Lauren Redhead

Further to my post yesterday - here is, as an image, a quick...

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 21:12:38 +0100

Further to my post yesterday - here is, as an image, a quick score of the setting of this poem I worked on yesterday.

Feel free to send realisations!

Foweles in the Frith

Wed, 01 Sep 2010 20:38:45 +0100

Foweles in the frith
The fisses in the flod
And I mon waxe wod
Mulch sorw I walke with
For the beste of bon and blod.

My first Creative Pact post comes about under rather strange circumstances: having arrived home to find my boiler classed as “immediately dangerous” I thought it best to vacate the house for the evening. But not wanting to renegue on my creative pact I brought my work with me.

The above anonymous 14th century poem does not appear in the libretto for my opera but is one Adam Strickson says was in his mind the entire time he was writing it. So to get into the swing of things I have spent the evening writing a short open instrumentation setting of the poem. I hope to post it in some form tomorrow. Undoubtedly the exercise and setting will permeate my writing process.

Despite the unnual circumstances this feels like a good way to get my writing and my creative pact going!

(Blog updated via my iPhone; apologies for markdown/formatting mistakes which I will correct tomorrow).

Creative Pact 2010

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:12:50 +0100

Creative Pact 2010:

Hang on to your hats for a month of opera-blog action!

This moring I signed up for Creative Pact 2010. This means I must produce something every day for the month of September. I’ll be reporting what I’ve done each day via this blog and hopefully with photos, and audio as well as words.

I’ll look forward to your comments and encourage you to sign up to Creative Pact 2010 as well.

Organ Concert at seeds and bridges

Tue, 24 Aug 2010 17:15:23 +0100

Organ Concert at seeds and bridges:

Here’s a link to the seeds and bridges blog for 2010.

I have an organ concert on 02.10.10 at Holy Trinity Church in Hull.
It would be wonderful to see you there!

Every piece will be a premiere of some sort or another and there will be organ music by:

Chris Newman
Nick Williams
Scott McLaughlin
Alistair Zaldua
John Lely
Adam Fergler
Caroline Lucas
and even myself.

Here’s the information you need:

seeds & bridges 2010 present:

‘….reverence # 2’ LAUREN REDHEAD (organ)

playback of sacred works by Paert, Howells, Byrd & others

12 noon to 4pm
Holy Trinity Church
Market Place
Hull
HU1 1RR

Video: Green Angel Workshop Performance and Reflections on Reflecting on Work in Progress

Tue, 17 Aug 2010 16:46:29 +0100

Below is the video of the workshop performance of the opera I am writing collaboratively with Adam Strickson ‘Green Angel’. This project encompasses a lot of my interests and the chance to collaborate with non-musicians. Since this performance many things have changed, corrections been made, improvements to our working and rehearsal process contemplated and new ideas thought up. So, with this in mind, why might I want to share work in progress?

Firstly, comments are always welcome and constructive. It is nice to know what people liked and didn’t like. Over the last few months I have used my twitter account to talk to a number of people with different backgrounds and interests about opera, but not specifically about my own work. Although this piece is not a commercial venture as such (it reflects research done by both Adam and I and will form part of both of our PhD projects), the reasons someone may or may not like something can tell me a lot about what has been successful or not in my writing. Also, despite having identified changes, new ideas, and improvements, there is still a lot of what we produced in March that I am happy with, and I think the musicians are excellent, so I want to share this video as an achievement in its own right.

As someone who does research through practice I very much recognise the importance of self-reflection. As I think about this previous performance I also need to put it into the context of the final performance we are working towards and make sure that my ideas have been coherent throughout. As such I decided to write this blog post to introduce the themes of the opera and consider them in the context of the work we have already produced.

Opera usually employs some amount of convention, this is what makes it opera and not music theatre, and indeed noh theatre also employs its own important conventions. In my usual compositional life convention is something I try to avoid but on this occasion it’s something I have to accept is necessary to make the piece work at all. I must decide how to work with two often conflicting sets of conventions, how to utilise them, and decide what they can be used for. The place this is most important is characterisation and in turn the characters themselves are highly influenced by the themes of the opera.

There are three overriding themes in the piece which I very much see to be linked: our contemporary relationship with nature, the construction and destruction of identity, and metamorphosis. The libretto presents these themes as a journey: from storytelling (the first act, in the video) to singing; from autumn to spring as in all noh plays; from black to green. Reflecting on whether these themes really run through the first act as they do the libretto helps me to conceive of how the music should develop. Reflecting on what these themes mean for me and my research helps me conceive of how the music should develop to reflect me research.

Considering the work I have done in the light of further thought on these themes stemming from now reading the full libretto is difficult. The libretto itself reflects many of my personal research interests which themselves overlap with noh conventions: the use of quotation, reference to the past, the use of a constantly growing web of relations and interrelations. This itself has grown out of Adam Strickson’s and my collaboration. As the work itself as evolved the demands of the first act on its music have evolved to make it more than a stand-alone piece of work: 20 minutes of music which encompass storytelling, expectation, and the hidden seeds of the conclusion of the opera.

The most obvious thing to me, when watching the recording, is how any production can be improved by a more efficient rehearsal process and much more clarity on behalf of the composer/writer/director and others. Writing this blog post it has also become clear to me that many things may be interesting to me but not to others reading this. They belong, properly-thought out, in the music of the opera and are precisely the reason I choose to do research through practice and not always through written forms of communication. Rather than writing for several pages on the opera itself, I choose to reflect on the usefulness of such self-reflection in research. Embarking on this exercise may not have resulted in a post that focuses much on what the opera itself will become but has facilitated clarity that enables me to continue with the research as a whole.

Many thanks for bearing with me; more posts that are really about opera shall surely follow.

Act one of the new chamber opera ‘Green Angel’...

Tue, 17 Aug 2010 15:36:17 +0100

Act one of the new chamber opera ‘Green Angel’ composed by myself (Lauren Redhead) and written by Adam Strickson. The performers are: Aniko Toth (Ash, Soprano), Katherine Jarvis (Old Woman, Mezzo), Heather Roche (Bass Clarinet), Emilia Ergin (Violoncello), Robin Bowles (Accordion), Enrico Bertelli (Percussion) and Jenny Daniel (Soprano).

The costumes and sets were produced by undergraduate design students from the University of Leeds.

We will make many changes for the final staged version, but creating this performance has given us far more insight into writing and producing opera than we could have gained otherwise.

The video was made at Stage@Leeds.

NB no video until 4’45” as this begins with music played as people entered the theatre.

Darmstadt 2010 (for 3 days)

Sat, 07 Aug 2010 15:02:00 +0100

I recently caught the tail-end of the Darmstadt Summer Course. (For those of you who might not know, Darmstadt is a small town in Germany, just South of Frankfurt).
I wasn’t able to attend the whole two weeks of the course this time, and after previous experiences had not at first thought this to be a completely bad thing, but I was curious to know the impact that the changes new director Thomas Schäfer had made would have on the course.
Asking around there were mixed opinions: for some the course was a much more positive experience than ever before; for some there seemed to have been missed opportunities. As with everything new I think it’s possible the new ideas will bear more fruit in years to come when all the participants are fully aware of the opportunities available to them.
I particularly liked the “Open Space” idea, an opportunity for anyone (in theory) to present anything (within reason of space and technological requirements) to the course participants and even the public should they have wished to come. For me this seems to provide the course participants with a valuable link to the community and a great way to generate discussion.

My main (very favourable) experience of the Open Spaces was Aaron Einbond’s presentation of his piece Le Cabinet des Signes. I found the concept behind the piece particularly interesting and was sad to have missed the premier on 25.07.10 at the course.
This mixed piece could be presented as a concert piece or as an installation, which was the format of this open space. The piece is interactive and can react to sound it “hears” (in this case through the internal microphone of Aaron’s computer). A patch he developed using some objects from IRCAM analyses a possible data bank of sounds and uses this analysis to create a group of samples with which it can react to the inputs.

During the Open Space I was able to talk to Aaron about his piece, play with it, hear about and discuss the premiere of the concert piece, and look at his patch. This for me seemed like a much more fruitful discussion that I would otherwise have hoped to have had with a composer I did not know, and on this experience I base my opinion that the open spaces can only be a good thing.

I also heard two concerts whilst in Darmstadt: the Preisträgerforum and the final concert on the last night.

The Preisträgerforum, as can be perhaps gleaned from the title, showcased new commissions written by the composers who had won stipends last year: Bruno Ruviaro, David Brynjar Franzen, Joan Arnau Pamies and Clinton McCallum.
There were a number of ideas in, although many similarities between, the first three pieces. All seemed to be drawing on music that had been popular at the previous course in some way. The final piece be Clinton McCalum was somewhat bizarre and made a move towards theatre with similarities to music by Kagel and Globokar. For me, it was not as refined as music by these composers, but it was certainly entertaining and stood out from what was otherwise a rather pedestrian programme.

The Final Concert of the course was immensely long: six hours by the end. This was a very odd decision; clearly it could have been split into two programmes, particularly as nothing took place on the afternoon of the final day of the course. The concert also comprised the prize giving and the final speech but was perhaps designed to demonstrate that the ‘endurance’ aspect of the Darmstadt courses is not a thing of the past.
The concert consisted of four rounds, with pieces by Georges Aperghis, Orm Finnendahl, Brian Ferneyhough, Bernhard Lang, Liza Lim, Franz Martin Olbrisch, Enno poppe, Hans Thomalla, Rebecca Saunders, and Jorge Sánchez-Chiong. I’ve chosen three pieces which stood out for me to describe for you (and thus keep the length of this blog somewhat shorter than that of the concert itself).

The first is Orm Finnendahl’s Versatzstüke.
Some technical problems meant that we heard the 2-channel rather than multi-channel version of this piece but even so it was very enjoyable and I hope to hear the full version in the future. The pianist was Rei Nakamura who also won a very well-deserved prize judging by her excellent, committed, and highly-skilled performance. The piece itself was hugely interactive between the pianist and the electronics, with this interaction drawing directly on her playing. In the centre of the piece was an extended, somewhat post-minimalist piano solo which also sparked my attention given some recent research forays into this field.

Some of the piece can be seen on YouTube here.

The next piece which stood out for me was Bernhard Lang’s Monadologie VII.
I have found Lang’s Monadologie project extremely conceptually interesting and will let him speak for himself about it here. I had found this piece initially interesting and engaging although eventually perhaps a little long. The extreme length of the concert (which began at 6.00, and by the time we heard this piece it was past 10.00) could be to blame for this, however, as could be what was put to me by a friend as the conductor’s lack of engagement with the music. In truth, he did act as if he were glad the piece was over.

The final piece I want to comment on is Hans Thomalla’s Piano Counterpart.
I have often reflected on the number of problems I find with solo piano pieces, many of these problems begin to do with failure to engage with the often problematic history of the instrument and its relation to the western canon. This piece has few of those problems: Thomalla systematically takes apart and pieces back together piano repertoire at the same time clearly un-doing some of the semiotic significance of certain piano gestures. Thomalla describes the piece as a ‘Rhapsody’, a very romantic notion, and I certainly find him to be a very romantic (with an importantly lower-case ‘r’) composer; the traditional ideas of beauty in solo piano repertoire are not divorced from this piece despite ideas relating to ‘deconstruction’ of language.

After six hours, as you might imagine, I have many more comments about the music in this concert. I’ve chosen to focus on my three most positive experiences since I would much rather share this music with you than use this space merely to explain my critical problems with some of the other music, and indeed that may be a topic for yet another post.

All that is left is to mention the two winners of the Kranichsteiner Musikpreises for composition: Stefan Prins and performance: Matteo Cesari. Both recipients are certainly worth further investigation.

Mediæval Music from the International Mediæval Congress 2010

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 13:08:00 +0100

The International Mediæval Congress 2010 is now over. I have worked there for the past 3 years and very much enjoy helping out with their events, particularly since I get to hear their wonderful concert series in the wonderful St John the Baptist Church in Adel (near Leeds).

The three performing groups this year were

And all the programmes reflected the congress theme of Travel and Exploration, with particular reference to the Crusades.

Joglaresa performed music pertaining to the crusades in a number of ways, and relating to Christian, Jewish and Muslim experiences. Belinda Sykes produced many of the arrangements which featured voices, vielles, the oud, harp, bagpipes and perucssion, often matching music and words in a way which reflected performing practices of the time as well as the sound itself. The performance was exciting, rousing, and very technically secure, and filled the church with people as well as an immersive musical experience. I sadly missed Belinda Sykes’ workshop on performing Medieaval music in the 21st century and having heard the concert I believe it would have been hugely informative and interesting.

Schola Cantorum were very much the other end of the scale, focussing on plainchant mainly from Toledo, and liturgical practices. Their performance was very much informed by the time and focussed on demonstrating the religious practices of a time contemporary to the building. Presentation of research in the form of readings helped explain the significance ot their interpretation.

Alva gave my favourite performance of the congress. Vivien Ellis has a beautiful voice and was accompanied by Giles Lewin on the vielle and the ‘ud. Both artists perform and record a soloists and in other ensembles too, however demonstrated in their performance was a very intimate relationship betwwen the musical parts and a very close understanding of the (musical and written) texts. The music chosen demonstrated the shared imagery between Christian, Muslim and Jewish devotional and religious-themed songs.

Overall, I was struck by the amount of research demonstrated by the performers in their playing and singing as well as their programme notes. Hailing from an academic music department the idea of practice-led research is very much at the forefront of many projects but in non-performing arts departments it is still non-existent. Despite occurring outside of the traditional academic sessions an afterthought of mine was how much could be learned in the study of history, geography, theology and the many other disciplines represented at the congress through practice-led as well as traditional research. It is my hope that consideration of things such as ‘impact’, as well as events such as these, will make practice-led research more of a priority in these subject areas in the future.

The main purpose of this blog post, however, is to very strongly recommend this music to anyone who reads it. I find it truly beautiful in a way I would find very difficult to say about any other music, and as always I would love to read your opinions too.

My Reflections from Freiburg

Sun, 11 Jul 2010 11:08:41 +0100

After spending a couple of days in beautiful Freiburg last week I decided to write this post reflecting on the music I heard there. Wonderful weather, countryside and new music are a perfect combination for me and for once I felt there was adequate time to think about the music that I listened to at concerts, time I’m often lacking in the UK.

The question I asked myself before writing this was “Can new music by students really cause me to think philosophically?” An important question since in my research it is important that I do think philosophically. And of course, the answer that I came to was “Yes, of course.”

I spent two evenings at two very contrasting concerts: the first presented recent work by the composition students of the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg conducted/directed by Alistair Zaldua; the second a more experimental affair entitled “YouTube” directed by Orm Finnendahl and consisted of a series of 25 very short pieces written by the same students, all which reacted to the previous pieces.

I found the first concert in some ways a little depressing. It was clear from the music presented that the students’ training at the school focussed on the concert hall as “work-place” and thus the music displayed a high degree of similitude, frequent reference to, and reliance upon, the western tradition, an emphasis on sound or technique over other musical considerations, and much evidence of the influence of the composers’ teachers. In other words, there is no reason not to believe this group of students as the next generation of Darmstadt composers.

This is not to say that the music was not enjoyable; it was. Thinking about this music made me ask myself not “How can these composers improve?” but “How might teaching of composition improve?” My reflections led me to question whether traditional classical composition training serves only to perpetuate social norms such as those associated with the concert hall before all else. I am all for “one must learn the rules before one can break them” but I wonder if through this educational system these rules become far too entrenched and are never really broken. Some of the music in this concert displayed imagination and creativity which was often stifled by a return to or reliance on convention.

There were three notable pieces, about which I’d like to share a little with you. What I like most about these pieces above the others in the programme is what appears to be the consideration of the musical whole of the piece as well as the ideas that they contained.

Firstly Zhen Wang Gespräch (2009/10) for six loudspeakers:

“Gespräch ist einie szenische Collage von selbst aufgenommen konkreten Klängen für sechs im Raum verteilte Lautsprecher”

The virtue of being the only purely electronic piece on the programme automatically made this piece stand out. Wang demonstrates a real consideration for the sound in the space and awareness of how audience expectation can be built up and subverted. Zhen Wang is a student of Orm Finnendahl.

Secondly Carlos Cotallo Solares Tangram (2009/10) for electric guitar, electric bass, electric violin and electronics:

“Tangramist ein altes chinesisches Spiel, das aus sieben Plättchen in einfachen geometrischen Formen besteht. Mit diesen versucht man, eine vorgegebene Gastalt, von der man nur das Schattenbild kennt, nachzubauen.
Damit vergleichbar, besteht mein Stück aus unterschiedlichen Teilen, die wiederholt oder variiert werden, bei denen es jedoch, wie im Spiel, um die Gestalt der jeweiligen Kombinationen und nicht um die Form des einzelnen Plättchens (oder Teiles) geht.”

This piece stood out in the programme by virtue of creativity. The choice of electronic instruments could have been seen as a novelty, or an attempt to ‘extend’ the pssibilties of their acoustic counterparts, but the music genuinely presented them as electronic instruments in their own right. The simple structure of this piece allowed the ideas to ‘speak’, and for these ideas to feel part of the coherent musical whole. Carlos Cotallo Solares is a student of Cornelius Schwehr

Lastly Linna Zhang Kreuz II (2010) for trombone and small drum:

“In diesem kleinen Stück habe ich überlegt, wie ich mit den Verbindungen zwischen zwei Instrumenten umgehen kann. Hierfür benütze ich eine Posaune als ein Istrument ohne Tonhönen und eine Kleine Trommel als Instrument mit (relativer) Tonhöhe. Das Thema des Stükes ist der ‘allmächliche Übergang’ in den Klangfarben.”

Zhang’s piece succeeded due to a very considered approach to the relationship between the two instruments. She manages to make economic use of the material allowing this relationship to articulate itself. Linna Zhang is a student of Cornelius Schwehr.

The second evening featured work by many of the same students and was overall more encouraging. Perhaps the shorter pieces, the less traditional nature of the concert and the indication from some of the participants that it was considered more throwaway allowed the students to make recourse to humour, take risks, and think experimentally. The programme note describes the process of creating the works as such:

“Auggehend von wenigen musikalischen ‘Originalwerken’ werden Kommentare komponiert, die wiederum Ausgangspunkt für weitere Kommentare sein können.
Diese Kommentare bzw. Originalwerke werden im Konzert live auf der zentralen Bühne aufgeführt und dabei von einer Videokamera mitgeschnitten.
Wenn ein Kommentar aufgeführt wird, wird parallel dazu die Videoaufnahme des dazugehörigen kommentierten Stücks auf eine seitlich der Büche positionierte Leinwand projiziert.
Den Komponisten des live aufgeführten Kommentars bleibt freigestellt, den Ton der Videoaufnahme des kommentierten Stücks beizubehalten, oder stumm zu schalten.
Jedes Stück kann von jedem eilnehmen den Komponisten jederzeit kommentiert werden.”

There were some questions as to whether this would really work, on both the technical and musical levels, and it is fair to say that this was not always the case: there seemed to be some minor organisational problems and it was also not always possible to make a link between the re-played video and the commentary. Some of the pieces seemed to be more of a montage of the previous and new works. There was also a bizarre moment involving a remote-controlled, conducting, giant teddy-bear which made its point well within the short piece and the continuity of the concert but ultimately looked extremely odd on stage throughout the concert. I cannot say I did not enjoy the anticipation whilst wondering what it would do.

Despite any worries and technical problems the music that did work on the evening showed the imagination of the students involved and this seemed to me to be a much more modern project than the concert of the previous night. While the ideas presented were not fully formed, and my own work on quotation led me to find many of the references a little too raw and obvious, there were many more thoughts and ideas on show in these 25 short pieces than in 10 longer ones the previous evening. This is extremely positive: it shows the awareness of the contributors of a more ‘relational’ approach (something I am very much in favour of) as well as the historical approach demonstrated in the first concert.

Anyone who knows me will know that I believe this type of project to be much more musically viable in the 21st Century. Nevertheless and despite my bias, I believe this concert shows there must be room to encourage innovation within the programme at the school. This type of event follows in the footsteps of ex- Hochschule für Musik Freiburg students Johannes Kreidler and David Helbich; perhaps there is a tradition for this kind of thinking at least amongst the students.

Well done to Carlos Cotallo Solares, Irene Galindo Quero, Kosmas Giannoutakis, Alexander Grebtschenko, Takaaki Horiuchi, He Tang, Fredrik Wallberg, Zhen Wang, Jan Esra Kuhl, Xin Xie, Saehoon Chung, Linna Zhang, and Fernando Aguila.

A video recording of my piece love speed and thrills from the...

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 10:17:19 +0100

A video recording of my piece love speed and thrills from the University of Leeds Film Music Conference in association with Leeds International Film Festival, November 2009.

The ensemble are Leeds Film Music Ensemble and the conductor is Ian Sapiro.

Photos from the Workshop Performance of Green Angel on...

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 11:16:51 +0100

Photos from the Workshop Performance of Green Angel on 06.06.10.
Taken by Tony Glossop, University of Leeds Photographer.

New Work, Premiers and Performances

Thu, 29 Apr 2010 17:57:00 +0100

The last few months have been pretty busy but also fairly exciting for me. As a result there are many things coming up that I shall endeavour to keep the website updated with.

For now I shall mention just a few:

Wednesday 21.01.10 saw the premier of a new piece the enigma machine 2b: [no subtitle] played by the microtonal trumpet and horn duo Mikroblech.
Due to the recent volcanic ash I was unable to make the premier but I am hugely grateful to Samuel Stoll for making a recording which sounds excellent, if currently a little on the quiet side. I’m hoping with some editing to be able to share it soon.

This Saturday, 01.05.10 a further premier the engima machine 1: hendecaptych of hans memling will be premiered by Trio Atem at this concert as part of York Late Music. The score will also be availble to buy through Late Music Publishing.

Further new pieces are planned for this year, and also an organ recital where I hope to present some of the work of Chris Newman, a much under-rated British Composer.

Green Angel Design Film Film by Yuling Lin Some of the opera...

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 16:49:00 +0000

Green Angel Design Film

Film by Yuling Lin

Some of the opera can be seen at New Stages Festival at PCI in the University of Leeds on 6.03.10

Ian Pace - Piano at City University in London

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 21:47:45 +0000

Ian Pace - Piano at City University in London:

Ian Pace will play my piece Robin and Marian amongst lots of other good music in London on the 9th March

Tim McCormack: Disfix

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:15:33 +0000

Tim McCormack: Disfix

Updated website, finally!

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:14:13 +0000

You can now see performances, and new works, for the beginning of this year.

Very much cut-down reviews of concerts from the end of last year coming soon, along with the DVD recording of love speed and thrills

Nieuw Ensemble at HCMF

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:17:00 +0000

Nieuw Ensemble at HCMF:

The Nieuw Ensemble will play 4 new works, including my new piece the empiricist view.

23rd November 2009
St. Paul’s Hall, Huddersfield.
Entrance is free and no tickets are needed

New Publication

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:25:13 +0000

New Publication:

My article “Nonlinearity and the Aesthetics of Time and Space” is now available in the Destellos Foundation Journal. A paper on this topic was also presented for me at the International Conference of Aesthetics in Mar del Plata, Argentina, on 25th October 2009.

The Adorno Song! Adorno about popular music against Vietnam...

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 08:36:53 +0000

The Adorno Song! Adorno about popular music against Vietnam War
By Johannes Kreidler

University of Leeds Film Music Conference

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 10:54:35 +0100

University of Leeds Film Music Conference:

I will be presenting a paper at this conference. To get you interested, here’s the abstract:

Sound and Image in Kagel’s Ludwig Van

Ludwig Van is the final film produced by Mauricio Kagel. It may be considered, as Bjoern Heile posits, the pinnacle of what he hoped to achieve in the film genre, despite its creation being far from the end of his career. But regardless of its description as such, is this really a film? And is the music that accompanies it really film music? Could this be considered as a piece of music, a film, a documentary, a discourse, or as a coherent whole - integrating all these elements - that cannot simply be defined as any one of them?
The use of aural and visual signifiers in this piece has implications for the way one thinks about Kagel, Beethoven, music, culture, and even society. These signifiers work in conjunction and in dialogue with each other as a significant feature of Kagel’s compositional technique, and therefore a further question arises from Ludwig Van: is there any musical difference between sound and image at all?

A new piece of mine love speed and thrills for chamber orchestra, black and white film clip, public address loudspeaker and tape will be premiered at the concert at 1.10pm.
This piece was written specially for the event.