Venue: Concert Hall

Dates: August 24,2018

Programme

Joseph Pereira

Mallet Quartet

Iannis Xenakis

Rebonds B

Kalr-Heinz Stockhausen

Vibra Elufa

Steve Reich

Mallet Quartet

——Intermission——

Kevin Volans

Four Marimbas

Steve Reich

Drumming Part 1

Artist

Colin Currie

Hailed as “the world’s finest and most daring percussionist” (Spectator), Colin Currie is a solo and chamber artist at the peak of his powers. Championing new music at the highest level, Currie is the soloist of choice for many of today’s foremost composers and he performs regularly with the world’s leading orchestras and conductors.

A dynamic and adventurous soloist, Currie’s commitment to commissioning and creating new music was recognised in 2015 by the Royal Philharmonic Society who awarded him the Instrumentalist Award. From his earliest years, Currie forged a pioneering path in creating new music for percussion, winning the Royal Philharmonic Society Young Artist Award in 2000 and receiving a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award in 2005. Currie has premiered works by composers such as Steve Reich, Elliott Carter, Louis Andriessen, HK Gruber, James MacMillan, Anna Clyne, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Jennifer Higdon, Kalevi Aho, Rolf Wallin, Kurt Schwertsik, Alexander Goehr, Andrew Norman, Mark-Anthony Turnage, Julia Wolfe and Nico Muhly. Looking ahead, in the coming seasons Currie will premiere new works by Andy Akiho, Helen Grime and Simon Holt.

Currie is Artist in Association at London’s Southbank Centre, where he was the focus of a major percussion festival Metal Wood Skin in 2014 and continues to perform there every season. Currie is also Artist in Residence with Oregon Symphony Orchestra 2015/16 -2017/18. The three season residency included annual performances with Oregon Symphony Orchestra, extensive education and outreach work, and this season sees the world premiere of Andy Akiho’s Percussion Concerto in April 2018, conducted by Carlos Kalmar.

Currie’s 2017/18 season is marked by a number of other premieres including a new work for piano and percussion by Sir Harrison Birtwistle with Nicolas Hodges at the Library of Congress and London’s Southbank Centre. Currie also premiered new works by Brett Dean and Joe Duddell with Håkan Hardenberger at Malmo Chamber Festival in September and Aldeburgh Music in November 2017, and a new work for percussion and electronics by Dave Maric with the Scottish Ensemble.

Other highlights of 2017/18 include the Scandinavian premiere of HK Gruber’s Into the open… with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, conducted by HK Gruber, and a series of solo recitals including The Schubert Club, Budapest, Lawrence University and at Sir James MacMillan’s The Cumnock Tryst. Currie’s orchestral engagements include Houston Symphony, Antwerp Symphony, BBC Philharmonic, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Het Gelders Orkest, National Youth Orchestra of Scotland and Brno Contemporary Orchestra.

Currie’s dynamic ensemble the Colin Currie Group was formed in 2006 to celebrate the music of Steve Reich and made its five-star debut at the BBC Proms. Since then, with Reich’s personal endorsement, Currie and his ensemble have taken on the role of ambassadors of Drumming, which they have performed at many venues and festivals internationally. Highlights of the 2017/18 season include the release of the group’s debut recording of Drumming and performances at King’s Place and Saffron Hall.

In October 2017, Currie launched Colin Currie Records, in conjunction with LSO Live, as a platform for his diverse projects, celebrating the extraordinary developments for percussion music over the past century. The label’s first release was the debut recording of the Colin Currie Group: Steve Reich’s Drumming, out in March 2018.

Currie has recorded many concerto, recital and chamber works including most recently Elliott Carter’s Two Controversies and a Conversation with Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Oliver Knussen (Ondine) and Simon Holt’s a table of noises with The

Hallé Orchestra/Collon (NMC). His recording of Rautavaara’s Incantations with the Helsinki Philharmonic/Storgårds (Ondine) was released to critical acclaim and won a 2012 Gramophone Award. Previous releases by Currie include MacMillan’s Veni, Veni, Emmanuel with the Netherlands Radio Chamber Philharmonic/MacMillan on Challenge Classics, Jennifer Higdon’s Percussion Concerto with the London Philharmonic/Alsop, which won a 2010 Grammy Award, and a recital disc Borrowed Time featuring music by Dave Maric (Onyx). Currie recently recorded Steve Reich’s Quartet with Colin Currie Group, released by Nonesuch Records in February 2018.

Presenter

Colin Currie Quartet

The Colin Currie Quartet was formed in 2018 by Colin Currie to present the diverse works written for percussion quartet. Comprising of Colin Currie, Owen Gunnell, Adrian Spillett and Sam Walton, the players form the core of the Colin Currie Group, and in this new collective they perform works by Steve Reich and branch out into other composers who have been swept along by that highly influential force.

Their 2018/19 debut season performances include the China NCPA and Wigmore Hall, amongst others. A dominant premiere in their first season is a substantial new work for four marimbas by Kevin Volans, and other works in their debut programme include Joseph Pereira’s Mallet Quartet alongside solo pieces by Xenakis and Stockhausen, performed by Currie.

As some of the world’s leading solo, symphonic and chamber percussionists each player of the quartet brings a different and insightful slant to the art of chamber percussion performance, and the group will be adding substantially to its repertoire in the coming years.