College plays host to innovative composers

Shrewsbury Chronicle - 20 Mar 2008

BCMG, Concord College, Acton Burnell

THE Birmingham Contemporary Music Group are musicians from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, who are widely regarded as some of the most innovative and imaginative supporters of modern music in Europe.

They recently performed in concert at Concorde College, as part of the annual series promoted by the similarly innovative and imaginative Shropshire Music Trust.

The BCMG played ten short pieces ranging from just two minutes to around 15 minutes, written by British and Irish composers born within the last 50 years or so, two of whom were present for the evening. The first of these, Tansy Davies, contributed two works - "Undertow" and "Grind Show Unplugged", inspired by a Goya painting.

BCMG played the acoustic version, without the electronic soundtrack against which it can also be performed.

Two pieces by John Woolrich, the other composer present, were also played, both inspired by poems. In the "Mirrors of Asleep" was a musical representation of the faces of the people we have lost. Haunting violin melodies died away into an ending of peaceful chords on the piano.

Highlights of the six pieces by other composers were "Caprichos" by Philip Cashian, also inspired by a Goya painting, and Thomas Ades' "Court Studies from the Tempest", music drawn from his opera The Tempest first performed at Covent Garden in 2004.

BCMG will be performing in Shropshire again in the spring.

Paul Nutley

Last Updated : 30/03/2008