Sounds of Now: Lullaby
Manasamitra
http://new.manasamitra.com/about/history/
The Lullaby Project
https://www.manasamitra.com/our-work/lullaby/lullaby-sonic-cradle-2018-19-tour/
Supriya Nagarajan – voice and director of Manasamitra
Supriya Nagarajan, a Bombay-born Indian musician, who studied Carnatic Vocal music from the age of five, is the founding member and CEO of Manasamitra, a UK based arts organisation. Her passionate love of music drove her to achieve great things and the desire to help people from all backgrounds to find that passion within themselves.
Having built up a successful career in the banking sector it was in 2005 that Supriya founded Manasamitra as a way of fulfilling her passion for music and presenting traditional and contemporary Indian art, giving UK audiences an ambience of India, its tradition and culture.
In acknowledgement of her work as a creative entrepreneur, Supriya received a nomination for the 2012 National Microsoft Diversity Awards for her contribution to promoting diversity and access to the arts.
As CEO of Manasamitra, Supriya delivers a variety of arts projects and performances from visual arts to music both classical and contemporary alongside artistic interventions in social and community settings. Manasamitra has toured extensively across Europe bringing its unique cultural experience to non-traditional performance spaces in order to engage and inspire new audiences in public spaces, including the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, York Minster, Huddersfield University, National Railway Museum, Tatton Park and Kew Gardens.
Through Manasamitra she supports over 40 artists locally and nationally and is an active mentor in the local community to artists and school children alike seeking out ways to create career pathways and opportunities for individuals to overcome socio-economic barriers and achieve their goals.
Supriya is one of the most sort-out Carnatic vocalists in the UK and has performed around the world in India, Thailand, Cambodia, Europe and the UK. Supriya has worked with a number of artists from other genres creating new musical vocabulary and constantly widening the boundaries through collaboration. She enjoys setting her work in unusual spaces and has been commissioned to create music responses to the artists Andy Goldsworthy, David Nash and other sculptors exhibiting at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. She
also worked closely with a Cultural Olympiad project, Stanza Stones, exploring the Yorkshire Moors, the poetry of Simon Armitage and Indian classical music.
Duncan Chapman – composer and live electronics
Duncan Chapman is a composer and sound artist who regularly works with leading music organisations throughout the world. Much of his composing and sound artistry results in sound installations, recordings or multi-media performances. Recent projects include co-directing a large-scale performance project for Casa da Música (Porto) and the St Andrews Voices festival in Fife. Duncan’s other numerous projects include Dark Januaries, an annual personal composition project with Isabel Jones; But where do we get the water?: London Chamber Orchestra for orchestra, young players / laptop ensemble ; Rising Breath with Stewart Collinson and Mike McInerney at Seeing Sound 2016; developing and presenting family concerts (London Sinfonietta) exploring music and science ; leading the Fanfare project for young composers (Royal Opera House); Director, Link Ensemble (Britten Sinfonia) ; Performances with Supriya Nagarajan (Manasamitra) lullabies project at the Ultima Festival (Oslo); the Kamppi “Chapel of Silence” (Helsinki); anthem for the Choir of York Minster and orchestral lullabies (Iceland Symphony Orchestra). Duncan is also currently involved in touring White Cane (Salamanda Tandem) and performances for Spitalfields Music, HCMF & Firstsite Gallery. He also contributes to courses at De Montfort & York Universities and is an external examiner (Music & Communities) at Aberdeen University.
Lucy Nolan – harp
Lucy Nolan began studying the harp at the age of seven with Eira Lynn Jones after being inspired when it was featured in an episode of the children’s television show, Teletubbies.
After graduating from Oxford University in 2013 with a BA in Music, she continued to study for a Masters in Performance in which she achieved a Distinction. During her time at Oxford she was awarded the Margaret Irene Seymour Award, the Archibald Jackson Prize for outstanding postgraduate results, an Alice Horsman Scholarship and the Oxford Philomusica Young Artists’ platform. She was subsequently awarded an entrance scholarship from the Royal Northern College of Music for an Advanced Postgraduate Diploma in Performance in which she achieved a Distinction. Whilst at the RNCM Lucy was selected to perform as a finalist in the 2019 Gold Medal weekend, the highest accolade the RNCM awards for performance.
Lucy’s work to date has been eclectic and ranges from giving solo recitals and performing Handel’s Harp Concerto with New Chamber Opera to appearing on Hollyoaks performing her arrangement of Abba’s ‘I do, I do, I do’ and ITV’s drama, Victoria. As well as featuring in performances for BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4, Lucy has had the honour of working with
many inspirational musicians including, Sir Mark Elder, Markus Stenz, Gabor Takacs Nagy and Ian Bostridge and has performed in renowned music venues such as Cadogan Hall, The Sage, Bridgewater Hall and Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts.
Lucy is a keen orchestral player and regularly performs with professional orchestras such as the Hallé and Royal Northern Sinfonia. She recently worked with Manchester Sinfonia to record a CD featuring new works for string orchestra and harp and performed in a new multimedia opera with Liverpool Philharmonic players. During her postgraduate studies she was selected to participate in the BBC Philharmonic’s competitive orchestral placement scheme, held the reserve place for the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Future Firsts Scheme and toured with the European Union Youth Wind Orchestra in Luxembourg, Germany and the Netherlands.
Lucy is particularly interested in helping to develop new music for the harp and in 2021 won a Developing Your Creative Practise Award from the Arts Council to enable her to explore new collaborations and artistic partnerships and create more of her own music. She was invited to work closely with the composer, Paul Patterson, to prepare his solo work, Armistice, for a performance at the World Harp Congress in Hong Kong. She also gave the European premiere of his harp duet, ‘Scorpions’, as part of the Chroma Harp Duo, a piece for which they were awarded first prize in the ensemble class at the Camac Harp Competition in London and the UKHA prize for the best performance of a work by a British composer.
She is a founding member of the contemporary music group, SHOAL, who were selected to work with the Norwegian composer, Eyvind Gulbrandsen, as part of a Moving Classics project. They have since enjoyed working with a variety of composers and have premiered new works at a number of events, including New Music North West Festival, Bury Light Festival and Hull City of Culture. Most recently they were invited to compose and record music for a short film for Channel 4.
Lucy also enjoys collaborating with the singer, Supriya Nagarajan for Manasamitra, an arts organisation specialising in delivering a range of South Asian arts in innovative ways. They have performed at venues such as The Sage, Gateshead as well as Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and for the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth Palace.
Lucy is passionate about bringing classical music to a wider audience. She worked closely with staff and patients at the Intensive Care and High Dependency Units at Blackpool Victoria Hospital, performing and introducing them to a variety of harp music in a study measuring the impact of music in hospitals. She spent two years working at a school in North London as part of the Teach First Leadership Development Programme where she helped to establish an orchestra and secured positions and funding for 5 pupils in the National Orchestra for All, rehearsing with them in preparation for performances at Alexandra Palace and Leeds Arena. She is an enthusiastic teacher and has been awarded a Leverhulme Scholarship for her work as a harp tutor for the Junior RNCM department and RNCM Young Harps’ Scheme. As well as having private pupils, she is currently the harp tutor for Uppingham School and the Transpennine Branch of the Clarsach Society.
Lucy is grateful to the WM & BW Lloyd Charity Trust, Rotary Club of Darwen, Hilda Clarke Memorial Trust, John Frederick Leach Trust and RNCM Scholarship who have helped to fund her studies.
https://www.lucynolan.co/about
Isobel Mortimer – clarinet
Isobel is a clarinettist, composer and music teacher. Her work focuses on exploring non-traditional modes of performance, blurring the boundary between ‘performer’ and ‘creator’ and broadening access to arts participation.
Isobel has participated in projects such as Animiiki Physical Theatre’s Northern Theatre Laboratory, the CoMusica musical inclusion traineeship at the Sage, Gateshead and the ‘Women in Music’ mentoring programme at the Southbank Centre. Isobel has undertaken research into different modes of collaboration and styles of collaborative practice. She believes that inter-disciplinary exploration and collaboration is the key to creating exciting, original works which challenge and engage contemporary audiences.
Isobel’s work to date has included collaborations with composers, choreographers, filmmakers and artists. Isobel has delivered composition projects for groups with a wide range of musical backgrounds and ability, as well as working as an assistant workshop leader with the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and workshop leader with the Albatross Foundation.
Isobel is a founding member of SHOAL, an experimental ensemble who mix improvised music, physical theatre and inter-disciplinary exploration to create interactive and immersive experiences. Engagements to date include the Hull City of Culture Festival, Enlighten Bury Festival and the New Music North West Festival in Manchester, as well as their upcoming project ‘Seeking the Aether’ supported by Arts Council England.
A graduate of the University of Birmingham and the Royal Northern College of Music, Isobel now lives in her native county of Cumbria, where she teaches for Cumbria Music Service.
As an orchestral musician, Isobel has performed with the Northern Lusofonia, the Jersey Symphony Orchestra and the World of Women Festival Orchestra in venues such as the Sage Gateshead, the Royal Festival Hall and the Bridgewater Hall. She has given solo recitals and concerto performances across the north of England, and has participated in masterclasses with Mark Simpson, Gabor Vaga and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. Isobel has been the grateful recipient of a number of prizes and scholarships – including the Michael Hancock Bursary for ‘the most inspiring performance’ by a young musician at the Carlisle and District Music Festival.