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Workshops, Page 6

Cantores in Germany

The concert venue at Lüdenscheid Cantores Michaelis, the University of Southampton choral scholars, spent four days in the German town of Lüdenscheid and performed two concerts there and in the nearby town of Herford. Both towns are located near to the Rhine river in Western Germany and are full of lots of lovely German churches and ‘Kneipen’ – traditional German pubs. Continue reading →

Composing waves

Undergraduate composer Bekah Withers has just finished a rewarding communty music commission: Since December I have been lucky to be part of the Sound Waves project run by the d.@rt community art centre at Wildern School. The project was created to explore the relationship of science and music, and the resultant performance featured such a broad spectrum of music, ranging from pieces exploring literal sound waves, to pieces describing the soundscape of the coast (this is where I came in). Continue reading →

iChamps at The MuSoc Takeover

Music now has two new iChamps, Harry Matthews and Anna Kent-Muller, who are helping to spread new digital skills in the department.  Harry went to last week’s jazz and pop gig at Talking Heads to get started on the work: Last Thursday MuSoc (the student music society) ran a night of live music performed by Southampton music students. The night’s music ranged from acoustic acts and jazz trios to funk/rock bands with large brass sections. Continue reading →

Finnissy and EXAUDI at the Wigmore Hall

Jeanice Brooks (Professor of Music) has been listening to a recent performance of work by Southampton colleagues and friends: Michael Finnissy’s extraordinary Kelir for unaccompanied vocal ensemble was the highlight of a Wigmore Hall concert last Tuesday, broadcast live on BBC Radio 3. Kelir (1981) is the word for a curtain used for the shadows in Javanese puppet theatre. Its text is in Javanese, and consists of a ritual formula declaimed before the play begins. Continue reading →

Ensemble Fractales in Southampton

A special guest blog from Hannah Reardon-Smith, the flautist in Ensemble Fractales, who recently visited Southampton as part of a collaborative project with some of our PhD composers: Ensemble Fractales from the MaNaMa contemporary music master course in Ghent, Belgium, recently had the opportunity to visit the University of Southampton to work with three of the young composers there. Continue reading →

Concerts in Playhouses, plays in concerts: The Tempest or The Enchanted Isle

Southampton’s Head of Early Music, lutenist Elizabeth Kenny, has been in the news recently with rave reviews of an unusual version of Shakespeare’s Tempest at the Globe Theatre’s new playhouse: The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare’s Globe I’m spending a lot of time at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at the moment. Continue reading →

Places of Remembrance

EXAUDI conductor James Weeks and soprano Juliet Fraser Among the activities during last month’s Remembrance Day premiere weekend was a composition workshop with guests from the world-leading new music vocal ensemble, EXAUDI.  Mate Szigeti describes the pieces he and fellow postgraduate composers created: The rite of remembrance is always connected with a place. We remember at festive dinner tables, we remember in churches, as we do in public spaces designated for this purpose. Continue reading →

Experiencing music therapy

Alice Charlton (centre) leads cochlear implantees in percussion work Sarah Hodkinson, our Lecturer in Music Therapy, describes a workshop that allowed students to gain valuable hands-on experience to complement their year 3 music therapy lectures: Music students Alice Charlton, Esme Phillips, and Panos Mathicolonis assisted me in a music therapy workshop at the University of Southampton Auditory Implant Service. The students are well aware of the significance of music. Continue reading →

Extending theorbo players from the inside

Head of Early Music Liz Kenny has been getting out of her comfort zone, playing very new music for a very old instrument:  I use my instrument the theorbo – the largest of the lute family with an extra long neck – for many things: annoying people on crowded tube trains, confusing airlines, accompanying students, demonstrating continuo harmonies, playing with singers and baroque ensembles . . . and so on. Continue reading →