Marilyn Nonken. Photo: Sharka Bosakova.

On Tuesday 9 November at 7.30pm Marilyn Nonken returns to (le) Poisson Rouge, 158 Bleecker Street, to perform Frederic Rzewski‘s epic The People United Will Never Be Defeated! (1975) and the North American premiere of Miguel Chuaqui‘s Blues en el Corazon (2009). Tickets ($20.00; students $15.00) are available here; doors open at 6.30pm.

The People United Will Never Be Defeated! is a lengthy work of 36 variations on “El Pueblo,” a protest song by Sergio Ortega and Quilapayun; Rzewski (pronounced SHEV-sky) composed it as a tribute to the leftist Chilean cultural movement “Unidad Popular” under Salvador Allende. (Marilyn will be performing both the Rzewski and Chuaqui pieces in Santiago, Chile, on 2 November as part of the Chilean bicentennial celebrations.) When she last played The People United … in New York in 2005, The New York Times said, “Ms. Nonken’s playing was the victory of a survivor who had met every mood and outburst head on and with style, outlasting every obstacle.”

There is more about the Rzewski piece, including a short essay by American composer Christian Wolff, at the LPR Web page for the event. For a brief taste, here’s the composer himself playing the first five minutes or so of The People United … in March 2007 at the Miami International Piano Festival: