While the highlight of Sunday’s Bang on a Can Marathon at the University of Maryland’s Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center came early, the rest of the program offered plenty to enjoy as well, even if the culminating performance was somewhat dubious. Just after the Bang on a Can All-Stars completed their innovative arrangement of Brian Eno’s Music For Airports, a rather more scattershot program called kicked off in CSPAC’s Gildenhorn Recital Hall, in which members of the Bay Players Experimental Music Collective and the University of Maryland Percussion Ensemble played a series of short pieces for small ensembles. Finally, a 6pm event featuring Glenn Kotche and Terry Riley closed things out.

My impressions of the day, after the jump.

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I’ll have more thoughts on yesterday’s Bang on a Can Marathon at the University of Maryland later, but the highlight of the day came early for me. Watching the Bang on a Can All-Stars perform a beautifully arranged version of Brian Eno’s Music For Airports was a real treat. This is not how Eno envisioned the music would be heard: it was not meant for live instrumentation, and was not meant to be listened to in a concert setting, with an audience sitting and watching the performers intently.

But the space in which the performers played made all the difference. The airy, modernist lobby of the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center was ideal for the music, and even passably close to an airport concourse on a quiet day, with its cavernously high ceilings and skylights. While a couple hundred people gathered to actually watch the performance, CSPAC is an active campus building and as such there was a constant hum of people coming and going, catching earfuls of music and then continuing on their way. The music functioned as soothing background music for these people, yet also stood up to close listening for those of us who chose to focus out attention. So even if the circumstances were quite different from what Eno might have imagined, the end result was exactly what he intended. (Except for the standing ovation at the end: that part might have taken him aback!)

For myself, I’ve always been partial to Eno’s Ambient 4: On Land, but the piano melody of “1/1″ from Music For Airports is so deeply ingrained in my head that it was all I could do not to grin foolishly when I walked into the CSPAC lobby a little late and heard the performance just starting up. Maybe the only way this could have been better is if it had been performed at sunset.

For the past few years, the annual Bang on a Can Marathon in New York City has had my mouth watering, juxtaposing performances of fascinating and often under-performed avant-garde classical music with shows by cutting-edge popular music performers (and generally blurring the line between these two categories). Last year’s festival, for instance, featured compositions by Harrison Birtwistle and Terry Riley alongside performances by Marnie Stern and Dan Deacon.

This Sunday, the D.C. area is in for a treat as a scaled-down version of the festival occupies the University of Maryland’s Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center for an afternoon and evening (from 2pm until about 9pm). A free performance of Brian Eno’s famed Music For Airports is among the attractions, along with performances of compositions by Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche (some of which D.C. concertgoers may have seen when Kotche performed a solo set at the Black Cat back in 2006). A lengthy Terry Riley piece, with Riley himself on vocals and piano, closes out the event.

The first part of the event, from 2pm-6pm, is free; the concert beginning at 6pm is $35. Check out the full schedule of performances here.

Also of note: on Saturday evening, the D.C. Society of Art Rockers hosts renowned electric bassist Michael Manring for a solo show at Jammin’ Java. Manring was long the in-house bassist for new-age label Windham Hill, but don’t let that fool you, as he’s also recorded with jazz luminaries like Henry Kaiser and Wadada Leo Smith and even heavy/technical metal musicians like Alex Skolnick (Testament) and Ron Jarzombek (Watchtower). This show celebrates the release of Manring’s latest solo album, Soliloquy, and starts at 7pm.