Premières

For this year’s Proms, Saturday 14 August was designated “Bach Day”, and buried beneath all the BWVs were two new works, by Tarik O’Regan and Alissa Firsova, both works described as ‘arrangements’. O’Regan’s approach, as he saw it, was to tease out ‘hidden’ musical lines within the opening movement of …

A world première from Stephen Montague is always an exciting prospect; while hardly an avant-garde figure, he’s highly unpredictable, and one imagines neither the BBC nor the audience could have envisaged what Montague would ultimately present them with in his new work Wilful Chants, given its first performance by the …

So, where were we? Ah yes, The Proms; my catchup starts with the concert that took place on Friday 6 August, given by the splendid Birmingham Contemporary Music Group. Oliver Knussen‘s Two Organa is a work all the more engaging for its entirely lopsided nature. The first ‘organum’, “Notre Dame …

This evening’s Proms première came from the pen of one of England’s most intriguing and engaging composers, Simon Holt. Holt’s music betrays little of the generic English sound that plagues so many of the ‘established’ (i.e. published) composers in this land—there’s no trace of the anodyne ‘Faber sound’ here. On …

At tonight’s Proms, almost a year-and-a-half after its world première, Gunther Schuller‘s Where the Word Ends finally found its way to England. It came in the hands of the splendid WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, under the direction of Semyon Bychkov, in his farewell concert with the orchestra he’s faithfully served …

The Proms season is upon us once again, bringing with it the lively hope of new commissions and world premières. However, a cursory glance at the concert season makes for rather damp reading, the commissions going to an unadventurous gaggle including Mark-Anthony Turnage, David Matthews, Graham Fitkin, Jonathan Dove and …

Two months ago, i reported that my ensemble, Interrobang, was to perform Steve Peters‘ remarkable ambient work, The Webster Cycles. It’s a work that’s entranced me since 2008, when it was released on CD, more than 25 years after its original composition date. It gets its name from the fact …

Regular readers of 5:4 will know of my interest in the music of both Ryoji Ikeda and Steve Peters. Later this week i have the privilege of directing works by both of these composers, at the next concert given by my ensemble, Interrobang. In the first half, we’ll be presenting …

A VERY HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO YOU ALL! The tradition of commissioning a new carol each year for the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King’s College, Cambridge, continued in 2009, with the renowned choral composer Gabriel Jackson chosen this year. His carol, The Christ-child,  uses an interesting text by …

Returning to the (more recent) archives, here are some interesting works taking a look back at the 2008 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Markus Trunk‘s Parhelion is most striking for its extreme delicacy; after a while, the prominent celesta actually starts to sound loud. The material appears as though formed from …

“Too many notes”, complained Emperor Joseph II to Mozart in response to his opera Le Nozze de Figaro; quite how he would have reacted to the concert that took place a little over a week ago in Glasgow University Chapel – featuring the Finale from Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji‘s Second Organ Symphony, …

Self-promotion time once again. Today i finished a new electronic composition, [ULTRA]—infra, a second work in the series begun last November by Negative Silence (detail). It’s being premièred next Monday at a concert of electronic music at Birmingham Conservatoire. i know many (most?) readers of 5:4 aren’t in the UK, …

James MacMillan‘s most recent work, the String Quartet No. 3, was premièred a couple of months ago by the Takacs Quartet on 21 May, at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. i don’t know either of MacMillan’s previous two quartets, but this new addition is a fairly ambitious work. MacMillan …

Here’s a real treat for those who prefer their contemporary music to be at the more intellectually rewarding end of the continuum. It’s music from a concert given at the ICA in London by Ensemble Exposé (plus violist Garth Knox), under the direction of Roger Redgate, who also discusses the …

Last Wednesday, the Beloved and i were at Bath Abbey, for a “Messiaen Centenary Celebration” given as part of the Bath International Music Festival. In addition to Messiaen‘s rarely-performed Trois Petites Liturgies de la Présence Divine and a keyboard concerto by J. S. Bach, the concert included the world première …

i’ve been interested in Thomas Adès‘ work for many years, so here are recordings of the world première performances of three of his compositions. The tale behind his miniature orchestral work These Premises Are Alarmed is interesting, if disappointing. Adès was commissioned to compose a piece for the series of …

Here’s the Scottish première of James MacMillan’s Symphony No. 3 ‘Silence’, broadcast last Tuesday. Don’t be taken in by that subtitle; this piece does the exact opposite of “what it says on the tin”. MacMillan is more concerned with the perception – within the human experience of tragedy and cruelty …