Selected forthcoming performances smear
(USA premiere) 17.10.11, Sonic Festival, Miller Theatre, Columbia University, NY, USA: Estelle Lemire/Marie Bernard
48 Responses to Polymorphia
(UK premiere) 31.10.11, Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, United Kingdom: BBC Concert Orchestra/Keith Lockhart
Doghouse
10.11.11, Birmingham, AL, USA: Alabama SO/Steve Hackman
Popcorn Superhet Receiver 14.1.12, Koger Center for the Arts, Columbia, SC, USA: South Carolina Philharmonic/Morihiko Nakahara
Jonny Greenwood ‘Norwegian Wood Suite’ premiered at BBC Proms A 10-minute orchestral suite from Greenwood’s score to Norwegian Wood was premiered in London’s Royal Albert Hall on 12th August, as part of the 2011 BBC Proms. A BBC commission, it was conducted by the BBC Concert Orchestra’s Music Director Keith Lockhart as part of a Film Music Prom, also broadcast on BBC 4 TV.
In May, Greenwood’s largest orchestral work to date, Doghouse, was the centrepiece of one of New York’s most innovative new music strands, the Wordless Music Series. To a packed and expectant house, conductor Brad Lubman, Signal and the Wordless Music Orchestra gave a thrilling account. Greenwood’s music garnered acclaim from the US ‘Jonny Greenwood’s Norwegian Wood showed the press and had been uploaded to YouTube within hours: Radiohead front-man’s Herrmann-like mastery of
‘… a formidable piece in an individual style.’
atmosphere…’ The Telegraph (Hugo Shirley), 15 August 2011
‘the performance was superb. I want to get a little better sounded as hypnotic as ever, its basic strand of material cycled round & round at different speeds…The entrance of the lower strings, a few minutes in, is magical, at first quieting the anxious tone of the upper strings, before getting caught up in their material as well… It’s a case of blink-&-you’ll-miss-it with central movement The Meadow, the Wind, the Trees; for barely more than 90 seconds a high violin note slowly starts to become a melody, while beneath, a series of rich string chords shift & alter. One’s attention is constantly pulled between the two, which feel connected yet somehow independent. Its brevity is no bad thing; as it is, it becomes a sliver of beauty; a lesser composer would seek to draw this out for considerably longer…Ziegler’s choice of Naoko Died to conclude the Suite is a bold & surprising one, abruptly changing the mood from overt lyricism to dark & unsettling texture music… Particularly outstanding were the movement’s two soloistic passages, for horn & cello; both emerged as, respectively, desperate and plaintive outbursts from a music that seemed impelled to slide ever down into a dark nadir.’ 5-against-4.blogspot.com (Simon Cummings), August 2011
‘48 Responses to Polymorphia’ launches at European Culture Congress in Wroclaw
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Wordless Music Series stage US premiere of ‘Doghouse’
48 Responses to Polymorphia, a 20-minute piece for 48 solo strings is premiered in Wroclaw (Poland) on 9th September, as part of the European Culture Congress. It will be performed by the AUKSO orchestra under Marek Mos in a concert that pays homage to the distinguished Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki, one of Greenwood’s composing idols. Penderecki will also conduct Greenwood’s Popcorn Superhet Receiver in the same concert. Greenwood then travels to Warsaw, where he is to perform Steve Reich’s Electric Counterpoint at the Sacrum Profanum festival. The UK premiere of 48 Responses will take place as part of “Disturbia”, a Halloween-themed event being mounted by the BBC Concert Orchestra in London’s Southbank Centre on 31st October. PHOTO: jonny greenwood.
The Rest is Noise (Alex Ross), May 2011
‘…the players gave Mr Greenwood’s piece a gripping, nuanced performance… In a program note, Mr. Greenwood writes that he imagined his piece as a ramble through the faded scores of forgotten light music works and jingles in the BBC ensemble’s archives. That description shortchanges the piece, though it explains the rapid morphing - from lively modal passages to stretches of sustained string writing or pounding percussion and brass figures - that is among its principal charms. But the qualities that make the nearly 30-minute piece so consistently involving are its insistent drive and Mr. Greenwood’s intuitive use of dissonance and resolution.’ The New York Times (Allan Kozinn), 22 May 2011
‘…it’s not at all hard to conceive of Greenwood as one of modern classical’s foremost ambassadors…’ ‘… a hive of buzzing textures that eventually collapses into an exciting blast of D… it’s not at all hard to conceive of Greenwood as one of modern classical’s foremost ambassadors…’ www.villagevoice.com (Seth Colter Walls), May 2011