prepared piano music | Misfit City

Tag Archives: prepared piano music

June 2019 – Daylight Music’s summer season in London, continued – ‘From Call to Choir’ with Dominic Stichbury, Ben See, Esmeralda Conde Ruiz, Archie and a clutch of chorals (15th June), Piney Gir, She Choir and Oly Ralfe (22nd June); Xenia Pestova Bennett, Ligeti Quartet, Snowpoet, Muted Summer Landscape and the magnetic resonator piano (29th June)

The choral ideas touched on earlier in Daylight Music‘s new season of Saturday lunchtime gigs are developed further with the ‘Call to Choir’ event, including a chance for you to join in…

“What happens when the call of one voice captures the imagination of others? Starting with one singer and finishing with hundreds, this edition of Daylight Music will see numbers of voices grow to fill every corner of the Union Chapel.

“Dominic Stichbury (Chaps Choir, Bellow Fellows) and Ben See (La La La Records) are exploring the themes of expansion, commonalty and togetherness through the human voice; and are gathering singers together to celebrate its infectious power. The performance will include an eclectic mix of singers and songs, including new material written especially for the event, featuring female folk/jazz vocal quartet Archie, Ben See, Esmeralda Conde Ruiz and the GrandMother project, Chaps Choir, Bellow Fellows and Brixton-based “all girl, all awesome” close-harmony choir Electric Belles.

“Would you like to join the biggest ever choir to sing at Daylight Music? All welcome. No choir/performing experience is required, just fill in the online form, turn up for the preparation sessions (on Friday 14th) and take part in the final event. You will learn some short songs in harmony by ear and prepare to sing them with hundreds of other voices in the wonderful acoustics of the chapel.”

* * * * * * * *

More choral covers blend with pianos, pop and psychedelia on the 22nd when Piney Gir gets her hands on the reins…

“Piney Gir’s perfect pop music is dipped in sunshine, so she was an obvious choice to curate a special event inspired by the Summer Solstice as part of our 10th Year celebration. She wants you to get playful, be creative, and come along for summertime inspiration and maybe even do a little white witchy spell with her in honour of The Longest Day.

“Originally hailing from Kansas, but having lived in London for many years, Piney is a prolific and prodigious musician. She has been touring with Gaz Coombes around the UK, Europe and America and is also one of Gaz’s backing singers. She has recently been singing with Noel Gallagher and Danny Goffey, and supported Ride on tour around the UK just before Christmas. She’s gearing up to release her seventh album, ‘You Are Here’, which is a celebration of analogue gear with a sound that nods back to when music was on the cusp of change, just before synth pop and just after punk rock.

“Her allies on this afternoon will be London women’s SHE Choir who sing their technicolour version of songs from Destiny’s Child to Fleetwood Mac.

“Oly Ralfe (Ralfe Band) will present music from his debut solo instrumental piano album. Sitting somewhere between the oscillating patterns of Philip Glass and the reflectiveness of Gavin Bryars, the album ‘Notes from Another Sea’ sounds like music for a film that has yet to be made.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=40nTda6-d_k

“Finally, Piney presents a special acoustic set from Premium Leisure (a.k.a. Chris Barker) who has honed his own sound: a mix of experimental guitars and undulating rhythms reminiscent of late ’60s English psychedelic rock with a bit of early Tame Impala or White Denim thrown in.”

* * * * * * * *

The last of June’s gigs is a typically Daylight fusion of accessible classical and experimental ideas…

“What if you could play a note on the piano and have it last forever? Pianist, composer and improviser Xenia Pestova Bennett will curate a special afternoon featuring the Magnetic Resonator Piano, an exciting new instrument designed by the radical inventor Andrew McPherson. A grand piano will be completely transformed into a stunning acoustic cyborg with electromagnets suspended above the strings, allowing for control of minute details of shimmering resonance and gorgeous sustained tones. (Click here for an article on the instrument, from ‘Keyboard Perspectives’, and here for a ‘World Piano News’ article on its use in the soundtrack for last year’s film ‘Christopher Robin’…)

“Also performing will be string ensemble Ligeti Quartet who, since their formation in 2010, have established a reputation for breaking new ground through innovative programming and championing of today’s most exciting composers and artists.

“Completing this afternoon line-up, Xenia presents Snowpoet‘s debut at Daylight. The London-based band, led by “mesmerising” vocalist Lauren Kinsella and bassist Chris Hyson, have released two critically acclaimed albums to date, with the most recent being ‘Thought You Knew’ on Edition Records. Blending sweet hook-laden vocal lines with warm and lush arrangements, the music is infectious, delicate and tasteful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia0YtHdcHUU

“Joining the dots this week between the other artists is something a little bit special. We’re pleased to welcome Muted Summer Landscape, an audio/visual collaboration between electronic music composer Brian Robinson and visual artist Steve Lee who transform and shape their audio/visual field recordings, melodies and rhythms into delicate electronic portraits that often reflect the natural environments that surround them. Inspired by the simple and complex patterns that present themselves when manipulating source material, msl create immersive narratives that evoke emotions, stimulate imagination and provoke thought. Taking into account the architectural surroundings and the nature of this event, Brian will deliver a solo performance of live ambient/spectral transformations based on material taken from MSL’s forthcoming audio/visual release, expected later this summer.”

* * * * * * * *

All gigs are at the usual place – Union Chapel, 19b Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England – with a suggested donation of five pounds (as ever, an absolute bargain). Dates below:

Daylight Music 309: ‘From Call To Choir’ with Dominic Stichbury & Ben See with Esmeralda Conde Ruiz + Archie (plus members of Chaps Choir, Bellow Fellows, Electric Belles and the Grandmother project) – Saturday 15th June 2019, 12:00pm – information here and here
Daylight Music 310: Piney Gir’s ‘Midsummer Madness’ with She Choir + Oly Ralfe – Saturday 22nd June 2019, 12:00pm – information here and here
Daylight Music 311: ‘Magnetic String Resonance’ with Xenia Pestova Bennett + Ligeti Quartet + Snowpoet + Muted Summer Landscape – Saturday 29th June 2019, 12:00pm – information here and here

Details on July’s Daylight concerts to follow in due course…

Tags: Andrew McPherson (technologist), Archie, Archie (band), Arctic Circle (promoter), Bellow Fellows, Ben See, Chaps Choir, Chris Hyson, Daylight Music (event), Dominic Stichbury, Electric Belles, Esmeralda Conde Ruiz, Independent Country, Jam Tarts Choir, Lauren Kinsella, Li Mills, Ligeti Quartet, listening to women, London (England), Loose Tubes, magnetic resonator piano, Muted Summer Landscape, Oly Ralfe, Piney Gir, Premium Leisure (Chris Barker), prepared piano music, Sarah Gonputh, SHE Choir, Snowpoet, The Slowest Lift, Vibracathedral Orchestra, women of heart and mind, Xenia Pestova Bennett

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – Marin Allsop and the LPO bring a batch of premieres to ‘Here and Now’ (16th January); Philip Thomas, Richard Craig and Damien Harron perform Morton Feldman’s ‘Crippled Symmetry’ (22nd January); Phaedra Ensemble and friends play Meredith Monk, Caroline Shaw, Jamie Hamilton and Fred Thomas (29th January)

11 Jan

Marin Allsop, 2018

As well as interlocking with the Southbank’s SoundState festival, next Thursday’s ‘Here and Now’ concert, performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Marin Allsop, is part of the orchestra’s year-long ‘Isle of Noises’ series featuring three hundred and thirty years worth of “landmark classics inspired by the British Isles.”

While other concerts in the series are likely to feature Handel, Purcell, Vaughan Williams and other longstanding canon composers influenced (in some cases) by their migration to the islands or (in others) by their responses to its landscapes, this early-stages concert is packed with – read, entirely composed of – premieres of brand new pieces. On offer are the world premieres of Arne Gieshoff’s ‘Burr’, Helen Grime’s ‘Percussion Concerto’ (with Colin Currie as soloist) and Anders Hillborg’s new twenty-minute concerto-for-orchestra ‘Sound Atlas’ (also including a battery of percussion, from the more familiar timpani and tubular bells to Chinese opera gong, vibraslap and paint tin).

In addition, there’s the British premiere of Estonian composer Erkki-Sven Tüür’s ‘Solastalgia for piccolo and orchestra’ (featuring piccoloist Stewart McIlwham). There’s also the European premiere of Louis Andriessen’s ‘Agamemnon’, a kind of actorless, wordless instrumental opera composed by Andriessen for his own 80th birthday celebration concerts in New York last autumn, and described by him as “a war-like piece, full of fast music and nervous terror” constructed (as mythology usually is) by a babble of competing voices. Here’s a little snatch of it from the New York rehearsals…

Earlier in the evening, Marin Allsop will provide a free “Behind the Baton” discussion on the evening’s music and on her thoughts on classical music’s future.

* * * * * * * *

Over the next couple of weeks, there are two interesting free concerts in the City, University of London Concert Series at the City campus in Finsbury.

Morton Feldman

The first, on the evening of the 22nd, is a performance of Morton Feldman’s ‘Crippled Symmetry’ by percussionist Damien Harron, flautist Richard Craig and Philip Thomas on piano and celesta. One of the composer’s late works (from 1983), it’s “a haunting exploration of stillness, tonal and temporal ambiguities, and musical patterning.” As presented to players, it’s a slightly disassociated triple-part score: each individual part fully notated but deliberately not synchronized with the others (leading to fascinating opportunities for uncertainty and chance).

As with many Feldman pieces, ‘Crippled Symmetry’ is also a long, attenuated listening challenge, lasting an entire hour-and-a-half. Here’s the 1991 version recorded by Eberhard Blum, Jan Williams and Nils Vigeland from Feldman’s original ensemble:

The second concert – a week later on the 29th – features string-quartet-plus-collaborators Phaedra Ensemble. In this case, they’re performing a programme of New York- or London-composed string-based pieces inspired by the human voice.

From the American side, Roomful Of Teeth member, composer-violinist and sometime hip hop collaborator Caroline Shaw provides 2011’s ‘Entr’acte’: in part, a humorous deconstruction and reconstruction of Haydn in which his sublime classical-era tone shifts struggle to place and reassert themselves within the unruliness of twenty-first century music.

In parallel, NYC loft music veteran and intuitive voice music doyen Meredith Monk contributes her 2005 piece String Songs. Originally premiered in London by the Kronos Quartet almost exactly thirteen years ago, it’s the piece which she transposed and translated her idiosyncratic and individual vocal ideas into string quartet context for the first time. Examples below:

The first of the pieces from the British side – the crinkling, conversational ‘Taking a nap, I pound the rice’ (with its quinpartite nods to the compositions and thoughts of composers from the aforementioned Feldman and John Cage to Anton Webern and Thelonious Monk, and of transformative British nature writer/‘Peregrine’ author J.A. Baker – comes from Fred Thomas, one of F-IRE Collective’s multi-instrumentalist composers. Fred himself joins Phaedra for the piece on prepared piano, accompanied by percussionist Maurizio Ravalico. As with the previous performance of the piece – listen below – narration is provided on tape by rising black British actress Ronke Adekoleujo.

The last piece, ‘Remainder for vocalising string quartet’ is a world premiere from composer/mixed-media artist/Phaedra co-director Jamie Hamilton. It explores “the many techniques that were developed with him incorporating speech, singing and vocalisations with instrumental playing” and continues to pursue his interest in how humans use sound as a measuring medium.

* * * * * * * *

Dates:

London Philharmonic Orchestra presents:
London Philharmonic Orchestra/Marin Alsop: ‘Here and Now: Isle of Noises’
Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, Waterloo, London, SE1 8XX, England
Wednesday 16th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here (‘Behind the Baton’ talk info here)

City, University of London Concert Series presents:
Philip Thomas + Richard Craig + Damien Harron perform Morton Feldman: Crippled Symmetry
Performance Space @ City, University of London, College Building, St John Street, Finsbury, London, EC1V 4PB, England
Tuesday 22nd January 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

City, University of London Concert Series presents:
Phaedra Ensemble: Monk, Shaw, Hamilton, Thomas
Performance Space @ City, University of London, College Building, St John Street, Finsbury, London, EC1V 4PB, England
Tuesday 29th January 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Anders Hillborg, Anton Webern, Arne Gieshoff, Caroline Shaw, Colin Currie, Damien Harron, Eberhard Blum, Erkki-Sven Tüür, F-IRE Collective, Franz Joseph Haydn, Fred Thomas, Helen Grime, J.A. Baker, Jamie Hamilton, Jan Williams, John Cage, listening to women, London (England), London Philharmonic Orchestra, Louis Andriessen, Marin Allsop, Maurizio Ravalico, Meredith Monk, Morton Feldman, New York City (USA), Nils Vigeland, Phaedra Ensemble, Philip Thomas, prepared piano music, Richard Craig, Ronke Adekoleujo, Roomful Of Teeth, Stewart McIlwham, string quartet music, Thelonious Monk, women of heart and mind

Comments Leave a Comment
Categories 2019, 20th century classical music, 21st century classical music, acoustic music, chamber music, classical (Western art music), electro-acoustic music, experimental music, festivals, instrumental music, music drama, New Music, orchestral music, previews, spoken word

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – baroque, folk and present-day music intertwine at the second Baroque At The Edge festival (4th to 6th January)

2 Jan

As regards classical music, this month appears to be opening with London’s second annual Baroque At The Edge festival across the 4th, 5th and 6th January. Dividing its time between the Clerkenwell classical-church venues of LSO St Lukes and St James Clerkenwell, it starts from a baroque basis but roughly postulates (as it did last year) along the genre-blurring lines of “imagine if Bach was a jazzman, Purcell a folk-fiddler, and Monteverdi a minimalist…”

Following on from 2018’s debut festival, there’ll be a return engagement with concert dramatist Clare Norburn. Having tackled the murderous guilt and glory of Carlo Gesualdo last time around, Clare’s new work ‘Burying The Dead’ (premiered in the West Country last May) is another deathbed dream drama: this time set in 1695 and focusing on the final protracted thoughts and hallucinations of Henry Purcell as “dream-like memories of the Plague, the Fire of London, family life and the vibrant Restoration stage merge seamlessly with his exquisite vocal and instrumental music.” Said music will be provided by London-based baroque ensemble Ceruleo, who commissioned the play, while actor Niall Ashdown features as Purcell.

There’s more Purcell-related goings-on via Cecil Sharp House choir director and Wing-It Singer leader Sally Davies, who with her chorally-minded pianist daughter Holly Cullen Davies is running an open-to-all English folksong workshop, focussing on the songs Purcell would have known and referred to. In a similar spirit, the festival’s closing concert features a team-up of Dipper Malkin (John Dipper on fourteen-string viola d’amore, Dave Malkin on guitar and vocals) and singing storyteller Nick Hennessy – all three keen folk-steeped reinventors, on this occasion exploring how “the sophistication of Purcell meets the soul of English folk.”

Several more cross-disciplinary players are taking part. Violist Liam Byrne promises a concert in which you can “expect anything, anyhow, from (Marin) Marais to (Nico) Muhly”, although he’s keeping schtum on whether he’s playing pure and acoustic or with the electronics or conceptual tricks which make up the other side of his playing. Path-forging post-classical singer Nora Fischer, accompanied by theorbo lutenist Mike Fentross, will delve into the world of seventeenth century song with “intimate and exquisite re-imaginings of works by Purcell, Peri, Monteverdi and others.”

Elsewhere in the festival, vigorous violinist Elicia Silverstein will join the dots between Bach and Biber (representing the baroque) and Luciano Berio and Salvatore Sciarrino (representing the contemporary), as demonstrated on her 2018 debut recording ‘The Dreams And Fables I Fashion’. Replacing a planned baroque piano concert from Gabriela Montero (after she had to drop out following surgery), her fellow pianist David Greilsammer provides his ‘Scarlatti:Cage:Sonatas’ dual keyboard programme which constantly interlaces the music of Domenico Scarlatti with the twentieth-century prepared piano compositions of John Cage (hardware, wood and rubber resonating and burring between the strings).

Less compressed information, plus full dates and ticket info, can be found at the festival’s homepage and Facebook page.

‘Baroque At The Edge’
LSO St Luke’s, 161 Old Street, St Lukes, London, EC1V 9NG, England
St James Clerkenwell, Clerkenwell Close, Clerkenwell, London, EC1R 0EA, England
Friday 4th January to Saturday 6th January 2019 (various times) – information here and here

Tags: Baroque At The Edge (event/festival), Biber, Carlo Gesualdo, Ceruleo, Clare Norburn, Claudio Monteverdi, Dave Malkin, David Greilsammer, Dipper Malkin, Domenico Scarlatti, Gabriela Montero, Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber, Henry Purcell, Holly Cullen Davies, Jacopo Peri, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Cage, John Dipper, Liam Byrne, London (England), Luciano Berio, lute music, Marin Marais, men and women singing together, Mike Fentross, Niall Ashdown, Nick Hennessy, Nico Muhly, Nora Fischer, piano music, prepared piano music, Sally Davies, Salvatore Sciarrino, viol music, viola d’amore music

March/April 2017 – upcoming London gigs – Piano Day fringes – Xenia Pestova’s Non-Piano evening (18th March); Sophie Hutchings, Arthur Lea, Xenia Pestova and others at Daylight Music (1st April)

13 Mar

“Why does the world need a Piano Day? For many reasons, but mostly, because it doesn’t hurt to celebrate the piano and everything around it: performers, composers, piano builders, tuners, movers and most important, the listener.” – Nils Frahm, Piano Day founder)

This year, Piano Day is on the 29th of March. I did a pretty exhaustive guide to last year’s event – I doubt that I’ll go to the same lengths this year (if you’re interested, have a look at the official site), but here are a couple of upcoming concerts related both to that and to its tinkly little brother, World Toy Piano Day eleven days earlier on 18th March.

Xenia Pestova presents:
Xenia Pestova: Non-Piano
IKLECTIK Art Lab, ‘Old Paradise Yard’, 20 Carlisle Lane, Lambeth, London, SE1 7LG, England
Saturday 18th March 2017, 8.30pm – information

“Pianist Xenia Pestova will play everything but the piano, presenting a wild mix of unconventional objects and sounds. The performance will include music by Helga Arias Parra for two aerospace engineers with prepared piano and live electronics, by Ed Bennett for the Indian harmonium and drones, by Christopher Fox for toy piano, Pierre Alexandre Tremblay for the ROLI Seaboard and fantastic world premieres from the participants of the first London Toy Piano Composition Workshop.”

Xenia is also one of the several pianists performing at the Daylight Music Piano Day concert at the start of April.

Arctic Circle presents:
Daylight Music 251: Piano Day with Sophie Hutchings + Arthur Lea + Xenia Pestova + Lorenzo Masotto
Union Chapel, Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England
Saturday 1st April 2017, 12.00pm – free event (suggested donation: £5.00) – information

“For centuries, people have found joy in playing, and listening to, the piano. Nils Frahm thought this beloved instrument should be honoured, and launched Piano Day in 2015. Daylight Music will be joining in the worldwide celebrations with a special concert of piano delights — including performances from Sophie Hutchings, Arthur Lea, Xenia Pestova and Lorenzo Masotto. From John Cage interpreted on toy piano, to retro rhythm’n’blues and southern soul to post-classical reflection from the other side of the world.”

Tags: Arctic Circle (promoter), Arthur Lea, Christopher Fox, Daylight Music (event), Ed Bennett, harmonium music, Helga Arias Parra, London (England), Lorenzo Masotto, Nils Frahm, Piano Day (event), piano music, Pierre Alexandre Tremblay, prepared piano music, ROLI Seaboard, Sophie Hutchings, toy piano music, unusual instruments, World Toy Piano Day (event), Xenia Pestova Bennett

Search

Misfit City

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – baroque, folk and present-day music intertwine at the second Baroque At The Edge festival (4th to 6th January)

March/April 2017 – upcoming London gigs – Piano Day fringes – Xenia Pestova’s Non-Piano evening (18th March); Sophie Hutchings, Arthur Lea, Xenia Pestova and others at Daylight Music (1st April)

Archives

Calendar

Blog Stats

Recent Posts

All Categories

Tags

Top Clicks

Search

Follow Blog

Blogs which Misfit City follows:

Blogroll

Search

Misfit City

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – baroque, folk and present-day music intertwine at the second Baroque At The Edge festival (4th to 6th January)

Share this:

Like this:

March/April 2017 – upcoming London gigs – Piano Day fringes – Xenia Pestova’s Non-Piano evening (18th March); Sophie Hutchings, Arthur Lea, Xenia Pestova and others at Daylight Music (1st April)

Share this:

Like this:

Archives

Calendar

Blog Stats

Recent Posts

Category Cloud

All Categories

Tags

Top Clicks

Search

Follow Blog

Blogs which Misfit City follows:

Blogroll