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 Saturday 5 December
TOTAL IMMERSION: GEORGE CRUMB
Born just over 80 years ago in Charleston, West Virginia, George Crumb is one of the most original and unpredictable composers you’ll ever hear, a sonic inventor and true pioneer. There’s a haunting sense of the mystical and spiritual about his work. It’s also theatrical, rich in references to non-western musics and composers such as Bach and Chopin, extraordinarily beautiful in sound and delicate in texture. Crumb has written for everything from ‘spoken flute’ and amplified piano to electric cello and toy piano. His sparkling imagination has the power to astonish and delight. Here is music made for total immersion.
10.30am Film and Talk, Cinema 2
The Voice of the Whale
Composer Stephen Montague gives an introduction to the music of George Crumb, followed by Robert Mugge’s film which includes performances of Crumb's Vox Balaenae for Three Masked Players, samples of the rural gospel music which has influenced him, demonstrations by Crumb of the exotic instruments and unusual effects which figure in his compositions, and scenes from his home and university teaching environment.
US, 1976, Dir. Robert Mugge 54 mins
£6
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1.00pm Concert, Barbican Hall
GEORGE CRUMB
Makrokosmos Volume 1:Twelve fantasy pieces after the Zodiac
A Little Suite for Christmas, A.D. 1979
Ancient Voices of Children
Joanna MacGregor piano
Guildhall New Music Ensemble
Richard Baker conductor
Forearms, knuckles and fingernails, together with the pianist’s vocal and whistling skills, are required to perform Crumb’s first Makrokosmos volume from1972. The composer encompasses the heavens using sounds available from a single piano. His Little Suite for Christmas, A.D. 1979, a ‘holy tone-poem’ for piano inspired by Giotto’s frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel, is filled with transcendent echoes of ancient rituals and wild dances.
£12
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4.00pm Film, Cinema 2
George Crumb: Bad Dog
A new film celebrating Crumb’s 80th birthday. Featuring the George Crumb Ensemble with George Crumb on percussion performing Apparition, movements from Mundus Canis, Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik, Three Early Songs, and Sit Down Sister. The film also includes George Crumb discussing the music included in the film with David Starobin.
US, 2009, Dir. David Starobin 75 mins
£6
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6.00pm Talk, Mozart Room
Stephen Montague discusses George Crumb in his American context and the music in this evening’s concert.
Admission by free ticket only. Limited availability but admission guaranteed with a Day Pass.
7.30pm Free Event
Barbican Freestage
The culmination of a BBC SO Learning project inspired by the music of George Crumb. Featuring hundreds of dancers and musicians from Fulham Symphony Orchestra, Westminster and Hammersmith & Fulham schools, Trinity Laban and COMA (Contemporary Music-Making for Amateurs) the project is devised and led by composer Stephen Montague and inspired by Crumb's work Star-Child..
8.00pm Concert, Barbican Hall
Barbican Hall
GEORGE CRUMB
Echoes of Time and the River
A Haunted Landscape
Star-Child*
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Martyn Brabbins conductor
Matthew Coorey/Benjamin Shwartz/Nicholas Collon conductors*
Claudia Barainsky soprano
Helen Vollam trombone
Trinity Boys Choir
New London Chamber Choir
Handbell Ringers
Crumb’s orchestral works are few but masterly. Echoes of Time and the River, awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1968, explores the nature of passing time. The work takes the form of four ‘processionals’, performed by players who march around the stage at different speeds! A Haunted Landscape, commissioned by the New York Philharmonic in 1984, includes Caribbean steel drums and an Appalachian dulcimer. Crumb’s largest work in terms of performing forces, Star-Child, traces a blazing, inspired vision from apocalyptic darkness to redeeming light.
£24 £20 £16 £12 £8
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Save money and guarantee entry to all events with a Total Immersion: George Crumb Day Pass. There is a choice of pass, reflecting the range of ticket prices for concerts in the Barbican Hall. Available by telephone, on 020 7638 8891, or in person only.
Day Passes £38 £35 £32 £29 £26
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 Friday 11 December 7.00pm
GYORGY KURTAG ...quasi una fantasia…
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 9 in E flat major, K. 271
KODALY Matrai Pictures
BARTOK The Miraculous Mandarin
Robert Spano conductor
Jonathan Biss piano
BBC Singers
Musical strands of Hungary and Austria combine in a programme spanning more than two centuries of history. Bartók recovered from a near-fatal brush with Spanish Flu in 1918 and began work soon after on his sensational ‘pantomime’, The Miraculous Mandarin. Bartók’s vibrant orchestrations, thrusting rhythms and folk themes made a strong impression on the young György Kurtág. His …quasi una fantasia… (1987-8) explores the mysterious boundary lands between sound and silence.
Pre-concert talk, 6.00pm
Barbican Hall
An introduction to tonight’s concert.
BBC Family Music Intro concert
An introduction to concert-going for families with tickets at £5 each and a free Meet the Musicians Family event.
Full details of BBC SO Family Music Intro
£24 £20 £16 £12 £8
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