Riot Ensemble
St Paul’s Hall 16:00pm
Plexus
Wow! two pieces that are the essence of the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival Plexus, a reel to reel cacophony of sound rhythms, steel saws played with violin bows, stones bashed together and dropped into pianos, violins played with bottles, wood slapped, cymbals beaten, brushed, you get the idea, ref’s whistles, yeah the essence of hcmf. Harry Parch would weep with joy.
Spleen
The antithesis of the first, stripped down to strings, bass saxophone and bass clarinet. This a slow, slow, oh so slow examination of minute temporal changes. Instruments rise in harmony through each micro tone, passive, pensive, elegant, and technical like a World Cup slipping away from an under par Italian team. Technically brilliant, simple plays, more than the sum of its parts. Virtuosity, dignified, elegant, and true.
Heloise Tunstall-Behrens
Rhythmic, then not, pensive then not, imagine a ‘skipping CD, you get parts of the tunes, and then part of another tune, the whole thing moves with different tempos, through several, interrelated, reoccurring themes, there’s coordination, there’s passion, and there’s melodies interwoven. Heloise's practice covers contemporary classical, pop, experimental and timbral drone. It's important to know but Heloise should just change her last names to Amazing.
Lisa Streich - Francesca
Loud raucous storms, thunder lightning strikes. Whips are lashed, horns blasted, and basses attacked with rage. This piece features clapper boards, pianos - treated and played - one solo, there’s a war on stage as the instruments battle for control and find themselves driven literally by regular bullwhip lashes. I love it.
If this material or any of the material I’ve stumbled across at the 2022 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival is unfamiliar to you, then please, I implore you to check the BBC Radio 3 website, for ‘The New Music Show’ between now and Christmas. Lots of this music will be featured there. Be shocked, awed, amazed, devastated, and angered at what you hear. After a couple of programmes – you will never hear music with the same ears.
