| Fact File | - 30 November 2005: Horses Brawl along with Cruiser Chimps, Charlotte Morris and Mochikolinksi play at the Norwich Arts Centre, St Benedict's St. Admission is £2.50 adv or £3 on the door.
- Horses Brawl got together in 2003, performing for the first time as part of the Creative Arts East tour of rural Norfolk. Since then, Horses Brawl have performed on London's South Bank at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, received airplay on BBC Radio 3 and released a three-track EP.
- Recent highlights have included performing at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, at The Broadside Festival 2005 along with performances at the Norwich Fringe Festival, the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, the Swanage Folk Festival and regular appearances at the Norwich Arts Centre.
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Horses Brawl are an exuberant trio with a passion for the music of a bygone age. Formed a couple of years ago for a series of Medieval concerts with Creative Arts East, they soon started to develop a more contemporary sound. The trio - Laura Cannell, Adrian Lever and Jonathan Manton - draw their music from English, French medieval and European folk styles and have earned critical acclaim. Having caused something of a stir in the music press as one of the 'brightest young bands around', the Norwich-based group are about to record a new album to be released on their own label Brawl Records, in October. New album "The album will feature the three tracks from our EP and loads of new material which we have written and performed over the past year," said Laura Cannell. "We wanted to create music that combines our interests in early, contemporary and folk music and to perform to all sorts of audiences. "In many senses we are more of a band than an early music group. Although we do perform recitals, we find it really exciting when we play at venues that wouldn't normally put on a group like ours - places where guitars and drums are more the norm. "It's great when people think that they don't like folk music or don't know what early music is - but discover they really like our stuff," she added. Unconventional techniques
 | | Adrian Lever |
Exploring unconventional techniques on modern and ancient instruments, with a heavy influence from the Baroque and Renaissance eras, Horse Brawl's music is as complex in it's sound, as is it steeped in history. "We're all from different backgrounds. I'm a composer of contemporary music and it's use in theatre. Adrian has a folk background and Laura's is with Medieval and early music," said Jon Manton. "A lot of people who watch us are amazed at the amount of noise a group of three people can generate. "They like the types of sound you wouldn't get from the instruments. It's just an experiment in using the same set of instruments, but trying to get new sounds from them. "There's a device called a cappo, which you'd normally use on a guitar to hold the strings at a certain point so you can play the instrument higher. It's never used on a cello, but I put one on and then used a plectrum to strum the strings. "It gives it a unique tapping sound, a very woody and percussive edge and helps to get the rhythm tight. We play with a lot of energy and the speed of things does change with time, but a lot of it is period music," he added. Jon isn't the only member of the group to experiment with new musical techniques. "There's one track in which I unscrew my bow and wrap it around the fiddle so that I can play all four strings at once. This creates a really great noise - I think! It also means I can do things not normally possible with a regular bow," said Laura. "Adrian performs one of our pieces on bowed guitar, which creates a really eerie sound and rich texture," she added. Recorder music
 | | Laura Cannell and Jonathan Manton |
In addition to performing with Horses Brawl, Laura is also on a mission to change our views of the recorder. All too often the image of a school's group creating a sound which is far from musical can come to mind, but Laura is keen to put this stereotype to rest. "The recorder is a real virtuoso instrument, just like the violin. It's just falls into a different period of music," she said. "I started on the recorder as my main instrument. I played a lot of early music on it as there isn't any repertoire for the recorder in the classical period because. At that time it wasn't very popular. However, it was really popular in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. "I decided that I needed some new music to play as I didn't just want to be playing other people's music all the time, so I applied to the Arts Council of England for a grant to research into a new repertoire for the recorder. "What I'm doing is using is using late medieval divisions, using theories first put forward in 1535 by Sylvestro Ganassi, which helps me to compose. "But then I thought to do it with a computer programme which means I can play fantastic Medieval virtuoso recorder ideals, but they come out with a really contemporary sound," she added. Album launch The new Horses Brawl album promises to feature music from all over Europe, dating back to the 13th and 14th centuries, along with arrangements the band have written through improvising and pushing instruments out of their normal boundaries.
For details of the album launch event on Saturday 22 October, 2005 and other Horses Brawl gigs visit their website. | 
