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Festival

Birds & Boogie – Ensemble Offspring

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Ensemble Offspring features some of Australia’s most innovative and virtuosic performers. In this concert they play a programme combining nature soundscapes, poetic meditations, funk rhythms and unpredictable resonances, in works by composers Kate Moore, Nicholas Morrish, Holly Harrison and Ned McGowan.

Blackbird Song by Kate Moore is an expansive melody written in response to the early morning song of a blackbird. Fernby the same composer is an ode to the eponymous, enchanting, ancient plant. The world premiere of Ned McGowan’s new sextet examines grids, musical time, speeds and machines. From Nicholas Morrish, nominee for the Gaudeamus Award 2019, the ensemble plays the delicate tapestry of sounds Life of Lines II. Holly Harrison’s Bend/Boogie/Breakdraws inspiration from post-rock riffs and timbres, funk rhythms and honky-tonk piano, as well as the idea of deformed vinyl and things ‘going wrong’: bent out of shape, broken, not quite right.

Ensemble Offspring, led by acclaimed percussionist Claire Edwardes, embraces open-minded music-making in all its forms, from chamber work to free improvisation and interdisciplinary productions. The ensemble is driven by a philosophy of promoting artistic integrity and challenging the way audiences think about music.

 

Ensemble Offspring is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts advisory body, and the NSW Government through Arts NSW.

PROGRAMME

Kate Moore – Blackbird Song
Kate Moore - Fern
Nicholas Morrish - Life Of Lines II (nominee Gaudeamus Award)
Holly Harrison – Bend/Boogie/Break
Ned McGowan – New piece (world premiere) (commissioned by Gaudeamus)

Download the programme note

PERFORMERS

Ensemble Offspring
Claire Edwardes - percussion

Photo ©Keith Saunders

Partners

Ensemble Offspring