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Sound Affairs |
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Dave is currently performing with Sound Affairs, a company dedicated to producing and presenting the live performances and touring projects of composer Charlie Barber. Charlie has a deserved reputation for staging strikingly innovative concerts and events of new music juxtaposed with dance, music theatre and cinema. He has successfully toured these productions with various ensembles, not only around the UK, but also in Europe, Asia and America.
The first Sound Affairs project of 2008 is Bali to New York. With its infinite rhythmic patterning and metal percussion orchestration, Indonesian gamelan music has had a strong influence on many composers. The American Colin McPhee spent several years in Bali during the 1930s transcribing this luminous and fiery music including Balinese Ceremonial Music. In the following decade, under the spell of this magical sound world, John Cage and Lou Harrison collaborated on Double Music for an assortment of Chinese gongs, water buffalo bells and thunder sheet. Charlie Barber's Kantilan Karangan, a re-invention of traditional arabesques of Balinese music, is heard alongside the motoric rhythms of Steve Reich’s seminal minimalist classic Piano Phase and the eastward-looking Fifth Simfony by West Coast composer Lou Harrison. The concerts in Cardiff and Manchester include performances by gamelan groups from St David’s Hall and the Royal Northern College of Music respectively. Tour Dates Sunday 17th February 2008 - St. Donats Arts Centre, Llantwit Major Tuesday 19th February 2008 - St. David's Hall, Cardiff Thursday 21st February 2008 - Trinity College, Carmarthen Saturday 23rd Februray 2008 - Ucheldre Centre, Holyhead Sunday 24th February 2008 - Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester Saturday 1st March 2008 - Clwyd Theatr Cymru, Mold
The last Sound Affairs project was Ludwig, a short concert performed by a chamber orchestra of twelve musicians. This imaginative concert featured several works inspired by Beethoven's ‘apotheosis of the dance’ (Symphony No. 7) created by some of the most exciting composers working today: Graham Fitkin, Robert Moran and Orlando Gough and John Corigliano's Fantasia on an Ostinato based on the 2nd movement of the same symphony. A further highlight of the programme was Beethoven's work for Glass Harmonica (tuned glass bowls) written in 1815. The work was performed on video by specialist percussionist Alasdair Malloy which you can hear alongside a new set of variations composed by Charlie Barber. Also in the programme was André Boucourchliev's "hommage" to Beethoven, Ombres (Shadows), a transcendental and sustained piece for strings with a unique character. Ludwig Van, a surreal fantasy in film made in 1970 by Mauricio Kagel, received a rare screening as well as new video art from widelode. Tour Dates Thursday 27th September 2007 - De Valence Pavilion, Tenby Saturday 29th September 2007 - Clwyd Theatr Cymru Sunday 30th September 2007 - Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff Tuesday 2nd October 2007 - Purcell Room, South Bank Centre, London Wednesday 10th October 2007 - Wiltshire Music Centre, Bradford-on-Avon Thursday 11th October 2007 - Alsager Arts Centre Sunday 14th October 2007 - Taliesin Theatre, Swansea Saturday 20th October 2007 - St. Donats Arts Centre, Llantwit Major Tuesday 23rd October 2007 - Lampeter University |
