A party and a pledge - celebrating ten years of At Lunch

If you've ever sat in the audience of one (or more) of Britten Sinfonia's At Lunch concerts then you'll recognise the feeling of anticipation when a new piece of music is about to be premiered. Think about it: your ears are some of the first in the world to encounter what is going to be played, as a member of an attentive audience silently waiting to experience something new... And if you haven't had the pleasure yet, what are you waiting for?!

Britten Sinfonia is committed to commissioning music from some of the world's most established names and the best emerging talent. You'll find a huge variety of new music throughout each concert season, interwoven with the more familiar. So far in 2015-16 the orchestra has performed new music from the OPUS2015 winner Edward Nesbit, Anna Clyne and Daníel Bjarnason as part of its At Lunch series, which has been shedding light on new music for ten years, with five programmes to explore each season.

Britten Sinfonia musicians cutting the cake at the 10th anniversary party

In celebration of the tenth anniversary of the At Lunch series, on 20 January we hosted our own birthday party after the Wigmore Hall performance of Anna Clyne's This Lunar Beauty that included bubbly, balloons and of course, cake! We welcomed composers whose works had been premiered over the last ten years and displayed some of their scores as a mini exhibition. Since the first concert in October 2005 at Cambridge’s West Road Concert Hall (where every single At Lunch programme has been performed) there have been 43 new works premiered in 157 performances. Our Principal Cellist, Caroline Dearnley has performed in the most At Lunch programmes (33) and she joined us at the party alongside some of her fellow musicians and those who have helped make some of our music commissions possible: generous individuals who have donated to Britten Sinfonia’s Musically Gifted campaign.

A selection of scores from the past ten years

Since launching in 2013 Musically Gifted has raised nearly £50,000 from 135 individuals who have chosen to be part of new music from as little as £10. Ten of the lunchtime commissions have been supported through this scheme. At the party, we launched match-funding for the Musically Gifted campaign to the tune of £10,000 thanks to a generous, anonymous individual who wanted to boost our commissioning campaign for new music this year. If we are able to raise £10,000 before 31 March 2016 from people like you, we will be able to claim the generous pledge of the same amount. This means we need your help. From £10 to £1,000 every gift will help us get closer to our target. You can support Bryce Dessner, Elena Langer, Kenneth Hesketh, Sohrab Uduman (OPUS2016 winner), or Mark-Anthony Turnage, four of whom will feature in our up-coming At Lunch concerts.

So far we've raised £5,650 towards the £10,000 target (since 20 January) but your donation really will make all the difference and help us cross that finish line. We'd like to thank: Pauline Adams, Stephen & Stephanie Bourne, Robert Clark & Susan Costello, Eduardo G. Melguizo, Susan Maddock, Simon & Jenny Martin, Patrick Meehan, Trissa Orange, Sue Prickett, Judith Rattenbury, Roger Rowe, Paul Sackin, Barry & Ann Scrutton, John Stephens, Richard & Fiona Walford and three anonymous donors for helping us to get this far. 


A huge thank you to everyone who has supported Britten Sinfonia’s At Lunch series over the last ten years and all our composers and musicians who have performed so wonderfully. We’ve welcomed more than 25,000 of you to hear new music at lunchtime and hope to see many more of you in the coming seasons.

For more information about Musically Gifted and how you can be part of new music visit www.musicallygifted.org.uk and don’t forget that if you donate before 31 March 2016, your gift will qualify for match-funding and will be worth twice as much to Britten Sinfonia’s new music campaign.

Sinfonia Student review: At Lunch Two

At Lunch Two: West Road Concert Hall, Tuesday 19 January

Stephen Wilkinson

Although this programme, the second in this season’s At Lunch concerts, was created as a celebration of texture, thanks to the musicians’ skill and sensitivity it became a showcase of artful balance and ensemble. The 250-year timespan of the pieces, stretching from Bach to a new composition by Anna Clyne, showcased similar techniques and sound worlds which formed parallels between temporally- and geographically-distanced composers’ works, which was hinted at by the title of Ligeti’s Continuum. The result was a varied programme, which attested to the richness and intertextuality of the Western classical tradition.

Despite the spacious dimensions of the 500-seat concert hall, the musicians created an intimate atmosphere from the very beginning of the programme, which began with the welcome addition of the sinfonia from Bach’s BWV21. The instrumental movement set the tone for the rest of the concert, drawing the audience into the fine textural world of J.S. Bach’s 1714 cantata in its stately pace, which was maintained by the whole ensemble, despite the absence of a conductor and with no perceptible intervention from Jacqueline Shave. At the outset of the concert, the ensemble’s disposition outlined a key element of the concert. The soprano, Julia Doyle, was seated by the harpsichord at the rear of the ensemble, allowing her colleagues to take centre stage. This was a programme in which no divide was felt between the vocalist and the instrumental group, instead promoting a sense of unity, which added to the overall impression of balance.  

Julia Doyle’s silvery soprano was a perfect fit for the ensemble from which her first soft sighs of ‘Seufer, Tränen, Kummer, Not’ seemed to issue in the aria from BWV21. Doyle’s expressive singing never compromised the intimacy created by the ensemble’s sparse accompaniment in this movement, establishing a mood which was carried on into ‘Chi m’addita, per pietà’, the first of two arias from Scarlatti’s Due arie notturne dal campo, arranged by Sciarrino in 2001. Whilst Doyle afforded a slightly more indulgent, warmer tone to this Italian aria, she once again appeared to work with the string players who, even in monophony, achieved a beautifully subtle balance, which supported the soprano perfectly.  Doyle’s repeat was adorned with understated decorations and never detracted from the searching, internalised mood that was shared by both the first Bach and Scarlatti arias.

Sciarrino’s layered string texture, particularly in the use of harmonics, found an interesting parallel in Pärt’s Fratres for string quartet (played today by Jacqueline Shave, Miranda Dale, Clare Finnimore and Caroline Dearnley). An example of Pärt’s ‘tintinnabuli’, a neologism of his own coinage, the success of this piece was testament to the instrumentalists’ superb grasp of balance. The four voices were so unified that the impression was of one instrumentalist rather than a quartet. The steady unfolding of Pärt’s ‘tintinnabular’ variations was effected so skilfully that the entire audience was completely motionless, including four rows of schoolchildren, as the piece’s sense of expansive timelessness stretched out, a notable achievement in a lunchtime programme of only one hour.

The ensemble found a new, more expansive, positive tone in the second Scarlatti arr. Sciarrino aria, ‘Non to curo, o libertà’. The imploring, internalised vocal tone Doyle had found up to this point was replaced with an enriched, confident warmth as the piece swung onwards. Doyle’s postural change here, opening up to the audience and allowing herself more movement, also marked this shift whilst her vocal performance always remained as restrained as the elegant strings. In the absence of oboist Marios Argiros, this all-female outfit was reunited in Bach’s soprano aria ‘Tief gebückt und voller Reue’ from Cantata BWV199, in which the pious timidity of his earlier work is replaced by a more self-assured tone. In response to this shift, the ensemble’s accompaniment was generous yet never overpowering. In return, Doyle’s attention to the soaring, more expansive soprano lines, although allowed to blossom from the instrumental texture, never detracted from her colleagues’ sensitive playing. Bach’s BWV187 aria ‘Gott versorget alles Leben’ saw the whole ensemble united in this warmer, fuller sound which accompanied Doyle’s more lavish tone in her declaration of ‘Weicht, ihr Sorgen’ (‘Worries, be gone!’), with the soprano and oboe lines joyfully interweaving above an accompaniment which glittered with harpsichordist Maggie Cole’s rich spread chords.

Cole’s performance of Ligeti’s Continuum saw the harpsichord’s capabilities span from its role in Bach’s cantatas to a more modern setting. Ligeti’s piece is at once reminiscent of Bach’s keyboard works and of twentieth-century minimalist techniques. The piece’s gradual changes and sense of steady crescendo created a sense of Cole taking a Baroque invention in all its intricacy of form and demarcation of individual notes, and slowly melting it down until smaller elements are lost in a blurred and blended sound world in which only broad changes can be perceived. As the piece moved towards the higher registers of the instrument, the percussive sound of the plectrums falling back onto vibrating strings suggested other more recent realisations of the harpsichord’s capabilities with a hint of musique concrète. Cole’s flair and sensitive playing were rewarded with applause worthy of this accomplished performance.

The nocturnal theme from Scarlatti’s Due arie notturne dal campo was echoed in Anna Clyne’s new work, This Lunar Beauty, co-commissioned by Britten Sinfonia and  Wigmore Hall. As W.H. Auden (whose poem Clyne sets for soprano, oboe, string quartet and harpsichord) and Benjamin Britten were collaborators as well as close personal friends, there was a sense of reuniting the two as the Sinfonia that bears Britten’s name played Clyne’s setting of Auden’s poem. The piece neatly encapsulated many of the programme’s explorations, mixing suggestions of British folksong with a more modern, avant-garde sound world. The setting of the poem’s second stanza sees rising scalic melismatic patterns in the soprano, echoed in the instrumental lines, suggesting a raising of the eyes and voice to the lunar object of the persona’s meditation. These more expressive, confident voices then surrender to a once again personal, introspective mood.

This programme showcased the capability of a small group of musicians to work together in order to create a diversity of moods and to highlight unobvious intertextual and intertemporal links between a range of pieces. Given the amount that this programme achieved, it is surprising that it lasted only an hour. It is testament to the quality of the musicianship and the diligence of the programming that the lunchtime concert was not only intellectually appealing but also contained many moments in which a weekday’s inevitable busyness seemed to melt away. All of the musicians are to be congratulated for today’s subtle yet no less powerful, varied or transporting performance. 

Stephen Wilkinson (Sinfonia Student 2015-16)

A look back on At Lunch - James Calver

James Calver, Concerts Director, shares a fond memory from our April 2011 At Lunch concert...

Marcelo Nisinman (c) Karin van der Meul

One of my fondest Britten Sinfonia At Lunch memories was back in 2011 (in my previous role as Concerts Assistant), when Thomas Gould (violin), Huw Watkins (piano), Caroline Dearnley (cello) and Stephen Williams (double bass) performed a Piazolla-inspired programme with guest artist Marcelo Nisinman (bandoneon).  Marcelo Nisinman is internationally renowned in his field, and much in demand as a soloist playing with orchestras and at festivals around the world. He has performed with, Martha Argerich, Gidon Kremer, Gary Burton, Fernando Suarez Paz, Assad Brothers, and the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Charles Dutoit, and formed his own world-famous quartet ‘Tango Factory’ in 2009.

Moodily-lit, laced with thigh-slapping rhythms, percussive string techniques, and featuring a newly-written piece by Mexican composer Enrico Chapela, Nanobots, this At Lunch tour had an ‘end of term’ vibe, Britten Sinfonia doing what we do best: exploring music outside what one might normally expect to hear filling Wigmore Hall on a wet Wednesday lunchtime in April...

I turned pages for Huw, and found myself doing so with a certain uncontrollable Argentinian flare. It was that easy to become this immersed in the music and infected by the style and atmosphere, to the extent that I’ve never really felt so much a part of a performance than at this moment, particularly in the closing work of the concert: a dramatic performance of Piazolla’s Curato Estaciones Poteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires), in a version close to the original written and performed by the composer himself and his quintet. It brought the house down.

At Britten Sinfonia, we’ve often adapted and expanded At Lunch programmes into full-length evening performances, this being one of those occasions.  Marking the start of a new series entitled ‘Unbuttoned’ at the newly-built APEX concert hall in Bury St. Edmunds, we gave an intimate ‘in-the-round’ cabaret-style performance of the programme with a couple of additions.  Thom Gould instructed me to “show some chest hair” when I was about to turn for the final piece…the event was Unbuttoned in every sense of the word.  

James Calver, Concerts Director

Find out more about the last ten years of At Lunch on our website, and don't forget to take part in our competition to be in with a chance of winning two tickets to an At Lunch concert this season.

Fifteen hundred new audience members? Lucky us!

The Cambridgeshire Key Stage 1 tour funded by Cambridgeshire Music Hub and Esmee Fairbairn Foundation visited 9 schools between Monday 23 and Friday 27 March 2015. Each school hosted a 1 hour concert as part of Live Music Week, presented by workshop leader Jessie Maryon Davies and featuring five Britten Sinfonia musicians. 

***

Pianist Dinis Sousa sounds a little worried on the phone. He apologises that he can’t talk for long because he’s in the middle of teaching but he’d like to just run a few things by us.

“So, we’re doing nine concerts in five days?”

“Yes.”

“With three concerts in one day on the Wednesday?”

“Yep.”

“Fifteen hundred children in total?”

“Mmm hmmm.”

“Oh right.” 

There’s a short pause.

“Are we really playing Adès, Bartok and Debussy?”

“Yup.”

A longer pause.

“Cool! See you on Monday!”

***

It is grins all round on Monday morning when five exceptional musicians come together to rehearse Neoma and the Night Time, the concert they will tour with workshop leader Jessie Maryon Davies through Cambridgeshire’s primary schools. The tour will give over 1500 primary school children in nine schools (including two special schools) the opportunity to experience world class performance and explore great music in the kind of programme for which Britten Sinfonia is renowned. Today’s rehearsal venue may be adorned with a giant banana chart encouraging five to seven year-olds to eat their five-a-day, but the atmosphere is all professionalism with such challenging repertoire on the musical menu.  

Violinist Ruth Ehrlich suggests they begin with Bartók’s Contrasts. The fast, humorous Hungarian folk rhythms (originally commissioned by Jazz clarinettist Benny Goodman) will represent a mischievous rooster in the concert’s story. Clarinet player Kimon Parry laughs remembering “The first time I looked at this piece with friends at Music College in London we got as far as this third movement and decided it was too hard! We ended up in the pub instead.”

When the moment arrives to play the leaping, fast patterns tossed between clarinet, violin and piano during the performance that afternoon, one hundred and seventy pairs of small eyes widen. The excitement is infectious and a new, technical difficulty of playing the piece presents itself: trying to play the clarinet while smiling!

Bartók’s boisterous energy and colour, also evident in two duets performed by Ruth and cellist Caroline Dearnley, sits beautifully in contrast to Debussy’s Syrinx for solo flute which also features, representing the day-dreaming of heroine Neoma.

“It’s interesting” notes flautist David Cuthbert, “here you have one of the great cornerstones of the flute repertoire and you’re used to performing it in the hushed, semi-dark of a formal recital. This week I’ll be walking right in among the audience while I play to bring them as close as possible to the music. Their reactions will colour the performance, enhancing the wide range of tones, colours and textures. It really brings it to life.”

The power of the music and the young people’s reactions and engagement with the performances is no more pronounced than at the performances in special schools. At a key moment, children are invited up to conduct the ensemble with a simple series of hand gestures. Carolina is ten and has Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. Her face lights up as the music swells when she stretches her arms out as wide as she can and then suddenly drops to a whisper as she brings her palms in close. She dances on the spot and her delight is mirrored on the faces of the musicians. “It is extraordinary. These children never have the chance to be in charge of anything in their lives and now, in this moment, they do” explains a teacher. “It’s very emotional.”

As the story ends, the magic of the performance hangs in the air and children file out under the gentle wash of Debussy’s Clair de Lune. They have found their voices in song, been inspired to lead music themselves and their imaginations have taken flight on backs of the great classical composers.  

It is Friday, there is just one more school on the tour schedule and there is a real glow in the Creative Learning office at Britten Sinfonia. We have the good fortune to work not only with some of the best musicians in the UK but we are reminded, not for the first time, that they are also versatile and inspirational torch bearers for a bright future for classical music.  

Jen House, Creative Learning Director

You can find out more about our Creative Learning department and the other work they do on our website.

Sinfonia Student review - At Lunch 4

Britten Sinfonia At Lunch 4 
West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge 10/03/15

Harrison Varied Trio for violin, piano and percussion
Joey Roukens Lost in a surreal trip (world premiere tour)
Shostakovich Piano Trio No. 2

Britten Sinfonia’s Lunchtime Concert series came to a flourishing Easter climax* with the ensemble’s performance of varied and fantastic instrumentation. Parallels can be drawn from the contemporary nature of both Lou Harrison and Dmitri Shostakovich, however the success of this
lunchtime concert came in its eclecticism, not its continuity. The two composers, whose works comprised the beginning and end of the recital, were active during a similar time, however their music could not be more dissimilar.

Lou Harrison’s Varied Trio for violin, piano and percussion is a wonderful gem of a piece, with influences from Gamelan music palpable and Native American sounds coming to the fore in Elegy, the central movement. Gould’s playing was sensitive and engaging, remaining particularly accessible as was Watkins' piano interjections in Bell Bowls. The real star of this piece was the fantastic Owen Gunnell, whose playing was virtuosic and displayed consummate technical prowess, remaining involved throughout. Even when playing rice bowls with chopsticks, Gunnell displayed musicianship and ability. The sporadic and broken-up nature of the work was not a hindrance to its effectiveness, rather this added to its charm.

Lost in a surreal trip, on its world premiere tour, by Dutch-born composer Joey Roukens was full of interest and style. Characterised by sharp contrasts in atmosphere and mood, the work began in an ethereal-like haze, and shifted through a pulsating club-inspired sections, to pop induced rhythms, finally to return to the shimmering opening material once more. Again, virtuosity aided the successful evocation of the piece. It is interesting that the extremely eclectic styles exhibited in Roukens' work were aptly reflecting in the altering ensemble size throughout the programme, first with the addition of cello and then with the removal of percussion. Again, Gunnell’s playing was especially sensitive, with his vibraphone technique evoking both intensity and subtlety.

Shostakovich’s second piano trio is a work of sublime intensity, and this was well managed by the trio of Huw Watkins, Thomas Gould and Caroline Dearnley. Written in 1944, in the midst of
WWII, Shostakovich’s composition reflects the tumult of the age, with incredible dissonance in the opening movement, unfolding from the fantastic opening cello solo, entirely in harmonics, convincingly played by Dearnley. The trio was gritty and powerful, while real emotional intensity was realised in the slow movement, effectively a funeral march; the opening piano chords evoke total pain and sorrow, while the violin line weeps with searing agony.

This was the first concert in a long while where members of the audience were visibly reduced to tears it was simply that wonderful, and moving. The final movement was equally persuasive, with Watkins’ playing reaching transcendental heights in his rendition of the Jewish-style ‘Dance of Death’ melody that has become so well-known and widely recognised. A fantastic crescendo was reached towards the end of the finale, concluding a resoundingly superb performance that had audience members captivated and exclaiming their delight come the final few notes. The ensemble’s weight, mettle and intensity was admirable, however the overall sound still required a little more grit in the cello.

This was a wildly persuasive performance, and a hugely enjoyable and engaging one too, reflecting in its repertoire and instrumentation the wide-ranging span of twentieth-century and modern chamber music.

Carl Wikeley (Sinfonia Student 2014-15)

This programme will be recorded in Norwich's St Andrew's Hall on Friday 13 March 2015 for later broadcast by BBC Radio 3.

*The final concert in the 2014-15 At Lunch series will take place on 30 June (West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge) and 3 July (St Andrew's Hall, Norwich) and feature the young musicians from Britten Sinfonia Academy. More information.

Sinfonia Student review - At Lunch 2

Sinfonia Student David Roche shares his experience of our At Lunch 2 programme, which was performed on Tuesday 13 January 2015 in West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, and featured a new work by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho...

***

Kaija Saariaho’s instrumental writing is incredibly exciting and sophisticated, Nocturne is especially so and it proved to be an awesome opener. The rhythmically-loose, choppy, folk-style music moves into and out of broad musical gestures concomitant with spectral music: diaphanous trills between open strings and harmonics at a pace that prevents the lower pitches from ‘speaking’ properly; playing extremely close to the bridge in order to coax out a shimmering, unpredictable range of overtones (violist Garth Knox* calls this ‘irising’); looking to the sounds themselves to find an organising principle– all completely mesmerising in performance. The very strong hints of Scandinavian folk music were almost as striking, check out Benedicte Maurseth’s latest release Overtones to hear what I mean - similar soundworlds! Violinist Jacqueline Shave brought the work to life: a moving interpretation of a hefty composition.

Light and Matter was the second of two Saariaho pieces on the programme. The composer notes the influence of ‘the changing light and colour of Morningside Park’, especially ‘the continuous transformation of light on the glinting leaves’. The beautifully intricate, delicate instrumental writing and its evolution into dense, nebulous music certainly invites the listener make comparisons between the programme note and the composition - the hidden complexity of musical sound being used as a metaphor for light. The looming, resonating piano made me much more aware of the temporal nature of timbral sound: the attack and decay of its’ sounds drawing attention to one of the central precepts of the composition – gradual transformation. The trio gave a superbly assured performance of a difficult composition, the same being the case with the remaining works.

Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho

The Debussy suffered from a slight tuning issue with the cello’s low C but this did nothing to detract from the performance as a whole. I was particularly fortunate as I heard the sonata performed in rehearsal prior to the concert where there was no such problem, it was played impeccably on the first attempt and I was the only audience member at the time… which was nice (no iPhones or whispering). Caroline Dearnly’s vivacious performance and Huw Watkins’s perfectly-matched pianism cut through the bricky tone of the concert hall with ease, an extremely secure, visually-engaging performance that, along with the final piece, served to concretize the concert as a success. 

Fauré

The Fauré was, along with Nocturne, the best performance of the concert.  Well-paced, gorgeously subtle rubato in the strings; crystal-clear, perfectly appropriate accompaniment from the piano; the visual presence and fantastically lyrical performance from the cellist, especially in the first movement, really brought the piece to life. The interplay of the cello and violin gave the work a wonderful narrative drive, the performers responded to each other’s phraseological nuances, a dialogue that set their parts away from the piano – refreshingly liberal.

As excellent as the performances were, I was far less concerned with the Debussy and Fauré. To my mind there’s something considerably more interesting in the compositions created by living, working artists: they are able to defend and discuss their works, contribute to new depths of expression, new ways of making, and new ways of thinking. There is so much music one can engage with and the major, most frequently performed repertoire constitutes a very, very small piece of an outrageously tasty, terrifyingly large, yet-to-be-fully-discovered pie. 

It is extremely reassuring to see a successful professional ensemble commission works and dedicate so much to contemporary classical music. It was particularly pleasing to hear, firstly, a living composer’s music as the centerpiece of a concert and, secondly, a female composer’s music as the centerpiece of a concert – living composers and women are woefully underrepresented in classical music** (see Bachtrack’s most recent survey). It seems outrageous that the two things are uncommon enough to be worthy of notice. Also, having lived in a few other cities I can say with some certainty that new music does not get its deserved share of performances, especially performances by musicians as committed and excellent as those in Britten Sinfonia. The people of Cambridge are very lucky to have this music available and should endeavor to make the most of it, however demanding it may seem on first hearing!

*Explore Garth Knox's Viola Spaces here.
**Click here to read an article from The Guardian exploring our current male-dominated classical music industry.

David Roche (Sinfonia Student 2014-15)

Joey Roukens on composition

Composer Joey Roukens is writing a new work for Britten Sinfonia, which will be premiered on Wednesday 4 March 2015 in London's Wigmore Hall followed by performances in Cambridge and Norwich as part of our At Lunch 4 programme. Joey is one of the composers you can support through the Musically Gifted campaign. Find out more about Joey in this blog post as he answers questions about himself and his music...

How would you summarise yourself in one sentence?

I'm a composer with an eclectic (yet hopefully distinctive) musical language embracing the great diversity of styles and genres that make up our current musical age.

What’s your earliest musical memory?

Probably listening to my father’s vinyl records: mostly crooners, country and folk music. But I also remember a record of songs played by a Dutch street organist, which I was very fond of.

What do you like most about composing?

What I like most is when you stumble upon an idea that seems brilliant and you think this is going to be the masterpiece you’ve always wanted to write… only to realize the next day that the idea is not that brilliant after all and the piece you’re working on is definitely not going to be a masterpiece. For the most part, it’s not fun to compose: it’s an agony – 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration!

What inspires you?

Anything can be a source of inspiration – a good movie, a museum, a night club, etc. But what inspires me most is other music. When I hear music that really moves or excites me I get inspired to write my own.

When was the last time you experienced writers’ block, and how did you move on from it?

With each piece, I go through a stage of writers’ block, sometimes it lasts only a day, other times it can last many weeks or even months. Frustratingly, there’s not much you can do about it; it’s part of the creative process. What works best for me is to just accept it and take a break.

How do you feel about new music and what we’re trying to do with Musically Gifted?

In these times of arts cuts it is very important that projects such as Musically Gifted exist to make alternative financing of new music commissions possible. Musically Gifted is a wonderful initiative I can only applaud. New music that’s being written today must be performed today, for it has something to communicate to the audience of today.

What would you like to be recognised for?

Frankly, I don’t care. I just write the music I want to write and as long as there are listeners out there who think my music is worthwhile, I am happy.

What advice would you give to other composers?

I don’t think I’m in the position to advise other composers, but if I had to advise younger, aspiring composers, I’d say: Be open to the whole gamut of styles, genres and sources that the current musical culture has to offer. Embrace everything, question everything and write only what you want to write, even if you think you shouldn’t write it.

What’s your musical guilty pleasure?

I’ve got plenty: the lush film scores of John Williams and Morricone, Strauss waltzes, Bacharach songs, new agey ambient music, at times I can even enjoy a bit of Einaudi.

If you turned your iPod on now, what would be playing?

That could be anything from Renaissance vocal music to the new Aphex Twin album.

  

Favourite five tracks of all time?

That’s difficult to say because I have so many favourites, plus, they change all the time. So let me just give you my favourite composers. As of now, they are (in no particular order): Bach, Mahler, Mozart, Sibelius, Stravinsky.

The last concert you saw?

A concert with orchestral works by Dutch composers, including a piece by me, about a month ago.

If you hadn’t been a musician, what might have happened?

Either I would have become a researcher in cognitive psychology (in fact, I studied psychology at university, as well as music composition), or I would have ended up a tramp.

Which musical instrument do you wish you could play, and why?

The violin. Because of the enormous emotional range it is capable of expressing.

Is there anything else you want to share with the world?

No, enough said, just listen to my music!

Joey's new work will be premiered in March 2014 as part of our At Lunch 4 programme, which also features works by Lou Harrison and Shostakovich.

You can find out more about Joey's music by listening to some tracks on his website.

RPS Award Ceremony

Last night we were very proud to recieve the Royal Philharmonic Society Award for Ensemble. The award was presented to Britten Sinfonia Leader Jacqueline Shave and David Butcher, the orchestra's Chief Executive and Artistic Director by Dame Janet Baker at a glittering ceremony at London's Dorchester. Here are some photos from the ceremony;

David Butcher, Jacqueline Shave and Dame Janet Baker

Jacqueline Shave and David Butcher with the RPS Ensemble Award

Jacqueline Shave, Caroline Dearnley (Principal Cello) and David Butcher with Beethoven's bust

Read all about our award here

 All photos (c) Simon Jay Price

www.rpsmusicawards.com

Read All About Red!

A Britten Sinfonia quartet consisting of Miranda Dale, Alexandra Reid, Sarah-Jane Bradley and Caroline Dearnley performed with singer-songwriter Emma Salokoski and guitarist / theremonist Jarmo Saari as part of the London Design Festival last week. The red dress designed by Aamu Song and Johan Olin is made up of 550 metres of plush red fabric and appeared in London for the first time as part of a series of events promoted by the Finnish Institute; eerily, but beautifully transforming the interior of the 1930s music hall, York Hall in Bethnal Green.


The dress, which has become a national treasure in Finland has appeared at several European venues including the Design Museum in Helsinki (2007), the Ourfestival in Tuusulanjärvi, Finland (2008), Elizabeth Church in Designmai, Berlin, Germany (2008) and Muziekgebouw Frits Philips, Eindhoven, Netherlands (2010).

Audience members experienced the hour-long concert from pockets around the skirt of the dress, the bodice of which was raised above floor level seamlessly rotating and pivoting as Emma delivered her performance of a number of Nordic tracks.

Highlights included a new piece entitled ‘Red’ written by Lauri Salokoski, Emma’s brother and a number of other tracks, some with ancient Finnish lyrics, many of which had been arranged to feature string quartet, previously performed at the Lake Tuusula Chamber Music Festival, curated by virtuosic violinist Pekka Kuusisto.

Britten Sinfonia got into the red spirit, dressed completely in red, with the addition of a rather fetching red hairpiece on the final night.

Events concluded with a red cocktail at a trendy East London bar. Certainly not an event to be forgotten and hopefully the beginning of a long lasting friendship with this inspirational team of artists.

Many thanks to all involved, especially Hanna Harris and Suvi Saloneimi at the Finnish Institute.

James Calver
Concerts Assistant

Photos copyright Thomas Skovsende

First day in Mexico

The orchestra arrived safely in Mexico City on Wednesday evening and yesterday they set to work rehearsing with violinist Henning Kraggerud for the first concert to be held tonight at the Anfiteatro Simon Bolivar. The concert is to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the British Chamber of Commerce in Mexico.

Anfiteatro Simon Bolivar

Britten Sinfonia rehearsing

Henning Kraggerud and the viola section

Thomas Gould and Beatrix Lovejoy

Celebrating Chopin

2010 is Chopin year – to be precise the 200th anniversary of his birth.With nearly 9 months of 2010 gone, Britten Sinfonia have so far not performed any of Chopin’s music in celebration of this significant event. And in actual fact we had not planned to do so, not as a snub to Chopin and his wonderful music, but just couldn’t be fitted into our schedules or programming.

Then a couple of days ago Peter Maxwell Davies sent us his new work which we had co-commissioned with Wigmore Hall for our award-winning At Lunch series. His new work is entitled Nocturne No. 1 and is his immediate ‘hats off’ reaction to Chopin’s piano works, songs and cello music.

Many of Chopin’s works involve the piano and all demand considerable technical expertise and expressive depth. I’m sure Max’s piece, which is scored for Piano Quartet will be no different and our players Huw Watkins (piano), Jacqueline Shave (violin), Martin Outram (viola) and Caroline Dearnley (cello) are looking forward to discovering the nuances of this new piece.

So in typical Britten Sinfonia style the orchestra will be celebrating Chopin’s anniversary with music inspired by him. You can come and enjoy these concerts at London’s Wigmore Hall on 6 October, Norwich’s Assembly House on 8 October, Cambridge’s West Road Concert Hall on Tuesday 12 October and Birmingham’s Town Hall on Friday 15 October.
The programme will also include Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet which is acknowledged as a masterpiece and probably his best known chamber work alongside a set of miniatures from James MacMillan, each dedicated to important figures in his life. You can find out more about this concert here