Sounds of the North

The Music department and Turner Sims are celebrating Norwegian musical culture with an array of fantastic events featuring visiting performers across the genres.  Lecturer in Composition Ben Oliver reports on one of the first of the series:

On Saturday I had the great pleasure to attend a concert at Turner Sims featuring the Daniel Herskedal Trio with The University Strings. This was truly a fantastic event that brought together three breathtakingly brilliant musicians from Norway and an ensemble of string players from the department. Both Daniel Herskedal (tuba) and Eyolf Dale (piano) were phenomenal but the playing of Helge Andreas Norbakken on percussion was jaw-dropping; sensitive and colourful with amazing groove and feel!

The orchestra dealt adeptly with the wide range of challenges posed by Daniel Herskedal’s music including strange rhythms and quarter-tone inflections; all without a conductor. Well done to everyone and also to Paul Cox, our head of strings, for preparing the string players so well.

Not only was the standard of performance exceptional but there was also a very special atmosphere on stage, which was communicated clearly to us in the audience. Daniel and his trio were clearly happy to be working with the strings and there was a real sense of generosity and collegiality. I’m certain all the students got a massive amount from the experience. Thanks to Kevin Appleby and his team from Turner Sims for putting this together.

Brilliant stuff, thanks for a great evening!

Coming soon in the Norway series: Tord Gustavsen (jazz piano) and the Kreutzer Quartet’s Grieg-fest with Michael Finnissy.