jennyhorn
Posts: 76
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« on: 14:00:33, 28-02-2007 » |
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So many people come to mind that it's perhaps churlish to raise this topic.However,i'd like to go for a more unexpected choice:
Vanessa Reed who briefly worked for the BMIC helped get some great initiatives off the ground:New Voices and the Cutting Edge series.Thankyou!
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #1 on: 01:11:14, 01-03-2007 » |
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Absolutely, let's hear it for Vanessa. I'd also like to put a few words in for Mark R. Taylor then James Clapperton, who were the first younger pianists to start taking up 'complex' music, and for Richard Emsley and James Clarke, whose ensemble Suoraan, founded in 1978, really constituted the beginning of such a performing tradition, when most others were declaring the music impossible. All of these people paved the way for the rest of us.
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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jennyhorn
Posts: 76
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« Reply #2 on: 19:09:36, 01-03-2007 » |
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I'm pleased you agree with me regarding Vanessa:in some situations a big personality and optimistic diposition counts more than an encyclopeidic knowledge of contemporary music and Vanessa achieved some amazing things.
I well remember James Clapperton's performance of the Finnissy 3rd Concerto at both Huddersfield and Purcell Room (the latter was more slightly better i think) and i even have that horribly out of tune recording of 'Fast Dances,Slow Dances' which Richard Barrett reviewed in tempo.
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #3 on: 20:33:58, 01-03-2007 » |
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Another major mover and shaker, now too-often forgotten - Andrew Law, responsible for signing up Dench and Barrett at UMP (not sure if he signed up Finnissy as well, or that happened before he got there). And Richard Toop, who tirelessly strove to raise the profile and awareness of highly important but then less well-known composers in Britain and elsewhere.
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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autoharp
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« Reply #4 on: 20:53:52, 01-03-2007 » |
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A mover and a shaker of a more subtle kind is the pianist John Tilbury - think of how many British/World premieres he's done over the years. And he still encourages composers to write new works for him.
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xyzzzz__
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« Reply #5 on: 20:54:57, 01-03-2007 » |
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"ensemble Suoraan, founded in 1978, really constituted the beginning of such a performing tradition"
Any recordings of them out there? It would be fascinating to hear one of the first ensembles that played this kind of music.
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #6 on: 20:57:19, 01-03-2007 » |
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"ensemble Suoraan, founded in 1978, really constituted the beginning of such a performing tradition"
Any recordings of them out there? It would be fascinating to hear one of the first ensembles that played this kind of music.
There are no commercial recordings, but there are plenty of tapes in existence of them playing works of Finnissy, Emsley, Clarke, Barrett, Dench and so on (probably some Xenakis and Feldman as well). Some are held by the respective publishers, otherwise you might contact Richard Emsley (look on his website to find his contact details). |
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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marbleflugel
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« Reply #7 on: 15:34:52, 03-03-2007 » |
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I'd add Chris Shurety of COMA - a modest builder of bridges who's achieved a lot, often with scratch resources,
and I think he's helped broaden the audience and accessibility of new work without comprimising its own mission.
...and for the Brass Band movement ,let alone his accomplishments in Germany and the international circuit, Gary
Howarth for commissioning Birtwistle, Patterson , Tippett et al and opening the door for the modern mainstream
to contribute.
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'...A celebrity is someone who didn't get the attention they needed as an adult'
Arnold Brown
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time_is_now
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« Reply #8 on: 16:18:03, 03-03-2007 » |
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...and for the Brass Band movement ,let alone his accomplishments in Germany and the international circuit, Gary
Howarth for commissioning Birtwistle, Patterson , Tippett et al and opening the door for the modern mainstream
to contribute.
Indeed, although he seems to be getting grand. A friend of mine who recently tried to engage him to conduct a (fairly high-profile, as such things go) new-music concert was told by his agent that he, quote, 'doesn't conduct contemporary music any more.' |
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The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
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jennyhorn
Posts: 76
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« Reply #9 on: 19:21:51, 03-03-2007 » |
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David Atherton is another one who seems to have done his quota of New Music-interesting to hear that anecdote about Howarth- -even the famously picky Ligeti liked his conducting.
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