2009 }} and Panaibra Gabriel Canda,Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. [https://www.ddcf.org/globalassets/Arts/Mapp-International-Final-Report.pdf MAPP International Productions 2014 Report]. Retrieved December 3, 2020 among others.

He has composed music for the European channel Arte TV, and created a sound installation for Goethe Institut on the occasion of the FIFA World Cup 2014 in Brazil.

He has collaborated with Lebanese sound artist Tarek Atoui,{{Cite web|date=2013-05-29|title=Visiting Tarab|url=https://www.urielbarthelemi.com/visiting-tarab/|access-date=2020-12-03|website=Uriel Barthélémi|language=fr-FR}} and has been resident artist at the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, where he created a site-specific performance.{{Cite web|title=Lukas Ligeti, 9-29 November, 2015 {{!}} Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN w Warszawie|url=https://www.polin.pl/en/lukas-ligeti|access-date=2020-12-03|website=www.polin.pl}}

As an improvisor, he has played with John Zorn, Henry Kaiser, Kurt Dahlke (aka Pyrolator), Raoul Björkenheim, Elliott Sharp, John Tchicai, Ned Rothenberg, David Rothenberg, Marilyn Crispell, Michael Manring, Benoît Delbecq, Gianni Gebbia, Mari Kimura, George Lewis, Gary Lucas, Wadada Leo Smith, DJ Spooky, Thollem McDonas, Jon Rose, Jim O´Rourke, members of Sonic Youth and The Grateful Dead, and many others.{{Cite web|date=2013-10-16|title=Composer, Performer, Improvisor {{!}} The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts|url=https://herbalpertawards.org/artist/composer-performer-improvisor|access-date=2020-12-03|website=herbalpertawards.org|language=en}}

He leads or co-leads bands such as Hypercolor (with Eyal Maoz and James Ilgenfritz),{{Cite news|last=Schweitzer|first=Vivien|date=2015-04-02|title=Review: Lukas Ligeti's Disparate Interests, on Display at the Stone (Published 2015)|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/03/arts/music/review-lukas-ligetis-disparate-interests-on-display-at-the-stone.html|access-date=2020-12-03|issn=0362-4331}} Notebook and Burkina Electric.  

He frequently performs solo on electronic percussion, especially with the Marimba Lumina, an instrument designed  by renowned synthesizer engineer Don Buchla. He is one of the very few musicians performing on this instrument.{{Cite journal|last=Lubow|first=Arthur|date=2012|title=Cross-Fertilization|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41550156|journal=The Threepenny Review|issue=128|pages=26–27|jstor=41550156|issn=0275-1410}}

CDs of his music have been released by Tzadik, Cantaloupe, Intuition, Innova, Leo, among other record labels, and he is endorsed by the drum sticks brand Vic Firth.

Ligeti was recipient of the CalArts Herb Alpert Arts Award in the Music category in 2010.{{Cite web|date=2013-03-23|title=Lukas Ligeti {{!}} The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts|url=https://herbalpertawards.org/artist/2010/lukas-ligeti|access-date=2020-12-03|website=herbalpertawards.org|language=en}}

Ligeti is a two-time recipient of the New York Foundation for the Arts Composition Fellowship (2002, 2008),{{Cite web|title=The NYFA Collection {{!}} Innova Recordings|url=https://www.innova.mu/albums/nyfa-composer-fellows/nyfa-collection|access-date=2020-12-03|website=www.innova.mu}} of the Austrian State Grant for Composition (1991, 1996), and was awarded the “Förderungspreis” of the City of Vienna in 1990, a 1993 award of the Republic of Austria and composition fellowships and grants by the Arts Council of Santa Clara County/California and the Austrian state.

In 2013 and 2015–19, he has been listed as a “Rising Star” percussionist in the Critics’ Poll of the leading jazz magazine DownBeat; he was also the winner of the NYC-based “UnCaged Toy Piano” composition competition in 2013.

Residencies have included Villa Montalvo (Saratoga, CA), the Emily Harvey Foundation (Venice, Italy), Acéfalo Festival (Santiago, Chile) and Sonoscopia (Porto, Portugal).

• 1991: Things Of Now Now – Nownowism
• 1993: Kombinat M – Hybrid Beat
• 1997: Lukas Ligeti & Beta Foly – Lukas Ligeti & Beta Foly
• 2003: Raoul Björkenheim & Lukas Ligeti – Shadowglow
• 2004: Lukas Ligeti – Mystery System
• 2008: Lukas Ligeti – Afrikan Machinery
• 2010: Burkina Electric – Paspanga
• 2011: Lukas Ligeti, Benoît Delbecq, Gianni Gebbia, Aly Keita & Michael Manring – Pattern Time
• 2014: Lukas Ligeti & Thollem McDonas – Imaginary Images
• 2015: Hypercolor – Hypercolor{{Cite web|url=https://www.lukasligeti.com/works/hypercolor|title = Lukas Ligeti Hypercolor}}
• 2021: Lukas Ligeti - That Which Has Remained... That Which Will Emerge...

{{Reflist}}

• [http://www.lukasligeti.com/ Lukas Ligeti´s Official Site]
• [https://www.facebook.com/lukasligeti/ Lukas Ligeti's Facebook Page]
• [http://www.mica.at/composerdb/details/Composer/composer22167.asp?cat=composer&letter=l Music Information Centre Austria on Ligeti]
• [http://www.starkland.com/st2010/index.htm Surround Sound DVD]

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Category:1965 births

Category:Living people

Category:21st-century Austrian classical composers

Category:Austrian classical musicians

Category:Austrian drummers

Category:Male drummers

Category:Austrian Jews

Category:Austrian male classical composers

Category:Musicians from Vienna

Category:Tzadik Records artists