Ferneyhough Week – La terre est un homme
This week sees the 70th birthday of one of the UK’s most significant composers, Brian Ferneyhough. For nearly fifty years, his music has been thrilling & discombobulating audiences in not entirely...
View ArticleFerneyhough Week – Exordium
La terre est un homme is an unusual work in Brian Ferneyhough’s output, inasmuch as he has only written for orchestra on two occasions (his other orchestral work will be featured later this week). The...
View ArticleFerneyhough Week – Prometheus
Today i’m going to focus on a relatively early work of Ferneyhough’s, Prometheus for wind sextet, composed in 1967. It’s not a piece that’s performed terribly often, nor is there much information about...
View ArticleFerneyhough Week – Missa Brevis
From one of Brian Ferneyhough’s less familiar works i’m turning today to one of the best known, the Missa Brevis, composed in 1969. The very fact that Ferneyhough turned to a form & text so...
View ArticleFerneyhough Week – Plötzlichkeit (UK Première)
A principal thread running through much of Brian Ferneyhough’s music is one that plays with notions of linear narrative. It has been present as far back as the Sonatas for String Quartet, composed in...
View Article5:4 at HCMF 2013 – Ensemble Linea + Irvine Arditti
The final concert yesterday took place, once again, in St Paul’s Hall, featuring Ensemble Linea, conducted by Jean-Philippe Wurtz. It featured three new works, by Brian Ferneyhough, Raphaël Cendo &...
View Article5:4 at HCMF 2013 – Quatuor Diotima
This morning saw Brian Ferneyhough back at St Paul’s Hall, his music this time being performed by the outstanding Quatuor Diotima, alongside works by Gérard Pesson, Miroslav Smka & György Ligeti....
View ArticleHCMF 2014: Shorts, Feldman’s Pianos, asamisimasa
Yesterday was HCMF’s annual day of ‘Shorts’, concerts of between 20 and 40 minutes, affording the opportunity to hear an exceptionally diverse range of music. Taken as a whole, it’s a cross between an...
View ArticleEnsemble Exposé: Brian Ferneyhough – Incipits (UK Première) plus Davies,...
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...
View ArticleProms 2010: Weir, Musgrave, Northcott, Ferneyhough, Taverner, Harvey and Jackson
The final Proms Saturday Matinee, two days ago, featured the BBC Singers, exploring a variety of contemporary works inspired by early music. The singers were joined for the occasion by the Arditti...
View ArticleNew releases: NEOS box sets – Donaueschinger Musiktage 2014, Darmstadt Aural...
What with the increase in listeners turning away from physical releases in favour of digital downloads, and in light of yet another (admittedly somewhat spurious) article this week offhandedly...
View ArticleA mass of miniature miracles: Alba New Music 2016
A couple of miles out of the centre of Edinburgh, emblazoned in brightly-lit capital letters, is a stark, startling sentence: THERE WILL BE NO MIRACLES HERE. Created by Nathan Coley in 2009, and...
View ArticleGigs, gigs, gigs: Spring 2017
There are lots of exciting events coming up in the next few months, approaching new music from a plethora of different angles. Next month the Royal Opera House will be giving the first UK performances...
View ArticleWittener Tage für neue Kammermusik 2017 (Part 1)
i’ve recently got back from the annual Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik (Witten Days for New Chamber Music), Germany’s annual three-day blow out celebrating the newest iterations of the idiom. It was...
View ArticleRecognition, raw ambition and raw power: Alba New Music 2017
Last weekend brought the welcome return of Alba New Music, Edinburgh’s nascent new music festival. Having got the ball rolling with a bang last year, the 2017 festival as a whole felt more focused, in...
View ArticleHCMF 2017: The Otheroom, Ensemble Modern + Arditti Quartet, zeitkratzer...
Yesterday at HCMF was unusual, personally speaking, as for the most part it involved hearing music not for the first time. In the evening at St Paul’s Hall, Ensemble Modern and the Arditti Quartet gave...
View ArticleBrian Ferneyhough – Fanfare for Klaus Huber
Today is the 75th birthday of one of the UK’s most consistently remarkable, bewildering, surprising and moving composers, Brian Ferneyhough. By way of a miniature celebration, here are two recordings...
View ArticleFerneyhough Week – Plötzlichkeit (UK Première)
A principal thread running through much of Brian Ferneyhough’s music is one that plays with notions of linear narrative. It has been present as far back as the Sonatas for String Quartet, composed in...
View ArticleListening, isolated: solo music by Brian Ferneyhough, Sam Hayden, Olga...
Considering that most of us have been spending the last 12 months in varying forms of isolation, it seems a fitting time to focus on music for solo instruments. German label Kairos clearly feels the...
View ArticleHCMF 2013: Ensemble Linea + Irvine Arditti
The final concert yesterday took place, once again, in St Paul’s Hall, featuring Ensemble Linea, conducted by Jean-Philippe Wurtz. It featured three new works, by Brian Ferneyhough, Raphaël Cendo and...
View Article
