SOME COMPOSITIONS

Score: http://bit.ly/1FyYDcS

Pedro Alvarez 
Two Surfaces (2013)
Ensemble Hand Werk:
--Daniel Agi, alto flute
--Heather Roche, clarinet
--Stefanie van Backlé, violin
--Niklas Seidl, cello
--Jens Ruland, percussion
Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik
www.pedroalvarez.info

'Two Surfaces', like many of my recent endeavours, attempts to present a static, 'objectified' aesthetic situation. It points at the utopian idea of time standing still, avoiding a 'processual' unfolding of music, and thus rebelling against inherited ideals of narrative fluency. Here we find two rich textural situations that do not evolve: a music of 'being' rather than 'becoming'.

Two Surfaces

Fabricated Memories, I. (2021) for six electric guitars

Score: http://issuu.com/alvarezpedro/docs/ver/1

Pedro Alvarez
Ver (2013)
Mark Knoop, piano
Premiere at St Paul's Hall, Huddersfield, UK on 5th Dec 2013.
www.pedroalvarez.info

The various musical situations that constitute this work are pervaded by a sense of ephemeral plenitude. By simply 'being themselves' instead of representing functional stages in ongoing processes, these situations question the idea of 'organic development' as an aesthetic model. What remains is a kind of brutal formal construction; the abrupt juxtaposition of self-enclosed blocks of dissimilar proportions. 'Ver' was written in Vienna/London in the summer/autumn of 2013.

"‘Instead’ explores four textural situations recurrently; a sort of collage of fragments from surfaces designed independently from each other. It makes use of extremely limited material, making the clarinet devoid of its characteristic refined sophistication and flexibility, treating it as a ‘found object’, as it were. Both material and form are thus approached in a brutal, ‘primitive’ way." (Alvarez)

Pedro Alvarez - Instead

Featuring clarinetists from the Jacobs School of Music, conducted by Gonçalo Lourenço.

For a video of this piece, go here: http://vimeo.com/louisgoldford/panopticon

Sammy Johnson, Benjamin Tyler Willis, Natalie Hart, Lilly Haley, Christopher Elchico, Kevy Bailey, Joey Miller, Laura Chalmers, B-flat clarinets; AnnaMarie Ignarro, Erik Franklin, Ross DuBois, Nick Morandi, bass clarinets

Recorded and mixed by Daniel Talton.

Panopticon (2013) for 12 periphonically-spatialized clarinets

7/25/14 UUCA, Atlanta GA
John McCowen's Clarinet Quartet no. 1 featuring Spiral of Sound Crystal Bowl Choir

Derek Emch, Tim Fitzgerald, Jon Goodman, & John McCowen - clarinets
Mary Ackerman, Lucy Banks, & Candace Keach - crystal bowls 

Clarinet Quartet no. 1 feat. Spiral of Sound Crystal Bowl Choir

live at 2640 Space (Baltimore); live recording of the premiere

Performed by, written for, commissioned by Ty Bouque [voice]

more info:
http://timothy-mccormack.com/seated-at-the-throat
http://tybouque.com

[photo credit: Hang Su, @oliver_espace]

Seated at the Throat [2023-24]

"clarinet, lost in crowd" for clarinet and electronics.

Performed by Heather Roche, 28th May 2024

clarinet, lost in crowd

Score: http://bit.ly/1dQvc0n

Pedro Alvarez 
Plasmares (2014) 
commissioned by hcmf// 
Ensemble CrossingLines: 
--Laia Bobi, alto flute 
--Victor de la Rosa, clarinet 
--Tere Gómez, tenor saxophone 
--Cassiel Anton, alto trombone 
--Feliu Ribera, percussion 
--Mireia Vendrell, piano 
--Luis Codera Puzo, sine waves 
--Pedro Alvarez, e-guitar (guest) 
--Lorenzo Ferrándiz, conductor 
Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival 2014 
www.pedroalvarez.info

Plasmares

Score: bit.ly/1LlKKFB

Pedro Alvarez
Margin (2015)
-Heather Roche, bass clarinet
-Marco Fusi, viola d'amore
-Rafał Łuc, accordion
The Riot Ensemble's 'Portfolio' concert
London, 06 June 2015
www.pedroalvarez.info

Margin

Carnivalesque (2014/ revised version 2016) -Ashkan Behzadi

for Flute (Piccolo), Clarinet in Bflat (Bass Clarinet), Violin, Violoncello, Accardion, Piano, Percussion 
Conducted by: Sandro Gorli 

Revised version composed for Divertimento Ensemble
Premiered on July 17, 2016, Bobbio, Italy, as part of International Young Composers Workshop 

Program notes:
“The one sin of which a Tarahumara Indian is conscious is that of not having danced enough.”
Jessie L.Weston From Ritual to Romance


Carnivalesque (2014/2016) -Ashkan Behzadi

Score: http://issuu.com/alvarezpedro/docs/fragments/1

Pedro Alvarez 
Fragments after Cioran (2011-2012)
Ensemble Interface:
--Bettina Berger, bass flute
--Andrea Nagy, clarinet
--Maiko Matsuoka, violin
--Christophe Mathias, cello
--Agnieszka Koprowska-Born, percussion
--Anna D'Errico, piano
--Scott Voules, conductor
Dampfzentrale Bern, Switzerland, March 2012
www.pedroalvarez.info

Fragments after Cioran

Claudia Jane Scroccaro - Overdrive (2020) 

Ensemble Musikfabrik
Carl Rosman, Bass Clarinet
Ulrich Löffler, Piano
Florentin Ginot, Double Bass

Rie Watanabe, condutor


Recorded live on the 6th of September 2020
Réfectoire des moines - Abbaye de Royaumont 

Lauréat de la Fondation Royaumont
Œuvre écrite dans le cadre de l’Académie Voix Nouvelles 2020

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

Overdrive refers to the fuzzy and growly tone, produced by distortion in audio signal processing, often associated to electric instruments and mostly heard in Blues, Rock and Punk music. In my latest works I’ve been intrigued by bringing to the foreground the physical tension existing between the musician’s body and the body of his/her own instrument, in the act of playing, which is determined by the nature and production of specific sounds, like microtonal oscillations, capable to project the listener in immersive spaces and ever-changing spectra. In Overdrive, the necessity to enhance the energy and sonic (at)tension existing among three musicians confronted with such large instruments, able to produce very low frequencies, determined some extreme sonic and instrumental research together with the members of Musikfabrik, moving some steps forward, by bringing the consequences of this reflection over its limits.

Overdrive (2020) for Bass Clarinet, Double Bass, Piano

Hands - Cassie Wieland

“An adrenaline shock to the UK new music scene…” – Kate Molleson, BBC Radio 3

“The Queen of Clarinet Mulitphonics” – Sara Mohr-Pietsch, BBC Radio 3

“…multiphonic virtuosity” – The Guardian

“…brilliant…” – The Times

“…performed by the excellent Heather Roche…brought vividly to life by Roche’s controlled but expressive performance… 5 stars” –  BBC Music Magazine

“…a figurehead for contemporary music performance practice” – Neil Luck, BBC Radio 3

“…undoubtedly one of the great instrumentalists of her generation.” – Graham McKenzie, Artistic Director of the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival

“What makes all of this so fully absorbing is how Roche has completely internalized extended techniques for clarinet into her playing, with nothing sounding forced or contrived.” – Point of Departure

Born in Canada, clarinetist Heather Roche trained in England, lived in Germany for 7 years and now lives in London.

She has played with Apartment House (London) since 2016. With them, she has recorded 28 albums for the Another Timbre label, and the ensemble is currently Ensemble-in-Residence at Wigmore Hall. She started working with the band Modern Nature in 2022, joining them first for their King's Place show in December of that month. 

In 2015 she formed a duo with the German accordionist Eva Zöllner, with whom she has performed at the Venice Biennale, MIXTUR festival (Barcelona), the Darmstadt Summer Courses, Gaudeamus (Holland), and the Bludenzer Tage (Austria). They also toured extensively in Mexico (2019), Sweden (2021) and Colombia (2022). They have commissioned dozens of new pieces for their duo, including works by Annika Socolofsky, Elnaz Seyedi, Pierre Alexandre Tremblay, Christopher Fox, and Johan Svensson. Their latest call for composers (supported by NeuStart Kultur) attracted 100 applications from around the world, from which they chose four – which will be premiered in January 2023 in Germany. www.zoellner-roche.com

She was a member of Mimitabu (Gothenburg) from 2018-2020, and she was a founding member of hand werk, a 6-person chamber music ensemble based in Cologne, and worked with the group from 2010-2017.

She has performed with ensembles and orchestras including Musikfabrik (Cologne), the WDR Orchestra (Cologne), mimitabu (Gothenburg), the London Symphony Orchestra (London), the London Sinfonietta (London), ensemble Garage (Cologne), ensemble interface (Berlin), the Riot Ensemble (London), the Alisios Camerata (Zagreb), manufaktur für aktuelle musik (Frankfurt), and ensemble proton (Bern).

She has performed at most of the major European festivals, including musikFest (Berlin), BachFest (Leipzig), Musica Nova (Helsinki), Acht Brücken (Cologne), the International Computer Music Conference (Huddersfield, Ljubljana), the Dias de Música Electroacústica (Seia, Portugal) the Bludenzer Tage (Bludenz, Austria), and the Agora Festival (Ircam, Paris). She has also performed solo programmes at the Zagreb Music Biennale, the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the New York Electroacoustic Symposium, at CIRMMT (Montreal), Sound Festival (Aberdeen), Unerhörte Musik (Berlin), Eavesdropping (London), Rainy Days (Luxembourg) and with the Birmingham Electroacoustic Sound Theatre (BEAST).

She has premiered many solo works for her instrument, including pieces by Maija Hynninen, Simon Emmerson, Martin Iddon, Lisa Robertson, Christopher Fox, Dai Fujikura, Martin Rane Bauck, Chikako Morishita, Michelle Lou, etc. In 2020, Scott McLaughlin wrote his clarinet concerto, Natura Naturans, for her, and it was premiered at Tectonics (Glasgow) with the BBCSSO under Ilan Volkov. Her CD of Martin Iddon’s clarinet music, Sapindales, recently sold out on the Another Timbre label. She also has solo CDs out on the HCR/NMC and Métier labels. 

Since 2016 she has acted as the Reviews Editor for TEMPO, a quarterly journal for contemporary music published by Cambridge University Press. She also writes regularly for the Clarinet and Saxophone Society Magazine, and has written feature pieces for MusicWorks Magazine (Canada).

Her website is host to one of the most widely read new music blogs on the Internet. In 2019 it had 90,000 hits from around the world. She successfully crowdfunded in 2014 in order to host her first composition competition. Six young composers were chosen out of 270 applicants to write new pieces, which were premiered in 2016.

She gives workshops in clarinet technique and composition all over Europe, for example in London, Munich and Copenhagen. She has a yearly workshop for fourth-year undergraduate students at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, in which they write a new piece for clarinet and electronics. She has also participated in residencies with young composers at Stanford University, Harvard University, Peabody Conservatory and the University of Leeds, etc.

In 2014 she was awarded a DIVA (Danish International Visiting Artists Fellowship), and lived in Copenhagen for two months.

Heather completed her Masters of Music (Orchestral Training) in 2006 at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, studying under Joy Farrall and Laurent Ben Slimane, in addition to conducting with Sian Edwards. Following her degree she completed residencies with the International Ensemble Modern Academy, at IMPULS in Graz and with ensemble recherche in Freiburg, the Darmstadt Summer Courses 2008 and 2010 and the International Ensemble Modern Academy in Innsbruck, Austria. She performed in masterclasses with Michael Collins, Ernesto Molinari and Shizuyo Oka, to name a few. She completed her BMus in 2005 at the University of Victoria, Canada, studying under Patricia Kostek.

Immigrant, nomad, traveller and sleepwalker. I make music too.

Pedro Alvarez - Instead

heather_roche

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