Edith

¨Lefrenk - Colours¨ is out now in the compilation ¨PFL4¨ of PFL records, mixed and unmixed by Willy Réal & David Prap.

Lefrenk - Colours (Original Mix)

Parallel Action

Always Future (feat. Laura Reid)

@0 EP1

Mt Baker

Track featured in Listening to the sand dunes, a geolocated sound walk at Shell Bay, Studland, Dorset UK 2021
I interviewed David Brown, from National Trust about what makes the area so special and why we need to protect and look after our sand dunes. Find the whole walk here:
https://explore.echoes.xyz/collections/j4HqpBTgJF5ujMJ3

Shell Bay View - Dune Dynamics Echo

Ahead of the release of their much anticipated 10th Anniversary Remastered Edition of A Matter of Life… 2021, Penguin Cafe share the remastered studio version of the album's closing piece Coriolis, along with a video of Arthur Jeffes performing a 2021 live rendition of the song on the dulcitone in his second home in Tuscany.

Watch: https://youtu.be/Kt0A8vWyM5k

The remastered track, a duet between Arthur Jeffes on piano and Oli Langford on violin, incorporates the aesthetics of the original PCO, seasoned into a confident and redefined style, maintaining that quintessentially English sound, but adding a fresh direction and a sense that they are evolving into something new and very much their own.

"The version of Coriolis that ended up on the record is actually a mix of several takes we recorded on a very slow, cosy day in the studio. It had been raining for days and Oli, our violinist, and I had the basic idea and played around with it. In the end the initial recordings sounded so beautiful I just cut together the best parts to make it into the song we have here. It always makes me think of rain."

Penguin Cafe will be performing songs from the album live at the Barbican Hall tonight, on March 22, the day this single gets released, followed by a UK festival tour this summer including The Great Escape. The album will be released via Erased Tapes on April 29.    

"Some of the most unusual and delightful music of the last 40 years” — The Guardian
“Stylistically, A Matter of Life… is a near-perfect match with the Penguin Cafe Orchestra of old” — Music OMH

Tour Dates:

22.03. London (UK) — The Barbican Centre
29.04. Belfast (IE) — The Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival (with Peter Broderick)
01.05. Cheltenham (UK) — Cheltenham Jazz Festival
12.05. Brighton (UK) — The Great Escape — Erased Tapes 十五 showcase
14.05. Saffron Walden (UK) — Saffron Hall
29.05. Hay-on-Wye (UK) — Hay Festival
01.07. Swadlincote (UK) — Timber Festival
29.07. Barnsley (UK) — Underneath The Stars Festival
24.09. Stroud (UK) — Hidden Notes (sold out)

A Matter of Life... 2021

Coriolis

Penguin Cafe - Coriolis

The Londoner

Breathe

Instrumentation:

3 Flutes, Eb Clarinet, 2 Bb Clarinets, 3 Oboes, 2 doubling Cor Anglais, 2 Trumpets in Bb, Tenor Trombone, Bass Trombone, Piano, Harp, Percussion (1 player)* STRINGS: 7, 5, 5, 6, 2. 

41 players spatially organised as:

Group 1: Clarinet in Eb, Flute 3, Violin, Violoncello, Guitar, Piano and Percussion 
Group 2: Oboe 1, Clarinet 1, Clarinet 2, Violin solo, String Quartet

Group 3: 4 Violin 1, 4 Violin 2, 4 Viola, 4 Violoncello and 2 Double Basses

Group 4: Flute 1, Flute 2  

Group 5: Two Trumpets in Bb, Tenor Trombone, Bass Trombone

Group 6: Oboe 2 doubling Cor Anglais, Oboe 3, Harp

Duration 20’36”

Performers include:
Group 1: Gleb Kanasevich (clarinet in Eb)Christian Smith (percussion) Lisa Cella (flute), Tristan McKay (piano) Jeremy Bass (guitar), Mark Fewer (violin) and James Burch (cello); Group 2 and 6: Zero Theorem string quartet, Players from the Bristol Ensemble including Roger Heaton (clarinets) and Chris Redgate (oboe/cor)Group 3: the Karski Quartet and Viridis Quartets, Group 4: (additional flutes) from Chamber Cartel, Group 5: Meridian Brass, Dirk Amrein (trombones). 

Performance instructions:  
1) This piece is unconducted. 
2) There is no score. All notated material is within each performer’s part. 
3) It is anticipated that the orchestra will be positioned in a conventional manner, but the nature of the music and performance also lends itself to new spatial configurations, should these be appropriate.  
4) All instrumentalists play independently of each other. The composer treats each performer as a uniquely independent voice.  
5) Music is cued only at the start when all stopwatches are synchronised. There are no other points of ‘fixed’ synchronisation between the instrumentalists.  
6) Whilst the relationship of each instrument is somewhat flexibly placed against its neighbour, care has been taken to calculate potential outcomes of coincidence and variability. To this end, it is vital that metronome markings and timecode are adhered to as accurately as possible throughout the performance.    

The Score and Parts: There is no score for this orchestral work. All musical material and instruction are fully notated within each player’s individual parts. Adherence to timecode ensures that the architecture of the piece remains intact, but the on-going interpretation of tempi and timecode creates contextual changes to the alignment of musical detail between all the parts. As such, there is no definitive performance; the music has to be performed or experienced to be ‘known’. 
 
Timecode: Timecode is not used to imply the use of any kind of click-track in performance or to be seen as a straitjacket to flexible performance within the orchestra and timecode framework. However, players are required to use individual mobile phone stopwatches during the performance to help structure timings, prevent long-term tempo-drift and delivery of their material to achieve an outcome that most closely matches the composer's structural intention. Continual reference to the timecode embedded in each part when read in reference to the stopwatch is particularly useful after longer pauses or where tempo has slipped due to playing under or over the metronome markings, enabling the performer to compensate by playing a little faster or slower to 'catch up' or extend or cut short pauses and rests as necessary to remain broadly on track with the timecode throughout the piece. It is important to start and also complete phrases within and as close to timecode parameters as possible. Please adjust your playing speeds continually to align with the timecode.

[...] which constantly generates a pulviscular cloud [...]

Quatuor Bozzini (https://quatuorbozzini.ca/fr/)
recorded live at the Time:Spans Festival (https://timespans.org/)
NYC, August 2019

string quartet no 4 (2019)

Egidija Medekšaitė – Textile 1 (excerpt)

Laura is a composer, cellist and arranger. 
"Fluid, virtuoso counterpoint" The Guardian.
Laura composes her own music and has collaborated with Steven Leggett on Bathhouse (firecracker), Hizou by Fourhands (Claremont56), Kathryn Williams, Thea Gilmore, Maximo Park, Owen Green and more...

Shell Bay View - Dune Dynamics Echo

Laura Reid

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