Sounds Like THIS Brochure 2020

9–20 MARCH 2020 www.soundslikethis.co.uk

Welcome to Sounds Like THIS Festival 2020 In our fourth year, this promises to be the most exciting and diverse festival yet. What does the future of music sound like? It Sounds Like THIS. From moments of delicate, minimalist beauty to full-throttle gritty performance art, there is something for everyone. Experience an amplified string quartet, discover brand new compositions for glass sculpture or dive into the world of circuit-bending and turntablism.

We are proud to present some of the world’s finest artists alongside the next generation from our own conservatoire, other educational institutions and early career artists. We also present a number of our alumni who have created their own space in the musical landscape, and of course our own faculty.

There are installations and performances you can get involved in, and there are plenty of ways to join in the conversation about what it means to be an artist in 2020.

Cover photo Plaid by Tim Saccenti; facing page Oberon White by Charley Etheridge

Alongside all this, there is a brand new opera production taking a fresh look at Romeo and Her Juliet, as well as songwriting by students from across Europe created during the festival in collaboration with people seeking refuge in our city, and much more besides.

So, we invite you to dive in to this colourful and vibrant celebration of music.

For all the latest updates visit www.soundslikethis.co.uk

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Monday 9 March

Friday 13 March

Monday 16 March

7:30PM Leeds College of Music Brighter Sound presents Both Sides Now: Electric Storm

10:00AM Leeds College of Music Ligeti Quartet workshop

7:30PM Leeds College of Music British Library presents AWATE: The Unearthed Odyssey

Tuesday 10 March 7:30PM Leeds College of Music Vie de merde & Ancient Infinity Orchestra

1:00PM Leeds Art Gallery Pop-up Performance 7:00PM Leeds College of Music House of Europe 7:30PM Brudenell Social Club Plaid Live AV Catenation & Jack Breeze

6:00PM Leeds College of Music Silvia Rosani: Intermezzo 4 7:30PM Leeds College of Music Gold.Berg.Werk & Griet Beyaert Thursday 12 March 10:00AM Leeds College of Music What does it mean to be a Contemporary Artist in 2020?

1:00PM Leeds College of Music Ioana Selaru, David Zucchi, THIS THUS & Wachsmann/Hackett/Karlsen 4:30PM Leeds College of Music The Art of the Song: Helene Mathiesen & Amy van Walsum 7:00PM Belgrave Music Hall Ligeti Quartet Vanessa Guinadi, This Is Not Jazz, Alex Mackay & Electroni-Kongo

7:30PM Leeds College of Music leo&hyde: The Marriage of Kim K Oberon White: winegod

Friday 20 March

Wednesday 11 March 1:05PM Leeds College of Music Leeds College of Music Jazz Choir

Tuesday 17 March

Saturday 14 March 1:00PM Leeds College of Music Unusual Ingredients 3:00PM Leeds College of Music Brutalust & Steve Beresford and Sounds like THIS Improvisation Orchestra 5:00PM Leeds College of Music Unusual Ingredients 7:30PM Leeds College of Music Territorial Gobbing, Jonathan Higgins, Naomi Perera & Psychiceyeclix 7:30PM Sunny Bank Mills Opera: Romeo and Her Juliet

Sunday 15 March 3:00PM Sunny Bank Mills Opera: Romeo and Her Juliet

7:30PM Leeds College of Music Festival Finale: Gala Concert 2020

HOW TO BOOK

Installations Monday 9–Friday 20 March Bridges can also Function as Walls Underneath the bridge link, Leeds College of Music Wednesday 11–Wednesday 18 March Déjà vu The Cube Hyperreality Society Archive, Kirkstall Road, Leeds

Book online at www.soundslikethis.co.uk or call 0113 222 3434 Box Office is operational between 10:00AM and 5:00PM Tickets also available at: Leeds College of Music, See, DICE, Resident Advisor, Jumbo Records and Crash Records

Brighter Sound presents

Both Sides Now: Electric Storm Tickets: £10 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

For the third year running, we partner with music charity Brighter Sound to present work as part of their gender equality programme Both Sides Now. This year’s performance, Electric Storm, will bring together 14 of the North’s most innovative music creators, producers and digital artists to showcase a bold new audiovisual work inspired by electronic music pioneer Delia Derbyshire, and White Noise’s 1969 seminal album An Electric Storm.

Produced in collaboration with Delia Derbyshire Day, this is their first full-scale performance following a five-day collaborative residency.

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Vie de merde by Minh Nguyen

Photo by Shirlaine Forrest

Monday 9 March 7:30PM

Tuesday 10 March 7:30PM Vie de merde Ancient Infinity Orchestra Tickets: £10 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

With influences as diverse as Ligeti, The Fall and Evan Parker, Vie de merde (VDM) create sounds that defy categorisation and challenge stylistic norms. With their unique line-up of brooding bass sax, microtonal electronics and explosive drums, VDM evoke soundscapes ranging from the delicate and ethereal to sonic onslaughts guaranteed to rip the face off even the most ardent noise music devotee. This collaboration between three distinct voices is guaranteed to excite, shock and annoy in equal measures.

Ancient Infinity Orchestra will take you on a cosmic journey into the unknown, simultaneously providing a sense of familiarity with diatonic grooves to springboard from. From textures of lyrical oboe and harp to waves of electronic thundering, wailing saxophones and raucous percussion, the ensemble will seamlessly transition between free and conducted improvisation, arranged compositions and audience participation. www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Wednesday 11 March 1:05PM Leeds College of Music Jazz Choir Tickets: FREE, no ticket required Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music Director: Miriam Ast

The Leeds College of Music (LCoM) Jazz Choir, directed by Miriam Ast, is a newly formed ensemble, bringing together students from across different pathways and year groups.

Students get to know a breadth of contemporary as well as traditional vocal jazz repertoire, by arrangers such as Darmon Meader from New York Voices, Kerry Marsh and Pete Churchill, allowing them to learn to blend their voices and to sing challenging harmony lines in a large choral setting.

The choir will be accompanied by a rhythm section made up of jazz students from LCoM, and the performance will feature solo numbers from members of the choir and by Miriam Ast.

Wednesday 11 March 6:00PM Silvia Rosani: Intermezzo 4 Tickets: FREE, no ticket required Location: Rooftop Bar, Leeds College of Music

Featuring a performance by Silvia Rosani.

Intermezzo 4 was born from White Masks, a project for cello, live electronics and resonating metal panels Silvia developed with cellist Esther Saladin and visual artist Ines Rebelo.

Intermezzo 4 was designed by Silvia to offer non-musicians the opportunity to experiment with sound without any musical background.

The metal panels are transformed into hybrid instruments by feedback and motors and, by approaching them with speakers drivers, sounds of different intensities and features are produced.

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Silvia Rosani by Brian Slater

After a short performance, Silvia encourages the audience members to interact with her panels.

Wednesday 11 March 7:30PM Gold.Berg.Werk Griet Beyaert Tickets: £10

Xenia Pestova Bennett by Damian Wojkic

Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

Gold.Berg.Werk A radical reinterpretation of J. S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations Xenia Pestova Bennett, Piano Karlheinz Essl, Live electronics The Goldberg Variations form a cornerstone of keyboard repertoire, yet we rarely question the mode of presentation for this piece. Austrian composer Karlheinz Essl offers a refreshing glimpse of a new performance practice through his unusual take in Gold.Berg.Werk. Originally envisioned as a performance environment for string trio, there is now a version for piano and live electronics, never before heard in the UK. Gorgeous time-stretched harmonies are manipulated in real time and played back through spatialised loudspeakers in between the piano variations, bringing together baroque and contemporary sound worlds. In this reimagining of Bach’s vision no two performances are the same due to the live generation of the electronic interludes. Gold.Berg.Werk transcends itself and becomes a new piece in its own right, creating a sense of space and grandeur through electronic distribution of the interludes. This magical performance invites and entices the audience into a journey of discovery, opening and blossoming into a whole new universe of sound.

Delayed Conversations (World Premiere)

Griet Beyaert

Griet Beyaert creates her sound using Powder Glass Sculptures, voice and creative programming. This piece is the result of a year long research and development project developing the sounding of her diaphanous glass work and her body. Firmly situated in the realm of experimental music, she organises her sounds using a pattern of delays as a basic structure for live performance.

Following the performances, students from Leeds College of Music will deliver a meta-improvisation in response to the evening’s performances within the context of Intermezzo 4 . www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Thursday 12 March 10:00AM–4:00PM What does it mean to be a Contemporary Artist in 2020?

Tickets: £20 (includes lunch and tickets for 1:00PM and 4:30PM concerts) Location: Rooftop Bar, Leeds College of Music A series of conversations and discussions will consider what it means to be a contemporary artist in 2020. Many artists refer to themselves as boundary-pushing, or describe their work as crossing and avoiding boundaries.

How true is this, in a world of meta-data and digital marketing? If you make it, can you sell it? Is the tail wagging the dog?

Find out more at www.soundslikethis.co.uk/symposium

Friday 13 March 10:00AM–6:00PM Ligeti Quartet workshop Tickets: £5 (FREE to attend with any festival ticket from Thursday 12 March) Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

Ligeti Quartet by Mike Massaro

Ligeti Quartet have selected a series of new compositions for string quartet which they will workshop and discuss throughout the day.

This is a brilliant opportunity for composers to learn new skills, and fascinating for anyone to gain an insight into how new compositions are tried and tested.

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Ioana Selaru David Zucchi THIS THUS Wachsmann/Hackett/Karlsen Tickets: £5 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music Electronic instruments and computer processing have had a commanding influence on all kinds of music in recent decades. This concert features four different approaches centred around live instruments, electronics and improvisation.

Featuring emerging artists and legendary names this programme includes brand new work alongside David Zucchi’s interpretation of Saxony by James Tenney.

Tickets: £5 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

Hailed as “outstanding” by Nonclassical, Londonbased Canadian saxophonist David Zucchi is a performer of classical, contemporary, experimental and jazz music, collaborating across the UK, Europe and Canada. He has commissioned and premiered works by emerging and established composers and works regularly with Syzygy Saxophones, Ensemble x.y, the Kumori Saxophone Quartet, Alex Paxton’s Dream Musics, art pop artist RJK and Echoshed. David has given UK premieres of a number of Canadian works.

Song has been a fundamental part of the human experience for thousands of years, and the art form is alive and well. This performance celebrates some of the freshest new female composers, including several world premieres, performed by two fascinating young singers.

Helene Mathiesen and violinist Cleo Annandale perform the world premiere of Charlotte Marlow’s Folk Songs, a semi-staged song cycle with libretto by Newcastle-based poet Caroline Hardaker. Each piece explores different reimagining of women’s stories in folklore and mythology and fuse together opera, folk and extended vocal technique.

Amy van Walsum is a current postgraduate at Leeds College of Music. Contemporary music is at the forefront of her focus, performing with the Thallein Ensemble and singing brand new works from composers such as John Joubert, Louis Andriessen and Andrew Toovey.

Amy has just released her debut album in collaboration with pianist Robin Bowman, Out of Town, a wonderful and varied selection of modern female song cycles and works.

Roxanna Albayati (cello) and Maya-Leigh Rosenwasser (piano) formed THIS THUS in 2019 when their interests in experimental, innovative and artistic performance practice brought them together at Trinity Laban. They have performed in Trinity’s New Lights Piano Festival, and Rude Health, a festival of new compositions. They will perform This Thus by Michael Clulow (2019) and Landlines by Maya-Leigh Rosenwasser (2019).

Wachsmann/Hackett/Karlsen Three distinguished improvisers working in electroacoustic, contemporary classical and improvised music. Violinist Philipp Wachsmann has recorded with Derek Bailey, Christine Jeffries and Frank Perry and with Evan Parker’s Electro-acoustic Ensemble and Paul Lytton. Martin Hackett is a composer and visual artist also writing text for performance.

A member of the Oxford Improvisers, London Improvisers Orchestra and the Muzzix collective in Lille, his performances centre around a modified Korg MS10 synthesizer. Norwegian drummer Emil Karlsen is quickly establishing a reputation in the UK for his forward-thinking playing which stretches the timbral and sonic possibilities of the drum kit.

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Thursday 12 March 4:30PM The Art of the Song: Helene Mathiesen Amy van Walsum

Romanian composer and instrumentalist Iona Selaru is fuelled by curiosity and hunger for knowledge. Her works often contain unusual combinations of instruments and sounds.

Here she explores her favourite instrument, the violin. Mazepa Neagra reflects on how places can change people and vice versa; how, unnoticed, our environment affects our personality and, over time, leaves harsh marks.

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

THIS THUS

Thursday 12 March 1:00PM

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Ligeti Quartet by Mike Massaro

Thursday 12 March 7:00PM doors ’til late Ligeti Quartet Vanessa Guinadi This Is Not Jazz Alex Mackay Electroni-Kongo Tickets: £10 Location: Belgrave Music Hall & Canteen, 1-1A Cross Belgrave Street, Leeds, LS2 8JP Age guidance: 14+

To kick off their 10th anniversary year, Ligeti Quartet take a snapshot tour of music by some of the most exciting, genre-defying composers working today in the UK and around the world.

Mandhira de Saram, Violin Patrick Dawkins, Violin Richard Jones, Viola Valerie Welbanks, Cello Ligeti Quartet have been at the forefront of modern and contemporary music since their formation in 2010. They have established a reputation as one of the UK’s leading ensembles, breaking new ground through innovative programming and championing of today’s most exciting composers and artists.

As well as playing at international festivals and landmark venues around the world, they regularly escape the stage to appear at museums, galleries, theatres, pubs, a fishing boat, an IMAX Theatre and on iceberg sculptures as part of a

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Greenpeace campaign. In 2016 they were broadcast live on BBC Radio 3’s In Tune. They have commissioned many new works and collaborated with artists from all types of musical backgrounds including Anna Meredith, Elliot Galvin, Kerry Andrew (Juice Vocal Ensemble, You Are Wolf), Laura Jurd, Meilyr Jones, Neil Hannon (The Divine Comedy), Seb Rochford (Polar Bear), Shabaka Hutchings (Sons of Kemet, The Comet is Coming), Shed 7 and Submotion Orchestra.

They are currently working with Ernst von Siemens prize-winning composer Christian Mason to create a series of ‘Songbooks’ for string quartet, based on overtone singing traditions from around the world.

The Quartet are passionate about supporting emerging composers and taking new music to diverse audiences, regularly leading composition workshops and undertaking education and community outreach work.

Recently appointed Ensemble in Residence at the University of Cambridge, they are City Music Foundation Artists 2016-18.

Ligeti Quartet are grateful for grants and generous support from the Britten-Pears Foundation, Hinrichsen Foundation, RVW Trust, St John’s Smith Square, Help Musicians UK, the Tillett Trust, and the Zetland Foundation to further their training with the European Chamber Music Academy under the tutelage of Hatto Beyerle of the Alban Berg Quartet. They have been coached by members of the Arditti, Chilingirian and Lindsay Quartets and mentored by the Kronos Quartet at the Barbican Centre (2012) and Carnegie Hall (2016).

Vanessa Guinadi presents world premieres of compositions by Athanasia Kontou and Celia Denore. Soprano Vanessa is a final year undergraduate at the Royal Northern College of Music. She has premiered work including Sascha Pellegrini’s The Jewelled Staircase at National Gallery Singapore (2017), Dominic Matthew’s chamber opera What happened to Anne (2018) and Caroline Bordignon’s The Painted Veil (2018) at the Anthony Burgess Foundation, Celia Denore Lopez’s The Body Electric (2019) and the multi-composer collaboration 7 Haikus at the Carole Nash Recital Room (2019). Vanessa has also presented recitals at Buxton International Festival, St. Martin-inthe-Fields and the Whitworth Art Gallery.

This Is Not Jazz is the free improvisation and graphic score project of Lara Jones and Ben Gaunt. This performance also features Robert Bentall (nyckleharpa and electronics) and Damien Harron (percussion). All four are established artists, regularly featured on national radio and in concerts in the UK and worldwide.

Between them they have won the Royal OverSeas League Ensemble Prize, been nominated for a British Composer Award, been a finalist in the Franz Liszt Composition Prize, and won or been nominated for countless other honours.

Alex Mackay presents Targaze, a set of new solo work for manipulated instruments and electronics. Alex’s solo work draws upon their background in contemporary composition and experimental electronic music; utilising modular synthesis, manipulated acoustic instrumentation and experimental guitar techniques to create immersive sonic environments that fuse a minimalist focus with a metallic intensity.

Electroni-Kongo combine cutting edge live electronics with the excitement and dynamism of Kongolese music to make you dance!

Mulele Matando (Bass guitar and guitar) and Ben Eyes (electronics) create a new sound, informed from their heritage but also from the future, taking stock of today’s tumultuous times to create a positive energetic force. www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Friday 13 March 1:00PM Pop-up Performance Tickets: FREE, no ticket required Location: Leeds Art Gallery, The Headrow, Leeds, LS1 3AA

Friday 13 March 7:00PM House of Europe Tickets: FREE, ticket required Location: Recital Room, Leeds College of Music

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This site-specific performance forms part of a series of events designed to complement Sara Barker’s exhibition All Clouds are Clocks, All Clocks are Clouds, at Leeds Art Gallery. Students from Leeds College of Music have spent time engaging with the pieces which inspired her performance.

Sara Barker’s sculptures delicately trace lines in space. Operating on the boundary between sculpture, painting and drawing, her work incorporates a combination of industrial and sculptural materials together with collage, painting and craft techniques, to create unique forms which draw viewers into a curious spatial imagination.

Songwriters from four European conservatoires will come together for this very special performance. The culmination of a project spanning four years, this performance will include songs written in residence at Leeds College of Music during Sounds Like THIS Festival.

This remarkable project is about human understanding and reaches across a number of divides.

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

Friday 13 March 7:30PM doors Plaid Live AV Catenation Jack Breeze Tickets: £15 Location: Community Room, Brudenell Social Club, 33 Queens Road, Leeds, LS6 1NY Age guidance: 14+ Plaid sit at the very heart of global electronica – the perfect encapsulation of what the electronic music of their generation was all about. Central to the “Artificial Intelligence” movement of the ’90s, alongside Warp stablemates Autechre, Aphex Twin, B12 and allies like Richie Hawtin, Speedy J, Kenny Larkin, they brought new rhythmic variation, emotive melody and sensual textures to electronic music, creating a warm and welcoming counterpart to the white heat of the rave explosion.

Plaid by Tim Saccenti

But where the others would swiftly diverge and head off in many creative directions, Plaid stayed truest to the musical values they started out with. Their sound palette has got broader over the

years, their techniques more sophisticated, they increasingly incorporate “real” instruments, but their focus has remained the same: intricate but always grooving rhythm, immersive listening experience and melodies and sound design that connect directly to the emotional centres.

The pair were first inspired by hip-hop and electro, then by techno, house and acid coming from the US. Their earliest releases from 1989 onwards are hip-hop as much as techno or electronica, schooled in jazz and funk with a swing and roll to their rhythms, and a narrative complexity to their chord and melody patterns that made them stand apart.

Plaid have collaborated with unique singers like Björk and Nicolette, remixed the likes of Goldfrapp and Herbert and supported Björk on tour. Their film soundtracks include Michael Arias’s Tekkonkinkreet and Heaven’s Door. Their most recent album, Polymer, was released by Warp in 2019.

Catenation present the world premiere performance of Cumulated Breath.

A disturbing soundcape is going to circle around the audience. A musical and practical feedback loop between Sylvia and Jeanne.

The human interface is controlled by musical gestures. Body movements are used as cues. Chaos meets unity in a liaison bruit.

Jack Breeze intertwines his love of classical music, experimental electronica and sound design to create melodicyet-experimental electronic music.

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Saturday 14 March 1:00PM & 5:00PM Unusual Ingredients Tickets: £15 Location: Rooftop Bar, Leeds College of Music

Unusual Ingredients brings to life the fascinating relationships between sound and flavour.

Join food artist Caroline Hobkinson and musicians and sound artists Jacob ThompsonBell and Adam Martin for a unique event guaranteed to delight all the senses.

Unusual Ingredients guides the audience through a menu featuring popping candy, honey, coffee, seaweed, tamarind and more, each paired with a specially-composed piece of music to dramatise and amplify its flavours and textures in extraordinary ways.

Drawing on the latest gastrophysical research into our sensory perception, Unusual Ingredients is an unmissable event for anyone with a love of music, food or science, to be released also as a limited edition album in February 2020.

‘An intriguing and successful creative extension of my research into the interactions between sound and flavour perception. Having sampled the music and food pairings myself, I will be following this project closely.’ Charles Spence

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Unusual Ingredients by Angus McDonald / Split

‘This project is about making everyday sensations and rituals special again. Deeply focusing on the interactions between sound and flavour shows how much is going on underneath the surface in a simple gesture like crunching a cracker or drinking a cup of coffee.’ Jacob Thompson-Bell, Composer

Saturday 14 March 7:30PM Territorial Gobbing Jonathan Higgins Naomi Perera Psychiceyeclix Tickets: £5 Territorial Gobbing by Cameron Moitt

Location: Recital Room, Leeds College of Music

Saturday 14 March 3:00PM Brutalust Steve Beresford and Sounds Like THIS Improvisation Orchestra Tickets: £5

Brutalust present devised absurdist sound/ theatre performance based on Ionesco’s The Lesson. Repertoire to include new and old works from the Brutalist ensemble. Themes of the work look to cliché, niche and degradation of language, provoking authoritarian and totalitarian realities as present today as they were in 1951. This performance experiments with post-verbatim theatre and storytelling through the sonic imitations of Ionesco’s style.

Location: Recital Room, Leeds College of Music

Steve Beresford has been a central figure in the British and international spontaneous music scenes for over forty years, freely improvising on the piano, electronics and other things with artists ranging from Derek Bailey to John Zorn. This special project with students from Leeds College of Music takes an open-minded approach to improvisation and showcases musical imaginations at their finest.

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Territorial Gobbing wrangles charity shop tapes, contact miced clutter, broken FX pedals and slurping vocal improvisation into a delicate and transient climate of explosive hyper-dynamic noise musique.

Jonathan Higgins presents Glitch Turntablism: a noisy, glitchy free improvisation using three hacked Sony Discman players and cheap DJ mixer. The project came from a frustration with the limitations of digital DJ equipment which, predominantly imitates vinyl. Modifying CD players uncovered a world of noise usually hidden within the circuitry. Utilising these modified players Jonathan warps and glitches audio live.

This digital, glitch turntablism exploits the noise of digital audio for music creation producing results wholly unlike turntablism using vinyl.

Naomi Perera and Adam Langley explore how flute and electronics engage sonically with each other. Aisle features the repeated bell tone from the processed flute, creating a meditative space in which the instruments play with the fragility of the sound. In Feverish, the agitated motifs become more and more frantic until they break down into fragments to be reshaped.

Psychiceyeclix is an experimental video and sound artists using hacked video gear to makes visuals and hacked toys, synths and drums to make audio. Having recorded and toured extensively throughout the world, live performances are always improvised, using sound and vision to bring out a performance that relates to that time and place. At present the mutual influence of light and sound on each other is the driving force although the process is fluid, never settling on any particular style or setup constantly experimenting with sound & visuals.

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Saturday 14 March 7:30PM Sunday 15 March 3:00PM Opera: Romeo and Her Juliet Tickets: £10 Location: Sunny Bank Mills, 83-85 Town Street, Farsley, Pudsey, LS28 5UJ What happens when you fall for someone that you’re forbidden to love?

This is the story of two star-crossed lovers, but not as you know it.

Performed in an intimate setting, Shakespeare’s greatest love story is retold through music from eight of Handel’s bestloved works.

Follow our young couples through the ages as they navigate love, secrecy and loss.

Performed by a student cast and orchestra from Leeds College of Music, prepare to experience a brand new version of this story as you’ve never heard it before.

Combining Shakespeare’s text with music in English and Italian, this production breaks with convention of the traditional operatic form, and explores perceptions of gender, identity and sexuality.

Romeo and Her Juliet by Richard Storrow

Director: Sophie Gilpin Musical Director: Ben Crick

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Monday 16 March 7:30PM British Library presents AWATE: The Unearthed Odyssey Tickets: £10 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

An Eritrean born in Saudi Arabia and raised in London, AWATE has been producing music for over 15 years. Nominated for ‘Best Urban Act’ at the 2018 Unsigned Music Awards, AWATE’s music, including his Happiness EP – praised as a ‘British rap masterpiece’ by Trench Mag – has been featured on BBC Radio 1, 1Xtra and 6 Music, as well as Noisey, Spotify and Complex.

AWATE recently completed a five month artist residency at the British Library and has been using its sound archive to weave together a long-form genre-bending musical piece exploring the subject of diaspora and human migration. Join AWATE for a special evening of music, discussion and performance.

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AWATE by Okwaeze Otusi

The British Library is the national library of the UK. We collect, preserve and provide access to an unparalleled collection of books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, sounds and even websites across our sites in London and Boston Spa in West Yorkshire. Our archive of over 170 million treasures spans Leonardo da Vinci to Nelson Mandela. AWATE is the Library’s Artist-inResidence for Unlocking Our Sound Heritage, a project which preserves the nation’s collective memory by saving and sharing rare and unique sound recordings before they are lost forever.

leo&hyde: The Marriage of Kim K Oberon White: winegod Tickets: £10 Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music Age guidance: 18+

Two contrasting theatrical performances which take a sideways glance at the modern world, and our place in it. leo&hyde: The Marriage of Kim K On the night before their anniversary weekend, Mike and Amanda have very different ideas about how to spend the night: Keeping Up with the Kardashians and chill, or The Marriage of Figaro and culture. But is this argument over what to watch on TV more than just a petty squabble? How different can you be from the love of your life?

Returning after a triumphant 2017 premiere, The Marriage of Kim K is a genre-defying smorgasbord of pop, electronic, and classical music, a 3-in-1 rom-com switching between two iconic marriages: Kim Kardashian’s 72-day marriage disaster with basketball player Kris Humphries, and the tempestuous Count and Countess from Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro.

The Marriage of Kim K by Toria Brightside

Tuesday 17 March 7:30PM

Oberon White: winegod Queer performance artist Oberon White presents a contemporary ritual in this multidisciplinary performance tracing the ancientness of queer identity. Through a language of experimental electronic music, virtuosic vocals and original text, winegod explores our unity as living, fleshy beings on an increasingly fragile globe.

Original Music & Text: Oberon White Dramaturg: Talia Randall Lighting Designer: Joshua Pharo Audio & Mixing Consultant: Jacob Aria Associate Producer: Emilie Labourey The development of winegod has been supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, Roundhouse’s Resident Artist Scheme and The Glory.

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Oberon White by Charley Etheridge

‘Breathe me deep. Hold me tight. Keep your eyes open. Don’t look back.’

Monday 9 – Friday 20 March Installation: Bridges can also Function as Walls Location: Underneath the bridge link, Leeds College of Music

Exploring the upside down world of contemporary politics, media, speech and sound, this site-specific installation explores the sound world of harmony/disharmony, truth/lies and up/down in a radical approach to listening in a ‘post-truth’ era.

Can you trust what you hear? Is what you hear worth trusting? Behold my truth!

Artists: Scott Hewitt & Andrew Potterton

Wednesday 11 – Wednesday 18 March Installations: Déjà vu The Cube Hyperreality Society Tickets: FREE, no ticket required Opening hours: Monday–Thursday: 8:00AM–4:00PM Friday: 8:00AM–6:00PM Saturday–Sunday: 9:00AM–4:00PM Location: Archive, 94 Kirkstall Road, Leeds, LS3 1HD

Déjà vu: Do you ever feel like you’ve relived something before? This 5.1 surround audiovisual experience combines cinematic and electronic soundscapes with abstract visualisations, creating an immersive, sensory experience.

Producer: Callum Lewis Projection Artist: Marie Collier The Cube is an art installation, designed as an immersive piece of progressive artwork, intended to explore how people feel about the links between live events, maths and art, and the emotions they feel when they see the piece.

Artist & Project Manager: Emily Hobbs Lighting Programmer: Jacob Martin Hyperreality Society This cutting edge digital artwork explores the troubled relationships with our planet and each other. The admiration of beauty versus wilful destruction. The need to love and the compulsion to hate. The chaos of a structured society. Will you listen to what Mother Nature is telling you? Which way will you turn?

Created by: Jamie Kenny, Paayal Shukla & Charlie Smith

www.soundslikethis.co.uk

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Photo by Richard Storrow

Friday 20 March 7:30PM Festival Finale: Gala Concert 2020

The Gala Concert is an annual celebration of Leeds College of Music’s distinctive approach to the training of performers, composers and producers.

Tickets: FREE, ticket required

Musically and visually spectacular, the Gala Concert has become a highlight of the performance calendar.

Location: The Venue, Leeds College of Music

Featuring performances from across the entire range of programmes at the conservatoire, you can be sure to see the leading artists of the future.

HOW TO BOOK Book online at www.soundslikethis.co.uk or call 0113 222 3434 Box Office is operational between 10:00AM and 5:00PM Tickets also available at: Leeds College of Music, See, DICE, Resident Advisor, Jumbo Records and Crash Records

Leeds College of Music 3 Quarry Hill, Leeds, LS2 7PD Tel: +44 (0)113 222 3434 www.soundslikethis.co.uk @LCoMEvents / LCoMEvents #SoundsLikeTHIS

For other formats including large print PDF, braille and audio please email: hello@soundslikethis.co.uk