hcmf// International Showcase 2017
hcmf//’s International Showcase 2017 takes place on Friday 24 & Saturday 25 November.
A diverse programme of work from a mix of six composers, artists, soloists and an ensemble will span a broad spectrum of practices, embracing free improvisation, noise and sound art, alongside notated composition.
Celebrating British contemporary, new and experimental work, the Showcase is a new hcmf// initiative supported by Arts Council England, enabling the Festival, the participants, our audience and visitors from around the world to explore innovative artistic territories and possibilities.
The Riot Ensemble is a collective of artists committed to reimagining the creation and performance of new music in the 21st century. The ensemble’s core is made up of sixteen international soloists (its ‘Artistic Board’) who feature as performers, educators, curators and collaborators across its many projects each year.
Since 2012, The Riot Ensemble have given more than 150 World and UK premieres, and appeared at international festivals in the Netherland and Spain. In 2018 the ensemble will take works by UK composers to Iceland and Sweden.
The Riot Ensemble is unique in its commitment to bringing works by emerging composers from around the world to UK audiences alongside established masterworks of the contemporary repertoire. Their 2017 Call for Scores saw 279 applicants from 28 countries and resulted in seven commissions, including Nikolet Burzynska’s new work, TITLE, which will feature at hcmf// on 24 November.
riotensemble.com | vimeo.com/riotensemble
The Riot Ensemble @ hcmf// 2017: 24 November @ 7pm, St Paul’s Hall
Laurence Osborn is a British composer with a particular interest in collaborations and forms that combine music and theatre.
Laurence studied composition with Martyn Harry while at Oxford, with Kenneth Hesketh at the Royal College of Music, with Julian Anderson while with LSO Soundhub, and with Julian Philips at The Guildhall School of Music, where he was also Artist Fellow in Composition. He held many awards during this time, including the Leverhulme Arts Scholarship. He is a current recipient of the Royal Philharmonic Society Composition Prize.
Laurence Osborn has written for the London Symphony Orchestra, Mahogany Opera Group, The Berkeley Ensemble, CHROMA, The Composers Ensemble, Consortium5, The English National Ballet, The Hebrides Ensemble, Juice Vocal Ensemble, The Riot Ensemble, and Tête-à-Tête Opera Company, among others.
Regular collaborators include soprano Lore Lixenberg, director Jessica Edwards, and writers Joseph Minden and Theo Merz. His music has been programmed throughout the UK, at The Royal Opera House, LSO St Luke’s, St Martin- In-The-Fields, Milton Court, St Magnus International Festival, and Ulverston International Music Festival, and in Denmark, France, Hungary, and Switzerland.
Current projects include The Mother, a 90-minute chamber opera commissioned by Mahogany Opera Group, and an orchestral piece for Nonclassical, to premiere in October 2017.
laurenceosborn.com | soundcloud.com/riotensmble/sets/micrographia-by-laurence-osborn | soundcloud.com/laurenceosborn
Laurence Osborn @ hcmf// 2017: 24 November @ 7pm, St Paul’s Hall
Laura Bowler is a composer, vocalist and Artistic Director specialising in theatre, multi-disciplinary work and opera. A professor of composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and at the Royal Northern College of Music, she is also the Founder and Artistic Director of Size Zero Opera, a company specialising in the creation and performance of contemporary opera.
She has been commissioned by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Manchester Camerata, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Ensemble Linea among other groups in the UK and abroad. Recent and future commissions include a 20-minute chorus and orchestra work for Crouch End Festival Chorus and a collaboratively composed music theatre work with Philip Venables supported by PRS Composer’s Fund, Whitworth Art Gallery, Rape Crisis and Aldeburgh Music.
Laura completed her BMus (Hons) at the RNCM and Sibelius Academy (Finland), followed by her MMus and PhD at the Royal Academy of Music. She also completed at MA in Theatre Directing at RADA. Laura has performed and premiered works internationally as a vocalist including the premiere of Louis Aguirre’s The Way The Dead Love as part of European Capital of Culture Aarhus 2017 programme and the World and Canadian premieres of Jennifer Walshe’s Training is the Opposite.
laurajbowler.co.uk | soundcloud.com/user-51422449 | soundcloud.com/l-j-bowler | sizezeroopera.com
Laura Bowler @ hcmf// 2017: 24 November @ 10pm, Bates Mill Blending Shed
Kit writes, performs and teaches music, as well as playing the piano, church organ and various other keyboards in a variety of different ensembles.
Whilst studying at the Royal Academy of Music he began performing with and composing for the UK band Empirical, with whom he toured the US, Canada and Europe whilst also performing with Acoustic Ladyland, Micachu, Lee Kontiz and Django Bates.
Kit has received numerous awards to include the BBC Jazz Award, a British Jazz Award and a Mercury Music Award nomination for his own albums and a number of commissions to include works for Organ for the Southbank Centre, Cologne Philharmonie and London Contemporary Music Festival. Upcoming commissions include a new work for Stavanger Organ Day 2017 at the Konserthus, a commission for the KonsertKirke Organ in Copenhagen and a solo organ recording for the ECM label (to be released in November 2017), his first solo album for ECM.
kitdownes.com | twitter.com/KitDownes | soundcloud.com/kitdownesmusic
Kit Downes @ hcmf// 2017: 25 November @ 12pm, St Paul’s Hall
Based in rural East Anglia, Laura Cannell draws on the emotional influences of the landscape and the sometimes dissonant chords of early and medieval music. With deconstructed bow and double recorders, Laura performs semi-composed, semi-improvised pieces which explore the spaces between ancient and experimental creating music that is rooted in but not tethered to the past.
Laura has released three critically acclaimed solo albums and has appeared live on BBC 6Music’s Freak Zone, recorded a Maida Vale session for Late Junction and been recorded live in concert for BBC Radio 3’s Hear and Now. She has been featured in The Guardian, The Financial Times and has appeared in numerous End of Year lists, including The Wire Magazine’s Top 50, MOJO Magazine’s Top Ten Underground Albums and The Quietus Top Albums of the Year.
Laura has performed solo at The Barbican, Royal Festival Hall and composed soundtracks for short films.
Recent projects include a commission with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, concerts with the cellist Lori Goldston (Earth, Nirvana), a duo with This Heat drummer Charles Hayward and curating a series of new music events under the heading Modern Ritual.
lauracannell.co.uk | soundcloud.com/lauracannell
Laura Cannell @ hcmf// 2017: 25 November @ 2:30pm, Bates Mill Photographic Studio
Lauren Sarah Hayes is a Scottish musician and sound artist who builds and performs with hybrid analogue/digital instruments. She is a ‘positively ferocious improvisor’ (Cycling ’74), her music refusing to sit nicely between free improv, experimental pop, techno, and noise. Over the last decade she has developed and honed a deliberately challenging and unpredictable performance system that explores the relationships between bodies, sound, environments, and technology. She is currently Assistant Professor of Sound Studies at Arizona State University and a member of the New BBC Radiophonic Workshop.
‘Exploratory rubbery rhythmic engagement’ – Disquiet
‘Travel with her as she pilots the sound waves’ – The Quietus
‘Ringing and thundering with a haunting and otherworldly performance’ – Fluid Radio
Lauren Sarah Hayes @ hcmf// 2017: 25 November @ 10pm, Bates Mill Blending Shed