Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, CBSO Centre, Birmingham

Tokyo composer turned American has style that looks medieval but sounds modern

by Stephen WalshMonday, 14 March 2011

Oliver Knussen: A career devoted too selflessly to other people’s music

This latest BCMG concert had its pleasures; and it had its irritations. Among the pleasures was a pair of works, one of them newly commissioned, by the under-performed Japanese composer Jo Kondo. The irritations were of the BBC variety: long pauses between short works while technicians in headphones faffed around with microphones and music stands, in sovereign disregard for the convenience of a large paying audience.

Kondo is the inventor of a method as individual in its way as Reich’s process music or Ligeti’s micro-polyphony

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Permalink Submitted by Christopher Morley (not verified) on Mon, 14/03/2011 - 14:37

Dear Stephen, I thought last night's BCMG concert was amazing (though I thought the Feldman dreary and gutless), and couldn't agree with you more about the self-inportant faffing of the BBC engineers. I'm sure they shifted the same microphone at least seven times, a maximum of about two inches. Unfortunately I won't have enough space to gripe about it in my Birmingham Post review. And you and I both thought of the word "hocketing" in the early Kondo piece. Best wishes, Chris Christopher Morley

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Permalink Submitted by Tim Rushby - BC... (not verified) on Tue, 15/03/2011 - 12:37

Dear Stephen, It wasn't announced during the concert but the title of John Woolrich's piece is 'A little song for Jackie and Stephen'. All the best, Tim

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Permalink Submitted by stephen.walsh on Tue, 15/03/2011 - 19:20

Tim and Chris, Thanks for those helpful comments. It's nice to be agreed with (for once) and good to get extra info. Stephen

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