Monday, 14 November, 2011

7.30pm, West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge

Anglia Sinfonia

Conductor - Paul Jackson

Terra Nova | Vita Nuova

Julio d'Escriván - Terra Nova, concerto for videogame player and electroacoustic ensemble (world première)
Luciano Berio - Laborintus 2

Julio d'Escriván's Terra Nova was written especially for Anglia Sinfonia and the Mechanical and Electroacoustic Music Ensemble (MEME) in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the British Antarctic Expedition led by Captain Robert Falcon Scott. The audiovisual materials for this piece are drawn from original archival material held in the Scott Polar Research Institute.

Terra Nova uses the medium of the video game, projected on to a large screen, to commemorate Scott's tragic expedition through the use of three-dimensional recreations of the Antarctic landscape. Anglia Sinfonia and MEME provide the additional live orchestral material in emulation of the early cinematic practice of playing live music to film.

The concept of 'New Lands' finds further resonance in Luciano Berio's 1965 masterpiece for singers, actors and orchestra, Laborintus 2. Written to commemorate the 700th anniversary of the birth of the Italian poet Dante Alighieri, Laborintus 2 presents a kaleidoscopic amalgamation of poetry, vocalisation, music and electronic sounds, drawing on themes from Dante's La Vita Nuova (The New Life) and The Inferno.

Tickets available from the Mumford Theatre Box Office:

£10 (£7 concessions; £5 students) Tel: 01223 352932 and on the door.

Wednesday, 7 December, 2011

7.30pm, West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge

Anglia Ruskin Orchestra and Chorus

Conductors - Paul Rhys, Alan Rochford
Piano solo - Maurice Hodges

Messiaen - 'Jardin du sommeil d'amour' from Turangalîla Symphonie
Mozart - Symphony No. 31 in Dmaj. K.297 (Paris)
Bernstein - Chichester Psalms
Copland - Old American Songs
Lambert - The Rio Grande

For their autumn concert, Anglia Ruskin Orchestra and Chorus present music from the old world and the new. Olivier Messiaen's 'Jardin du sommeil d'amour' from the immense Turangalîla Symphonie of 1948 conjures visions of 'two lovers enclosed in love's sleep. A landscape comes out from them...' Messiaen dedicated his final work to Mozart, and the latter's Paris Symphony of 1778 completes the first half of the concert.

Anglia Chorus then joins the Orchestra for a selection of American-themed choral masterpieces, including Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, commissioned for the 1965 Southern Cathedrals Festival and a setting of the book of Psalms (sung in Hebrew), Aaron Copland's Old American Songs, and Constant Lambert's The Rio Grande, part piano concerto, part cantata, set to verses by Sacheverell Sitwell.

Tickets available from the Mumford Theatre Box Office:

£10 (£7 concessions; £5 students) Tel: 01223 352932 and on the door.

6-7, 13-14 January, 2012

7.30pm, Mumford Theatre, East Road, Cambridge

Anglia Contemporary Theatre

Tony Harrison - The Mysteries

Part One - The Nativity (6 and 7 January)
Part Two - The Passion (13 and 14h January)

The Mystery Plays are amongst the earliest theatrical texts of Western Europe. First performed to great acclaim at the National Theatre between 1977 and 1985, this modern version by poet Tony Harrison adapts the texts to retell the Bible story through poetry, dance and song. Presented over two performances, The Nativity and The Passion range from the creation of the world to the death of Christ.

Of the original production:

'Rarely, even with Shakespeare, have I felt language in the theatre so to consume the bowels, excite the senses and stimulate the imagination.' Giles Gordon, Punch

'I was as enthralled, exhilarated and moved as I have ever been in a theatre in all my life.' Bernard Levin, The Times

Tickets available from the Mumford Theatre Box Office:

£10 (£7 concessions; £5 students) Tel: 01223 352932 and on the door.

Anglia Ruskin Orchestra and Chorus

Conductors: Paul Rhys, Alan Rochford
Percussion solo: Peter Mansfield
Violin solo: Mateja Kaluza

Anglia Ruskin Orchestra and Chorus begin their spring concert season with Iannis Xenakis' Rebonds, a virtuoso work of great energy and power for a single percussionist playing a startling array of different instruments.

Cantus Arcticus was composed in 1972 by Eino Rautavaara, one of Finland's leading composers working today. Subtitled 'Concerto for Birds and Orchestra', the piece uses tape recordings of birdsong made close to the Arctic Circle in the north of Finland. The romantic sound of the orchestra and other-worldliness of the birdsong have led to Cantus Arcticus becoming a truly popular work.

In May, the Orchestra and Chorus reprise their performances of Cantus Arcticus and Mozart's Requiem, adding to the programme Stravinsky's delightful Eight Instrumental Miniatures and Rachmaninov's sublime Vocalise, originally for wordless singer, but here presented in an arrangement for violin and orchestra.

The concerts conclude with Mozart's serene setting of the Requiem. Unfinished at the time of his death the work remains one of his most enigmatic compositions in its portrayal of the nerve-wracking terror of the last judgement and the heavenly grace of the afterlife.

Friday, 23 March, 2012

7.30pm, West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge

Xenakis - Rebonds A & B
Rautavaara - Cantus Arcticus
Mozart - Requiem

Tickets available from the Mumford Theatre Box Office:

£10 (£7 concessions; £5 students) Tel: 01223 352932 and on the door.

Thursday, 17 May, 2012

7.30pm, Emmanuel United Reformed Church, Trumpington Street, Cambridge

Stravinsky - Eight Instrumental Miniatures
Rautavaara - Cantus Arcticus
Rachmaninov - Vocalise
Mozart - Requiem

Tickets available from the Mumford Theatre Box Office:

£10 (£7 concessions; £5 students) Tel: 01223 352932 and on the door.

Sunday, 20 May, 2012

7.30pm, Binham Priory, Norfolk

Stravinsky - Eight Instrumental Miniatures
Rautavaara - Cantus Arcticus
Rachmaninov - Vocalise
Mozart - Requiem

Tickets (£8) available from Maureen Frost, Victoria Cottage, Langham Road, Binham, Norfolk NR21 0DW

Tel: 01328 830362, and on the door.

Saturday, 19 May, 2012

7.00pm, St Peter's Church, Great Walsingham, Norfolk

A Musical Celebration

Performed by students, graduates and staff from the Department of Music Therapy at Anglia Ruskin University, this exciting concert will feature music from a wide range of cultures and traditions, together with new pieces created in workshops with members of the local community.

Tickets: £10.00 (including refreshments)

Bookings and further information: Tel: 07866 502640 / erichards68@gmail.com

Thursday, 7 June - Friday, 8 June, 2012

2.00pm - 7.00pm, Wysing Arts Centre, Bourne

Anglia Contemporary Theatre

This is where the trees sleep

Taking place at Wysing Arts Centre, this year's graduating students from the Drama and Performing Arts degree courses at Anglia Ruskin University are performing devised site-specific projects that explore place, landscape, ghosts, journeys, mirrors, beginnings and poetic interventions in space. Join us as we encounter, explore, re-imagine and re-create the landscapes and environments around us through stories, texts, soundscapes, movement, surprise and suggestion.

Be prepared to picnic, relax, meander, linger, follow and explore the rural site that Wysing offers through a summer's afternoon of innovative devised works.

Wysing Arts Centre, 7 and 8 June 2012, from 2 - 7pm each day. Admission free.