Concerts!

The first UK show was a success! Pieces were performed by the Stranded Ensemble, our newly founded graduate composers' ensemble at King's, to a full room who were very happy. Matias Hancke and Teodoro Cromberg also pulled out some sweet electronics with their project Senales e intersecciones. They have some shows in Rome next week if you're there.

At the intermission George Benjamin came up and said he really liked my piece and the idea behind it (88 was performed) and said that I should write more of them. Then after the second half he came up again with more ideas for it. I said, "you're thinking of writing one, aren't you?" and he said, "yes, I really am." That was really exciting. Messiaen's favorite student, Britain's superstar composer, likes my stuff. AWESOME.

Today was "Composing Through Art" at the National Gallery, with presentations and workshops from both art historians and composers. It's hard to convincingly say there was an instant change in all of my art perception, but there were a few profound realizations that are going to really influence the way I look at renaissance painting. And hearing Graham Fitkin and George Fenton speak and getting to ask questions was very cool.

Tomorrow I'm either seeing Sigur Ros or seeing Strauss's Elektra at the Royal Opera House. Either one sounds pretty good to me. Then Saturday is a concert from the Ionian Singers, in Dulwich, which you should really come to, because they're shooting for 100 to keep the venue happy. It's a really cool program of Sibelius, Holst, Debussy, Ravel, Faure, and others. Info is here.

Off to work!

Reykjavik

Has an awesome scene. And the people there are outrageously nice. There is a record store there called 12 Tonar. It has cd players and couches all around the store, and the guys working there will recommend a bunch of stuff to listen to, then sit down with you and say "check out this track" and tell you all about the bands. I picked up an album by a band/project called Klive (I was unfortunately on a pretty tight budget, there was a lot of good stuff), and wrote down a few other bands to check out. Upon getting home and looking up Klive's website, I could see why the guy who suggested them smiled when I picked it. I don't know if he's in the band or not, but his picture is on the cover of one of their past records.

Similarly, I went up to a guy in a Converge shirt and more or less said "tell me about Icelandic hardcore." He went on to give me a history of their scene, walk around the store (this was a different, slightly larger one) picking out records, and put them on the store's sound system. I settled on a gem of Icelandic metal record called At The Borders of Arcadia, by a band called Celestine. Apparently their drummer is now working as a full time composer in the classical sense, so I've got to look up some of that too.

The scenery in the country, and the rest of the city outside of record stores, are both pretty unbelievable too, and the people's reputation of being warm and welcoming is well deserved. While we were walking around town someone actually honked, slowed down, and pointed out the window that my friend had dropped his glove.  In short, go to Iceland.

Here are some music pages:

Klive

Kira Kira

Celestine