Boulez at 100

As part of the worldwide celebration of Pierre Boulez’s centenary, acclaimed pianists Gloria Cheng and Ralph van Raat bring their touring program Boulez at 100 to MIT, hosted by MIT Media Lab Faculty Director Tod Machover. The program interweaves Boulez’s seminal piano works with music by John Cage, Morton Feldman, Frank Zappa, Magnus Lindberg, and Olivier Messiaen–composers who each echo, anticipate, or challenge Boulez’s vision across modernist, experimental, and boundary-crossing traditions.

Featuring chapters from Boulez’s rarely heard Structures Books I and II, the concert traces the rich artistic dialogue between Boulez and the composers whose music surrounds his own. Together, these works reveal Boulez not only as one of the twentieth century’s most influential composers, but also as an artist whose ideas have an increasing, surprising potential to resonate across generations, genres, and musical traditions.