FELDMAN Violin and String Quartet (135’)
One of the greatest modernist composers of the 20th century, Morton Feldman often likened his music to studying the detail of Persian carpets, in which sequences of repeated shapes and colours create vast and endlessly fascinating patterns. Likewise, Feldman’s mind-bending music stretches time through tiny fragments that shimmer with hypnotic beauty. This is a rare chance to hear one of his immense works performed in full by the fantastic musicians of Apartment House, and we invite you, as Feldman always intended, to listen in a way that makes you feel comfortable, with the option to take breaks for refreshments from the bar.
Presented in partnership with Another Timbre records and University of Sheffield Concerts.
Part of Classical Weekend, Sheffield’s biennial celebration of live music-making, 17 – 19 March 2023.
Programme of music by CoMA’s Sheffield, Manchester & Allcomers participants including work by Cyborg Soloists composer Mark Dyer.
Join CoMA (Contemporary Music for All) for this programme of works that interweaves explorations of the human voice into the unique colours of an open ensemble. CoMA Sheffield and CoMA Manchester are joined by composer Mark Dyer (of the Cyborg soloists project), and will present his piece Mensura for voice and wearable metronome alongside other works by Sheffield and Manchester based composers, including a world premiere by Peter Bourne.
The programme will also include two pieces by the CoMA Allcomers Ensemble made up of players from all around Sheffield who have joined the ensemble for the day.*
Scores will be available for audience members to peruse during the concert.
*If you would like to join the Allcomers ensemble, please email ellen@musicintheround.co.uk to receive more details.
SUPRIYA NAGARAJAN vocals
DUNCAN CHAPMAN field recordings & electronics
LUCY NOLAN harp
ISOBEL MORTIMER bass clarinet
Inspired by traditional Indian lullabies, this is an entrancing evening of music in which the hypnotic purity of Indian music meets contemporary electronica and live instrumental improvisation.
Timeless night-time sounds from around the world – chirping cicadas, the call of the night jar, the soft fall of rain – have been captured and located within the rhythmic pattern and soothing cadence of a lullaby to create an immersive experience that both soothes and stimulates. The space is yours to do as you please – sit, stand, lie down, slump into cushions and drift off, or remain alert and engaged throughout.
Devised by Supriya Nagarajan, a composer and southern Indian singer of the Carnatic tradition, who formed Manasamitra with musicians based in the north of England, including the electro-acoustic composer Duncan Chapman, the project also features a collection of sounds gathered in and around Sheffield prior to the event, to create a bespoke soundscape unique to Sheffield for this performance.
Find out more.
ESIN GUNDUZ En-he-du-an-na-me-en
MIRA CALIX code poem: any chance of war?
LAURA BOWLER Cover Squirrel
Set includes improvisations by Angharad Davies
(A woman sits alone in the room. She tries to speak. Her voice is gone.)
Mezzo-soprano Rosie Middleton and violinist Angharad Davies perform a sequence of works that explore the sonic force of the human voice and how easily it can be silenced.
Esin Gunduz examines power and resistance in music that transforms Rosie’s voice through electronic manipulation. Semaphore, morse code and other non-verbal communication inform Mira Calix’s anti-war musical poem. In Cover Squirrel by Laura Bowler, the human voice switches from operatic power to broken and unintelligible fragments. This provocative performance blends music and physical gesture by two captivating, exceptional performers.
Watch and listen to short clips of work from the performers and find out more about the Voice(less) project here.
BEETHOVEN Sextet in E flat Op.71 (18’)
BEETHOVEN Octet in E flat Op.103 (23’)
MOZART ‘Harmoniemusik‘ from The Marriage of Figaro (18’)
Music for wind instruments (Harmoniemusik) was regularly composed in the 18th and 19th centuries, and Beethoven’s Sextet and Octet are two of the finest examples of this genre. The Sextet was reviewed at its premiere as “distinguished by fine melodies and a wealth of new and surprising ideas”, and the Octet is just as lyrical.
This concert features guest appearances from participants in Music in the Round’s Wind Development programme, Bridging the Gap: Tamara Sullivan (oboe), Ola Akindipe (clarinet) Ben Garalnick (horn) and Florence Plane (bassoon).
A bar will be serving beer, wine and soft drinks from 6.30pm.
Adagio. Allegro
Adagio
Menuetto. Quasi Allegretto
Rondo. Allegro
When Beethoven sent the score of his Sextet to the publisher Breitkopf & Härtel in 1809, he was modest about it: ‘The Sextet is from my early days and, moreover, it was written in a single night. There is really no other way to say that it written by a composer who produced some better works.’
Scored for pairs of clarinets, bassoons and horns, it was composed in 1796 (the high opus number is misleading). The Sextet is an elegantly crafted piece in which the young Beethoven also explores some unusual sonorities, not least the rich lower registers of all six instruments in the Adagio where the bassoon presents the main theme. The vigorous Minuet and Trio is launched by the sound of hunting horns, while the Rondo is a spirited movement, bringing this little-known work to a cheerful close.
© Nigel Simeone
Allegro
Andante
Minuet
Presto
The high opus number of Beethoven’s Octet for two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons and two horns is misleading since it is one of the composer’s earliest pieces from his Vienna years: he started it while still in Bonn – and finished it in 1793, shortly after his arrival in the Austrian capital. It was reworked two years later as the String Quintet Op.4. Woodwind chamber music was all the rage in the late eighteenth century, nowhere more so than in Vienna, and it was usually written for performance outdoors. Like Haydn, Mozart and many others, the young Beethoven fulfilled the late eighteenth-century taste for Harmoniemusik (music for wind band) with cheerful, relatively undemanding works, of which his most substantial was this Octet.
Beethoven’s Octet was completed just when he started to take lessons from Haydn – and the wisdom and subtlety gained from those can be heard in his string quintet transcription (despite Beethoven’s far-fetched claim that he ‘learned nothing’ from his sessions with Haydn). But the Octet in its original version is one of Beethoven’s freshest early works. He clearly had good players in mind – the orchestras in Bonn and Vienna at the time evidently had wind sections with a taste for virtuosity, as can be heard especially in the delightful finale of this four-movement work. The first movement is engaging and straightforward, while the lyrical Andante has particularly prominent parts for oboe and bassoon. The Minuet is interesting: it’s already a long way from the courtly dance of its title, and an early example of what Beethoven would soon develop into the scherzos familiar from his symphonies.
© Nigel Simeone
Harmoniemusik – music for wind ensemble – was something that delighted Mozart, both as a composer (producing what are perhaps the finest serenades for woodwind ever written) and as someone who was willingly entertained by the arrangements that were often made of favourite numbers from operas of the day. Mozart himself alludes to this in a delightful way with the musical entertainment during the banquet in Act Two of Don Giovanni when a wind band plays tunes from operas by Soler, Sarti and also the aria ‘Non più andrai’ from Mozart’s own Nozze di Figaro.
Contemporary wind arrangements of Mozart’s music proliferated, including extracts from Figaro, Don Giovanni and Die Entführung aus dem Serail, while a selection of Harmonie arrangements from Die Zauberflöte was advertised in the Wiener Zeitung in January 1792. All provide delightful music for entertainment and sometimes include interesting clues about performance practice (giving an oboist, for example, an ornamented vocal line that included decorations as performed by singers but not included in the printed score of the opera itself). The identity of early arrangers is sometimes hard to determine, though the oboist Johann Wendt was particularly important as chief arranger for the Harmonie established by Emperor Joseph II in 1782. The best Harmonie arrangements, by Wendt and others, remain a charming way to experience operatic music in a new guise.
© Nigel Simeone
Sounds of Now: series launch with Elaine Mitchener and Apartment House
Following the recent closure of Theatre Deli’s Eyre Street venue, we can now confirm that this concert will take place at Channing Hall, 45 Surrey Street, S1 2LG.
All existing ticket holders are being contacted by Sheffield Theatres’ box office who will be re-issuing tickets. Thank you for your patience and understanding.
CHARLES MINGUS String Quartet No.1
BENJAMIN PATTERSON Duet
JEANNE LEE Mingus Meditations
LOUISE BOURGEOIS Insomnia Drawings
ARCHIE SHEPP Blasé
ELAINE MITCHENER Thought Words
KATALIN LADIK Genesis 04
CHRISTIAN WOLFF I like to think of Harriet Tubman
Sounds of Now is a platform for musicians who are creating and exploring some of the most exciting artistic ideas today, nurturing talent, inspiring new thinking and provoking debate. This new series from Music in the Round is your invitation to engage and connect with music in new ways.
Elaine Mitchener launches the series with a programme that spans the jazz of Charles Mingus to interpretations of artwork by Louise Bourgeois.
Fusing music, theatre, dance and art, Mitchener is an enthralling performer who manipulates her voice to evoke an incredible range of characters and emotions. She has collaborated with leading composers such as George Lewis and Tansy Davies and artists Christian Marclay and Marina Abramović.
A bar will be open before the advertised start time.
Listen to extracts from the performers about the work they will be performing and tell us what you think online.
Featuring Craig Ogden & Miloš Milivojević
Presented by Polly Ives
Classical guitarist Craig Ogden has recorded six chart-topping CDs for Classic FM. He teams up with award-winning classical accordionist Miloš Milivojević for this relaxed concert for babies and their grown-ups.
Find out more about 
Featuring Craig Ogden & Miloš Milivojević
Presented by Polly Ives
Classical guitarist Craig Ogden has recorded six chart-topping CDs for Classic FM. He teams up with award-winning classical accordionist Miloš Milivojević for this relaxed concert for babies and their grown-ups.
Find out more about
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