A Doll's House: Works for Percussion Ensemble
Ensemble Bash record British works they commissioned
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: David (Vickerman) Bedford, Stewart Copeland, Rachel Leach, Graham Fitkin, Nick Hayes, Stephen Montague, Howard Skempton, Peter McGarr, Keith Tippett
Genre:
Chamber
Label: Signum
Magazine Review Date: 01/2013
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 51
Mastering:
Stereo
DDD
Catalogue Number: SIGCD294
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Shard |
Graham Fitkin, Composer
Bash Ensemble Graham Fitkin, Composer |
Slip-stream |
Howard Skempton, Composer
Bash Ensemble Howard Skempton, Composer |
Rimfire |
Stephen Montague, Composer
Bash Ensemble Stephen Montague, Composer |
Bash Peace |
David (Vickerman) Bedford, Composer
Bash Ensemble David (Vickerman) Bedford, Composer |
Dance Play |
Nick Hayes, Composer
Bash Ensemble Nick Hayes, Composer |
Sound Asleep |
Peter McGarr, Composer
Bash Ensemble Peter McGarr, Composer |
Breather |
Stewart Copeland, Composer
Bash Ensemble Stewart Copeland, Composer |
Echolalia |
Rachel Leach, Composer
Bash Ensemble Rachel Leach, Composer |
Dance of the Dragonfly |
Keith Tippett, Composer
Bash Ensemble Keith Tippett, Composer |
Author: Jed Distler
Listeners familiar with Graham Fitkin’s post-minimalist mastery or Howard Skempton’s stark delicacy will know what to expect from their opening contributions, although the non-verbal vocalisations and cowbell effects throughout Stephen Montague’s Rimfire reveal an airy, whimsical side to a composer I know more for his driving intensity. The late David Bedford’s Bash Peace is a lilting, evocative duet for steel pans, leading into Nick Hayes’s Dance Play for marimba, vibraphones and drum-set, which is essentially a samba with quirky rhythmic parantheses. By contrast, Peter McGarr’s Sound Asleep is a collage incorporating a multitude of instruments and non-instruments from glass chimes and pitch pipes to wine glass and egg slicer.
While Stewart Copeland’s Breather is light and improvisatory, Rachel Leach’s Echolalia rigorously manipulates repeated phrases from one instrument to another. The facile fingerwork and melodic sophistication characterising veteran jazz pianist/composer Keith Tippett’s instrumental prowess replicates itself over the 15-minute course of this programme’s concluding work, Dance of the Dragonfly, which abounds in twitchy yet virtuoso single lines, sudden explosions into free jazz, silences where you don’t expect them, shimmering fills from shakers and subtle, low-lying tremolos.
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