Contemporary Classics October 9, 2018 Alicia Jane Turner and UK Composers

I have to begin with my sincere apologies to Alicia Jane Turner and to my as I apparently have lost over half of my interview with her – particularly the part where we talked about her work Feed.   But here is the beginning of the interview.   As part of this  interview you will hear her work “Waves, Wakening”.

I did want to play a recording of the premiere of her work “Feed” which I found totally immersive.  Here is her description of the origin of Feed.   I also had a powerful visceral reaction to this work as I found it totally immersive and visceral and breath taking.   I was not the only one who found it breath-taking.  Talking with composer David Lang after the performance of this work, he was equally stunned by its power.

For the rest of the show I would like to feature other composers from the UK.    The second half of this hour will be a performance of Benjamin Britten’s Cello Suite No. 3 Op. 87. Britten composed the Third Cello Suite in 1971 inspired by Rostropovich's playing of the unaccompanied Cello Suites of Bach. Rostropovich premiered the suite at the Snape Maltings, December 21, 1974.  The Third Suite is in nine movements, performed without pause:  Introduzione: Lento; Marcia: Allegro; Canto: Con Moto; Barcarolla: Lent; Dialogo: Allegretto;  Fuga: Andante espressivo;  Recitativo: Fantastico;  Moto perpetuo: Presto  and Passacaglia: Lento solenne

The work incorporates four Russian themes, including three arrangements of folksongs by Peter Tchaikovsky.  This is reminiscent of Beethoven's use of Russian themes in the Razumovsky quartets. The final Russian tune, stated simply at the end of the set, is the Kontakion, the Russian Orthodox Hymn for the Dead. Philip Brett in his article on Britten for the Grove Musical Dictionary considers the Third Suite to be the most passionate of the three.

The performance on this show is by Ashley Bathgate, live at the Bang on a Can Summer Festival on July 19^, 2018 at MassMOCA in North Adams MA

The Surgery Sessions, Pt. 1 An album created in collaboration with Glasgow based performance artist FK Alexander.   A Neo Classical Feminist Industrial Film Soundtrack Experiment Ritual For The End Of And In Praise To Psychotic Episodes.   It was recorded Live In One Take - Sheet Metal, Violin, Boss Super Shifter, Strymon Blue Sky, Devi Ever Rocket, Digitech Death Metal, Line 6 DL4, Electric Toothbrush, House Keys, Rocks, Bricks, and Medication at Shoot The Moon Studios Glasgow June 2017.

In the first half of this show we had an interview with Alicia  Jane Turner.  We are now celebrating UK composers.  We opened this hour with a collaboration between Alicia  Jane Turner and FK Alexander.  Now we are featuring other Turner collaborators – Dead Light – a duo featuring Anna Rose Carter and Ed Hamilton. Alicia Jane Turner performed violin through their self-named debut album “Dead Light”.  The inspiration for this album came as a result of leaving London and all its attractions behind in order to find inspiration in the countryside for the songs.  First is the work "Slow Slowly".   Ed Hamilton writes about Slow Slowly “There’s something so nice about the combination of the warm, tender piano melody at the beginning and the building violins moving into noise at the end of the track. It’s a musical parallel for that sense of being in limbo that we’ve felt often since moving here… I wish we had some video footage of us making it, me and Anna standing in the room with our friend Alicia (who played violin for us on the record) waving our hands and arms around like some kind of deranged conductors and trying not to knock over the mics in the process! It was definitely one of the most fun tracks to record, which is funny because it’s one of the tracks where the sense of ambivalence and displacement that permeates the record is at its most prominent.”

 Next from the their self-named debut album “Dead Light” is “Falling In”.  Ed Hamilton writes about “Falling In”: “It was the first track we wrote after we left London. It came out of the initial recording sessions as we explored the dynamic of collaborating together in this new environment. So you could say it’s us establishing our sound – tape loops, delay networks, piano preparations, and the various creaks and cracks of Anna’s piano! There’s also a nod to the past on here too… The opening loop was made using this old 8-bit sampler that my friend James got me into when we made music together years ago, I’ve been obsessed with it ever since. It sounds exactly like what it is; an 8-bit sampler! Really cheap and over compressed, but sometimes that sound is just right!”

We are going to close tonight’s show with Harrison Birtwistle’s Refrains and Choruses, for Woodwind Quintet with James Wood & Netherland Wind Ensemble from the album Birtwistle: Music for Wind and Percussion                       

I hope you have enjoyed my conversation with Alicia Jane Turner (although cut short due to my error) and the other music we have featured on tonight’s show.  Come back next week when we are celebrating the Birmingham New Music Festival which runs from October 18-21^st.