Fanfare - Cheltenham Music Festival 2011

EXTRA CONCERT CONFIRMED FOR IN-DEMAND STAR GUITARIST MILOSFresh from his appearance on the 12 June edition of the ITV show Pop Star to Opera Star, and riding high on the success of his chart-topping album The Guitar, Milos Karadaglic’s appearance at this year’s Festival on 4 July is hotly anticipated. In fact, so in-demand is the classical guitar star that it has now been confirmed he will give a repeat performance at 7.30pm.

Coming from a country in the Balkans with no real classical guitar tradition and a population of only 600,000, the challenges faced by Milos if he was to climb the international guitar-playing ladder were daunting. But he wasn’t put off, and after playing extensively as a young teenager he sent an audition tape to the Royal Academy of Music, who offered him a scholarship and he graduated with First Class Honours in 2004.

Since then, he’s been on a steep trajectory towards stardom, winning awards and appearing at numerous prestigious events. His progress to date has culminated in the release of his chart-topping album this year.

Visit cheltenhamfestivals.com/music to book tickets for his event on 4 July, or call 01242 505 444.

Evelyn Glennie

Artists including

James Rhodes

give us their hot picks for the

Festival on page 2

Pick up a Music Festival programme in town, call 01242 505 444 or visit cheltenhamfestivals.com

FANFAREShaken, beaten, but never stirred…We don’t want to bang on about it, but percussion is the hot hit for Music 2011.

For over two decades, Evelyn Glennie has been the percussion world’s most distinguished ambassador. So it is a pleasure to welcome her to Cheltenham Town Hall on Friday 1 July at 7.30pm. Percussion instruments come in all shapes and sizes, for Joseph Phibbs’ new work, Bar Veloce, which takes us on a musical tour of cocktails from around the world. She’ll also

play Joe Duddell’s Snowblind, which focuses on the expressive possibilities of the marimba.

Steve Reich’s 1971 work for percussion and voices Drumming is one of the iconic masterpieces of the 20th century. Hypnotic and engrossing, it’s a must for anyone who’s curious about music, and the Colin Currie Ensemble’s performance of this work is described by Reich himself as ‘revelatory’. Don’t miss it on Sunday 3 July at 6pm in the Town Hall.

Alternatively try Graham Fitkin on Saturday 2 July at 9.45pm. Fitkin’s micro big band brings together saxophones, brass, percussion, electric harp and piano for music that is catchy, energetic and joyous. With influences as diverse as Steve Reich, Latino and medieval dance, Fitkin’s ear for an addictive bassline also gives a flavour of Dutch Uncles or Foals.

Or if it’s Reich you like, Japanese-American percussionist Kuniko Kato has

a unique relationship with his music. She plays on Sunday 3 July, in the UK premiere of arrangements that Reich himself has described as ‘new and very beautiful’.

Read more about percussion on page 5. Go to cheltenhamfestivals.com/music or call 01242 505 444 to find out more and to buy tickets.

Living in the Fast Lane? Join the Rush Hour…For people who’d like to try something that’s relaxed, not a full evening event and at a great price, the Cheltenham Music Festival has come up with the perfect solution: Parabola Rush Hours.

These hour-long informal concerts take place at 5.30pm at the Parabola Arts Centre, and the £12.50 ticket price includes a Hotel du Vin drinks voucher.

Hear chart-topping Milos Karadaglic on Monday 4 July.

In this concert he’ll musically pay tribute to his own Mediterranean roots, exploring the Euro-Arabian world, his Montenegro homeland, the Balkans and Spain.

A concert we’ve called Mélange À Trois on Tuesday 5 July features violinist Katharine Gowers, guitarist Jonathan Leathwood, and Chris Hill (Jamie Cullum’s bassist). Together they play virtuoso classical pieces alongside Texan fiddling tunes, Venezuelan dances and Cole Porter.

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29 JUNE – 10 JULY 2011

On Wednesday 6 July, Radio 3’s New Generation Artists pianist Francesco Piemontesi, cellist Nicolas Altstaedt and violinist Veronika Eberle (who made her concerto debut aged 10 and performed the Beethoven concerto in her mid-teens with Rattle and the Berlin Phil) play Haydn, Bach and Brahms. This classical evening will be recorded for broadcast on BBC Radio 3.For a Friday night treat, why not attend Flotilla on 8 July. This saxophone quartet presents a broad mix of music that shows off

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29 June - 10 July 2011

75 EVENTS 12 DAYS 380 PERFORMERSPlan your perfect Music Festival on page 8

Milos Karadaglic

the special range of sounds that you get from four saxes. They’ll play Bach, Steve Reich’s New York Counterpoint, and work by Graham Fitkin and young Gloucestershire composer Gavin Higgins.

Find out more at cheltenhamfestivals.com/music

MATHS & MUSIC?

Find out more on page 7

Courtesy of BBC Music Magazine (June 2011)

Leif Ove Andsnes

James Rhodes

Evelyn Glennie

Milos Karadaglic

@cheltfestivals #cheltmusicfestfacebook.com/cheltenhamfestivals

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TURNAGE’S GREEKThursday 7 July, 8pm Mark-Anthony Turnage’s newest work, Anna Nicole, premiered earlier this year at Covent Garden. His first opera, Greek, is set in Thatcher’s Britain and uses a re-working of the Oedipus myth to create an edgy, raw portrayal of disaffection. Bold and shocking 20 years ago when first shown, this new production is bound to have renewed resonance and theatrical punch.

DON’T MISS…TOBY SPENCE Sunday 3 July, 11amToby Spence has given critically acclaimed performances at English National Opera, Covent Garden, Munich, Chicago and the Vienna Philharmonic. Catch this exciting British tenor in a performance full of ‘poetic love’, with mezzo-soprano Helen Sherman and pianist Julian Milford.

NATALIE CLEIN AND FRIENDSSunday 10 July, 6pmBBC Young Musician of the Year 1994 winner Natalie Clein has been wowing audiences with her musical passion and grace since winning the award. For this performance she’s joined by another former child star, violinist Alexander Sitkovetsky, and three other stunning instrumentalists to perform works by Dvorak and Chopin among others.

Toby Spence

Natalie Clein

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It was the London Philharmonic Orchestra whose three-concert residency first launched the Cheltenham Music Festival in 1945, and we are delighted to welcome them back on a rare day-off from Glyndebourne on Sat 2 July at 7.30pm. Do not miss Vladimir Jurowski as he conducts Wagner’s Meistersingers overture, Brahms’ 4th Symphony and Strauss’s Four Last Songs, with soprano Amanda Roocroft.

Leif Ove Andsnes is another world-class artist who will be making a splash at Music 2011. As the Berlin Philharmonic’s current Artist-in-Residence, and with his schedule full of A-list piano concerto and recital appearances in Chicago, Amsterdam and Vienna, Andsnes’ Cheltenham recital on Tuesday 5 July at 7.30pm will be an illustrious occasion. The programme includes two of Beethoven’s sonatas and Brahms’ youthful Ballades, tickets priced from £22.

The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and conductor Kirill Karabits perform Mussorgsky’s dark fable Night on a Bare Mountain and the majestic Pictures at an Exhibition on Friday 8 July at 7pm. Boris Giltburg is soloist in Rachmaninov’s 2nd Piano Concerto in

this programme of Russian favourites, with tickets priced from just £12.

If classical music’s not entirely your thing, then why not try the Swingle Singers? With incredible virtuosity and flair, The Swingle Singers break down music barriers, performing everything from Bach scats, to stylish revamps of Annie Lennox, Björk and the Beatles. Continually re-inventing themselves, their latest line-up is the slickest and most contemporary yet, wowing audiences with their remarkable beat-boxing. They are performing on Saturday 9 July at 7.30pm with tickets available from £12.

Penguin Café, whose music has infiltrated daily life from film and theme tunes to festivals including Bestival, The Big Chill and the BBC Proms, are also appearing at Music 2011. After touring packed theatres and concert halls earlier this year, Penguin Café comes to Cheltenham for the first time on Thurs 7 July at 7.30pm, tickets from £11.

Hear music samples, find out more information and book tickets at cheltenhamfestivals.com/music

SPECTACULAR SOUNDS AT THE TOWN HALL

Artist picks for the Festival

Penguin Cafe

Swingle Singers

‘Leif Ove Andsnes on Tuesday 5 July’ Evelyn Glennie

‘I love Florian Boesch’s approach, and it’s often a bit un-orthodox. His commitment to getting to the bottom of the poetry is unsurpassed, I think.’ James Gilchrist

‘Leif Ove Andsnes – a truly gifted and powerful musician’ Colin Currie

‘The London Philharmonic Orchestra with Jurowski on Saturday 2 July. Brahms’ Fourth Symphony is a total legend of a piece.’ James Rhodes

‘The London Philharmonic Orchestra concert, with the Strauss and the Brahms… my favourites.’ Milos Karadaglic

‘The London Philharmonic Orchestra with Jurowski performing Brahms’ Fourth Symphony. I played Brahms’ Second Concerto on tour with them this autumn, and it was a treat. Also I see that my friend the Norwegian trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth is performing on Thursday 30 June, and she is not to be missed. She is unique!’ Leif Ove Andsnes

‘Peter Harvey and the Magdalena Consort on Wednesday 6 July – some of my favourite works by Bach, and Peter Harvey is one of my favourite Bach singers.’ Boris Giltburg

Musicians including James Rhodes, Evelyn Glennie, Leif Ove Andsnes and Colin Currie tell us what’s hot at the Festival.

At this year’s Festival I absolutely wouldn’t want to miss…

Visit cheltenhamfestivals.com/music for more information on any of these artists, to watch videos and listen to samples.

Already a member?Cheltenham Festivals is indebted to people like you. Ticket sales alone only bring in a fraction of what it takes to run four world-class Festivals. Your support is crucial.

If you’d like to find out more about supporting Cheltenham Festivals in other ways, perhaps through sponsorship; becoming a patron; with a private donation or by leaving a legacy, please contact Kathryn Honeywill at [email protected] or telephone 01242 264136.

Discover more at cheltenhamfestivals.com


Get on the BandwagonOn Monday 4 July the Bandwagon ensemble will join James Rhodes and the Festival Academy on stage at the Concert for Schools. Over the next four days they will tour Gloucestershire primary schools on the Bandwagon bus, provided by Stagecoach West. These visits will follow a ‘flash mob’ model - unexpected, fun, and with the appearance of being totally spontaneous. For many children this is likely to be their first experience of seeing and hearing an ensemble playing live – and will be all the more powerful and relevant given the age of the musicians and the fact many of them are still at school.

See more information about Bandwagon at cheltenhamfestivals.com/bandwagon

Bandwagon Supporters: The Coutts Charitable Trust, The Dumbreck Charity, The Macfarlane Walker Trust

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LEAVE A LEGACYA will is your chance to help the organisations that have been important in your lifetime to grow and continue to be as important to others in the future.

A legacy to Cheltenham Festivals would be invaluable in helping us to continue to provide great live events, develop education projects or even commission a new work in your name.

For further details please contact Nicola Lawson in confidence:

Nicola Lawson The Leonora Society Manager T 01242 775 858 E [email protected]

There’s perhaps no better way to experience beautiful music than in one of the amazing sacred spaces being used as Festival venues this year. Bask in the warm glow of candlelight as the award-winning Stile Antico perform in Gloucester Cathedral on Wednesday 29 June. Their vocal music sounds positively heavenly, so will blend perfectly with the amazing acoustics of the cathedral.

After their stunning performance of Monteverdi’s Vespers in last year’s Festival, the Magdalena Consort returns to Tewkesbury Abbey on Wednesday 6 July for a programme that pays tribute to J.S. Bach.

Enjoy the majesty of Tewkesbury Abbey as choristers from Gloucester and

Tewkesbury combine in this largely English programme on Saturday 2 July, including two masterpieces from Britten and Parry’s original version of the beloved hymn ‘Dear Lord and Father of Mankind’.

Visit the intimate St Giles Church in Bredon on 1 July for a recital of works of homage and esteem by violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen and cellist Gemma Rosefield. Two of the four works: Ravel’s Sonata and Michael Berkeley’s Ode – In Memoriam are dedicated to talented friends – Debussy and choreographer Lesley-Anne Sayers respectively.

Visit cheltenhamfestivals.com/music to hear samples, find out more and book tickets.

MAJESTIC MUSIC IN SACRED SPACES

This year’s Music Festival is packed full of entertainment for the whole family, including the live telling of the Ella Bella Ballerina story.

As the music plays and the paint brush dances James Mayhew, author and illustrator of Ella Bella Ballerina, brings two of Tchaikovsky’s masterpieces to life. Alongside a string quartet performing highlights of Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake, James will be painting live on stage and telling the tales that inspired the ballets. Optional dress code of tiaras, tutus and tights!

You can also join Kjartan Poskitt, author of the acclaimed Murderous Maths series, for a hilarious, interactive demonstration of mathematical tricks and musical oddities. This is an event that is guaranteed to bend your brain and blow your mind! Discover more about the truly wacky relationship between Maths and Music with this hilarious event that will have children, and adults, rolling in the aisles—and you might learn something too!

For younger children, Rachel Gay, conductor of both the Cheltenham and Tewkesbury Youth Choirs, is appearing in Fingers and Thumbs on Saturday 2 July. She’s used to working mostly with 7–16 year-olds, but in this lively session

she’ll be getting the really little ones to sing out loud. Great fun.

Ella Bella Ballerina is live at Parabola Arts Centre on Saturday 9 July at 11am. Kjarten Poskitt is at Parabola Arts Centre on Saturday 2 July at 11am. Fingers and Thumbs is at Queen’s Hotel on Saturday 2 July at 11am.

Go to cheltenhamfesivals.com/music for more information.

Ella Bella Ballerina pirouettes to Cheltenham!

MIDSUMMER FIESTA IN MONTPELLIER CELEBRATING CHELTENHAM’S COMMUNITIESSaturday 9 July 2011 12 noon–10 pmMontpellier Gardens, Cheltenham

Headline Sponsor

Free entry and lots of free things to do:

• Live performances on 3 stages from local bands, musicians, dance acts and poets

• Dance workshops

• Gamelan

• Cheltenham Town Football Club

• Market place with over 80 stalls, including local produce, gifts, arts and crafts.

• Danters Fun Fair

• O2 Rugby Village with Gloucester Rugby Club

• Army assault course

• Classic cars

• Holistic therapies

• Food and licensed bar

• Lots of children’s entertainment

• Special guest, didgeridoo virtuoso William Barton

• Parades from the town centre by African Sambistas and Cheltenham Scouts

Find out more at www.midsummerfiesta.com

Music Q&A with

LEIF OVE ANDSNESPianist Leif Ove Andsnes is the Berlin Philharmonic’s current Artist-in Residence and has appeared in numerous A-list concertos and recitals in Chicago, Amsterdam and Vienna.

At this year’s festival, I absolutely wouldn’t want to miss... The London Philharmonic Orchestra with Jurowski performing Brahms’ 4th Symphony. I played Brahms’ 2nd Concerto on tour with them this autumn, and it was a treat. Also I see that my friend the Norwegian trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth is performing, and she is not to be missed. She is unique!

At which event in musical history would you most like to have been present? When Beethoven had all these pieces first performed in one evening: 5th and 6th Symphonies, 4th Piano Concerto, the Concert Aria Ah, Perfido, Choral Fantasy and more...and then he improvised. I would have loved to hear that!

If I were obliged to compete in the Olympic Games next year, I’d be in training for... Tennis. But that`s not especially big in the olympics, is it?...

Maths at school: loved it/hated it?I rather disliked it, maybe because my father is rather good at it, and I clearly had gotten my mother’s lack of talent for it.

Favourite performance space? Carnegie Hall

My most cherished building/landscape is... The Lofoten Islands in Northern Norway.

Right now I’m reading... Murakami: Kafka on the beach

You’ll never find… Heavy metal..on my ipod!

Where will your next stop be after Cheltenham? Believe it or not; The Lofoten islands!!

Leif Ove Andsnes is performing on Tuesday 5 July at 7.30pm. Go to cheltenhamfestivals.com to find out more.

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Cheltenham Music Festival isn’t just about musical performances from great artists. You can also experience a selection of fascinating films and art exhibitions throughout the Festival.

ART EXHIBITIONS

Parabola Arts CentreLove—10 new works by Michael Leunig

Cartoonist, philosopher, poet, artist and National Living Treasure, Michael Leunig’s commentary on the political, cultural and emotional life of Australia spans thirty-five years and often explores the idea of an innocent and sacred personal world.

Mystery and Joy— abstract paintings by Gillian Lever

Gillian Lever’s practice is concerned with her soul life. Inspired by music that evokes a spiritual realm through the abstract language of sound, she searches to evoke this same mysterious world through the use of colour and light.

It Takes Two

Work from two established textile artists who regularly exhibit with Stroud International Textiles (SIT). Hand weaver Sue Hiley Harris and tapestry weaver Anna Glasbrook will both exhibit new work during the festival.

Spa Well, Town HallCOS Members’ Exhibition

Artists from Cheltenham Open Studios transform the Spa Well into a mini exhibition space, where you can while away some time admiring a selection of the stunning visual art being created locally.

Apse, Pittville Pump Room Robert Goldsmith

From rapid, spontaneous sketches to worked-up paintings, this is an up-close-and-personal view of the Festival, capturing the intensity of rehearsal and performance.

Elizabeth Jacobs

In a selection of black and white photographs, this is a personal and often surprising view of the 2010 Music Festival

FILMSCheckmate Sunday 3 July 6.30pm A film of Sadler’s Wells’ Royal Ballet production from 1982. Terry Barfoot will give a short introduction to this film.Streetwise Opera Presents Fables, A Film Opera Tuesday 5 July 7.15pm

Fables is a collection of four short films created by some of the UK’s leading composers and filmmakers working with 125 Streetwise performers who have experienced homelessness.

Latcho Drom (Safe Journey) Tuesday 5 July 8.30pm

Tony Gatlif’s extraordinary film traces Gypsy-Romany culture from its desert origins in Rajastan to the streets of Andalucia. This visually stunning musical travelogue eavesdrops on Romany communities in Egypt, Turkey, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and France.

supported by

Steve Reich: Phase To Face A Film By Eric Darmon & Franck MalletFriday 8 July 7pm

This new documentary exploring the career of Steve Reich is interspersed with interviews and comment, and shows exactly why his take on the musical world has been so influential over the past half-century.

Cool and Crazy (15) Saturday 9 July 7.30pm

A quirky documentary about a male voice choir in Norway’s far north was a surprise hit on release a decade ago. Amidst a backdrop of bleak, Arctic beauty, Knut Erik Jensen’s charming film relates how a fishing community’s resilient menfolk are brought together through singing.

For more information about any of these films and exhibitions visit cheltenhamfestivals.com/music

More than Music…

‘The Little Party’ by Michael Leunig

Gillian Lever

From a cocktails-inspired concerto to minimalist drumming and beat-boxing, percussion features prominently in Cheltenham this year. Music journalist Andrew Stewart talks about percussion.

Globalisation was little more than textbook jargon, the property of educationalists and theologians, when a young American musician set out from New York to visit Ghana in the summer of 1970. Steve Reich sought total immersion in the ways of Ghanaian drumming. Although malaria dramatically curtailed his African studies, the composer absorbed essential lessons in rhythm, ritual and the transcendent power of acoustic percussion instruments. The experience left an immediate impression on Reich’s next work, which in turn proved a lasting landmark of western music. Drumming entered the world four decades ago, a synthesis of Reich’s creative innovations, of rhythmic phasing or repetition, and ideas rooted in timeless traditions. Its impact breached the

contemporary music ghetto’s boundary walls, reaching fresh ears and inspiring new generations of percussionists to advance Reich’s repertoire revolution.

Percussion has come far since Drumming. The family of instruments, at music making’s heart for millennia, had once been treated as poor relations, invited by classical composers to provide moments of exotic colour or deployed to reinforce emphatic cadences. Players often made their way from military bands to symphony orchestras and back again, while polishing their paradiddles on only a tiny sliver of the world’s apparently endless supply of hittable instruments. Steve Reich became a drummer at the age of 14, when career options open to percussionists of the western variety were as limited as the range of instruments in the average dance band player’s kit. His groundbreaking compositions, Drumming and Music for 18 Musicians prominent among them, helped blow percussion out of the

doldrums towards a world of wider musical possibilities. It took equally bold action by players to convert such creative potential into the reality of solo percussion careers.

Reich’s compositions, Drumming prominent among them, helped blow percussion out of the doldrums towards a world of wider musical possibilities.This year’s Cheltenham Music Festival pays tribute to sterling pioneers of contemporary percussion. The weekend showcase opens on 1 July with a concert by Dame Evelyn Glennie and the Festival Academy, complete with world

premieres of works specially commissioned from Hannah Kendall and Joseph Phibbs. The Colin Currie Group connects with Drumming on 3 July, prefaced earlier in the day when Kuniko Kato presents the UK premiere of her solo percussion arrangements of Reich’s ‘Counterpoint’ pieces. There’s more percussion to be heard around Cheltenham when frame drummer Andrea Piccioni crosses continents on 1 July, in company with Khyam Allami and Jacob Heringman (players of the oud and lute respectively), and the beatbox blend of the Swingle Singers

percolates through their 9 July masterclass.

You can read more from Andrew Stewart’s article, and find out what Steve Reich, Evelyn Glennie and Colin Currie among others have to say in the Music Festival programme book, which is available from the Festival Box Office.

Find out more about the events listed in the article at cheltenhamfestivals.com/music or by calling 01242 505 444.

Fancy expanding your mind this summer?

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DRUMMING MAJOR

The Colin Currie Group

This year’s Music Festival features a great selection of never before heard works.

Perhaps the most exciting premiere is of the new cocktail inspired work by Joseph Phibbs, which is being performed by Evelyn Glennie with the Festival Academy on Friday 1 July. Using a bewildering array of instruments, including a leather belt and a cocktail shaker, the performance will explore everything from the ‘Tequila Sunrise’ to ‘Sex on the Beach’ and beyond.

Martin Butler, whom The Financial Times have described as ‘clever, constantly ingenious and coolly eclectic’ has also written a brand new work Nonet: Rondes d’Automne, which will be accompanied by works by Beethoven and Spohr, and performed by the Dante Quartet and the New London Chamber Ensemble on Wednesday 6 July in Pittville Pump Room in Cheltenham.

Also, on Thursday 30 June pianist Huw Watkins will

premiere the winning work from a Royal Philharmonic Society composition competition before being joined by string soloists (including Presteigne regular, violinist Alexandra Wood) to perform Replay, a new composition from Charlotte Bray whose music is described by the Daily Telegraph as ‘fixing in sharp colours a distinctive world of great beauty and surprising emotional gravity’.

You can find out about all the exclusive works being performed at this year’s Festival in the Festival programme, available from the box office or at cheltenhamfestivals.com/music

Enjoy exclusive musical premieres

The Dante Quartet

Out of Africa

Khyan Allami

Jacob Heringman

supported by

LabOratory is an exciting project which brings science to life across all four Cheltenham Festivals. This summer science is being combined with art, classical music and film to explore the theme of migration.

In the Music Festival event Out of Africa on 1 July, the history of the lute and the Arabic oud, and their movement out of North Africa and Middle East is being explored, showing us a fascinating migration of instruments, music and people.

To give you a taste, here’s an extract of a piece written by two oud and lute players - Khyan Allam and Jacob Heringman:

The journey of the Oud from East to West is often accredited to Zeryab, a musician at the Abbasid Court of

Harun al-Rashid. As legend has it, Zeryab was so gifted as

a singer and Oud player that his teacher, the famous Ishaq al-Mawsili who is mentioned in the 1001 nights, became so envious of him that he was forced to leave the country. From Baghdad he travelled to Cordoba where he founded a music school and continued to play for and be revered by the Muslim rulers of Andalusia at the time. Zeryab is also credited with adding an extra 5th string to the Oud which garnered itself the title of al-‘üd al-kamil (the complete/perfect Oud).

The lute’s rich history, with all of its associations and implications, is a timely reminder that the

lute is a quintessential symbol of East meeting West. The renaissance lute, the instrument of Dowland and Francesco da Milano, is an equal product of Muslim and Christian cultures, closely intertwined one with another, and intermingled

with the heritage of Classical antiquity, a heritage looked to by medieval Muslims and renaissance Christians alike. Today, in the West, the lute is in the extreme cultural margins. In the Middle East, by contrast, it continues to flourish.

Also at the Music Festival, cultural migration is the subject of the intriguing film being shown on 5 July. Tony Gatlif’s extraordinary story, Latcho Drom (Safe Journey), traces Gypsy-Romany culture from its desert origins in Rajastan to the streets of Andalusia. Stunning.

To buy your tickets for either of these events go to cheltenhamfestivals.com, or call or visit our box office in the Regent Arcade shopping centre in Cheltenham (01242 505 444).

LabOratory is a three year project funded by the Wellcome Trust.

7 – 16 OCTOBER 2011BOX OFFICE 01242 505 444REGENT ARCADE CHELTENHAM cheltenhamfestivals.com Go online for more headliners & to buy tickets

PROGRAMME ANNOUNCED ONLINE AUGUST 8MEMBERS PRIORITY BOOKING ONLINE FROM AUGUST 15PUBLIC BOOKING ONLINE FROM AUGUST 22

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Norwegian music journalist Ida Habbestad examines the ongoing dialogue between Norway’s folk and art music traditions.

Folk music is at the heart of all our best-known art music in Norway, yet the differences between folk music and art music have been fundamental. In our present day, folk music has become professionalised, and we are seeing a mutual rapprochement between the two styles.

From an artistic point of view, the composer Edvard Grieg can be described as the most important brand in Norwegian music. Who does not know his famous Piano Concerto, with its characteristic opening theme: An A minor chord followed by a distinctive interval in the Norwegian folk music scale? Although the use of folk music elements is not on its own the key to Grieg’s success, folk music had an invaluable importance for him. Grieg was also instrumental in stimulating the awareness

in Norwegians of their own cultural heritage. It was in Grieg’s lifetime – and that of Ole Bull – that Norwegian fiddlers first brought folk music to the stage. This was an important step on the way to the professionalisation of folk music, a phenomenon which is well established in 2011.This means that the distinction apparent in the terms ‘folk music’ and ‘art music’ today is somewhat artificial. Traditionally, folk music belongs to the folk – the people – whereas nowadays it approaches more high-brow as well as popular music, which means the demarcation lines within classical music are no longer reserved for the elite. Compositional handicraft in the genre of folk music clearly indicates that this is decidedly also art.

Translation: Berit Scott

You can read more from Ida Habbestad’s article in the Music Festival programme book, which is available from the Festival Box Office.

A FOOT IN EACH GENRE

Trolls, Plagues and Sympathetic StringsFrom its seventeenth-century folk origins to Lord of the Rings fame, the Hardanger fiddle has a rich history. Lottie Greenhow investigates.

The Hardanger Fiddle, or hardingfele, is a folk violin from Norway with four or five steel sympathetic strings that resonate with four gut ‘melody’ strings. These gut strings are played in much the same way as a normal violin, whilst the sympathetic strings resonate according to the notes being played, creating overtones that produce rich and wonderful harmonies. Originating from the Hardanger region in Western Norway, the oldest known Hardanger fiddle is by Ole Jonsen Jaastad, dated 1651.

Structurally, the fiddle’s differences to a normal violin are the sympathetic strings running from the pegbox through a hole underneath the fingerboard to the tailpiece, a shorter neck, a larger pegbox to accommodate the eight or nine strings, more pronounced curves on the belly and back of the instrument and wider f-holes in the soundbox. These f-holes allow for greater projection, which makes the instrument ideal for playing outside. The body of the instrument is often decorated with rosemåling (traditional folk art) or mother of pearl.

The most common tuning is A-D-A-E (similar to the normal violin setting, with the bottom string tuned up a tone), but there are countless variants, often with superstitious names: trollstilt (‘troll tuning’) can only be played between midnight and dawn, Nackastamning (‘the devil’s tuning’) is believed to be cursed, while other tunings are named after colours or times of the day. The sympathetic strings are nearly always tuned (B)-D-E-F#-A, allowing for a wide range of overtones. Norwegian folk music is highly dissimilar to most other European music. Norway’s unique geography made transport and communication between villages very difficult, with the result that folk stories, art and music vary hugely from village to village. Thus Norway’s folk melodies, or slåtts, have extremely unusual structures, basic types being: dance tunes (springar, gangar and halling), the Bruremarsj (wedding march – the fiddle is central to traditional weddings) and the lyarslått, which is for listening, not for dance accompaniment. The slått is characterised by free metre, embellished improvisation and repetition of vensler (slått phrases) interwoven with minor rhythmical changes each time. Slåtts can last for hours, largely without the

fiddler pausing at all but being totally absorbed and ‘playing himself away’ in a kind of trance.

Most slåtts have corresponding folk tales, making them extremely symbolic and meaningful to Norwegians. Fornesbrunen, ‘The Brown Horse of Fornes’, tells the tale of the horse that pulled the cart carrying the plague dead in the fourteenth century.Fanitullen (the devil’s tune), tells of a fiddler who sold his soul to the devil in return a wonderful tune; however, he was unable to stop playing it, the wedding guests were unable to stop dancing, and they danced and played themselves to death. During the 1700s, when Norway was under Danish rule and a strongly superstitious Christian faith was observed, fiddlers were persecuted in the same manner as witches, often having their fingers burned and their instruments smashed. In response the violin’s normal scroll was replaced with a carved figurehead, similar to those on Viking ships, to ward off evil spirits.

You can read more from Lottie Greenhow’s article in the Music Festival programme book, which is available from the Festival Box Office.

Taken by Frode Inge Helland

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At the Music Festival this year, we’re investigating the connections between Music and Maths. ‘Music and Maths – they go together, don’t they?’ some people say. But how do they? Or how don’t they?

We’ll be exploring how the number 3 sounds in Bach…how medieval musicians played mathematical games… what trigonometry sounds like in a piano quintet…how composers concealed codes in their music…whether the mathematical brain looks like the musical one…why there are so many music buffs at GCHQ… and how Pythagoras discovered how to tune a guitar.

Here’s an extract from an article by the New Statesman’s music critic Alexandra Coghlan, which features in the Music Festival’s programme book (available in advance at the Regent Arcade box office and during the festival).

The history of maths and music is the history of early Greek philosophy, medieval astronomy, of the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the two World Wars. While mathematics at its purest may be an abstraction, the quest for its proofs is deeply and definingly human, charged with biological, theological and even political motive. Whether through performance or discussions about music, this year’s HSBC Cheltenham Music

Festival explores the mathematical processes that have both shaped and echoed the history of Western Europe and its art - tracing musical development from the polyphonic motets of the fourteenth and fifteenth century to the minimalist patternings of Steve Reich. Perhaps nowhere in music is mathematics more exposed to the ear, more tantalisingly within a listener’s grasp than in twentieth century minimalism...Steve Reich’s Drumming (performed in Cheltenham on Sunday 3 July) is a lived mathematical calculation whose syncopations and fragmented melodic dialogues create a joyous dance that is anything but abstract.

MUSIC & MATHS

TALK AND CONCERT: A YARDSTICK TO THE STARS30 June, 8pm, Parabola Arts Centre

Composers Robert Saxton and Charlotte Bray talk about composition, geometry,trigonometry and mathematically minded composers.

FAMILY EVENT: KJARTAN POSKITT’S MAYHEM WITH MATHS AND MUSIC2 July, 11am, Parabola Arts Centre

Join Kjartan Poskitt, author of the acclaimed Murderous Maths series, for a hilarious, interactive demonstration of mathematical tricks and musical oddities.

TALK: MARCUS DU SAUTOY2 July, 2pm, Parabola Arts Centre

Distinguished mathematician and broadcaster Marcus de Sautoy explores how mathematicians and musicians are drawn to the same patterns and structures to create their art.

TALK AND CONCERT: BACH NIGHT6 July, 6:30pm, Tewkesbury Abbey

Stephen Johnson discusses JS Bach’s fascination with number symbolism. The Magdalena Consort perform.

CONCERT: STRANGE CANONS9 July, 2pm, All Saints Church, Pittville

Stephen Rice and the Brabant Ensemble demonstrate, the mathematical games employed by medieval composers.

TALK: OCCULT ARITHMETIC OR ENIGMA VARIATIONS?10 July, 2pm, Parabola Arts Centre

Professor Ray Tallis will be joined by philosopher Roger Scruton, former GCHQ maths specialist Richard Walton, and musically-gifted Cambridge mathematician Tim Gowers in an interdisciplinary look at music and maths, finishing with an opportunity for the audience to quiz the speakers.

TALK: THE MATHS OF HARMONY10 July, 4pm, Parabola Arts Centre

In this performance lecture, Cambridge professor Tim Gowers joins with a bassist and jazz drummer to present a mathematician’s view of how musical harmony works.

MUSIC AND MATHS EVENTSAT THE MUSIC FESTIVAL

Finding your way

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THIS SUMMER DISCOVER THE HSBC CHELTENHAM MUSIC FESTIVAL IN REGENCY CHELTENHAM AND THE COTSWOLDS

EVENT PLANNERWednesday 29 JuneM1 Elias Quartet PPR 11amM2 Rhys Matthews SC, Q 3pmM3 Festival Evensong CCC 5.30pmM4 TALK: Richard Rodney Bennett PAC 6.30pmM5 Irving Berlin Songbook PAC 8.30pmM6 TALK: Spanish Renaissance Art GC 8pmM7 Stile Antico GC 9pm

Thursday 30 JuneM8 Florian Boesch/Roger Vignoles PPR 11amM9 Tine Thing Helseth CC 6pmM10 TALK: Robert Saxton and Charlotte Bray PAC 8pmM11 Festival Academy Soloists PAC 9pm

Friday 1 JulyM12 Pavel Haas Quartet PPR 11amM13 Waley-Cohen/Rosefield Bredon 3pmM14 Out of Africa: Lute & Oud PAC 5.30pmM15 TALK: Composers in Conversation TH, DR 6.30pmM16 Evelyn Glennie & Festival Academy TH 7.30pmM17 Cheltenham Bach Choir ASC 9.45pm

Saturday 2 JulyM18 Jerusalem Quartet/Melnikov PPR 11amM19 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Kjarten Poskitt PAC 11amM20 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Counting Songs QH 11amM21 TALK: Marcus du Sautoy PAC 2pmM22 Choristers of Tewkesbury & Gloucester TA 4pmM23 LPO/Jurowski/Roocroft TH 7.30pmM24 Fitkin PAC 9.45pm

Sunday 3 JulyM25 Spence/Sherman/Milford PPR 11amM26 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Instrument Making QH 2pmM27 Kuniko Kato: Reich Counterpoints PAC 3pmM28 DEMONSTRATION: Drumming TH 5pmM29 Colin Currie Group w. Synergy Vocals TH 6pmM30 FILM: Checkmate by Arthur Bliss PPR, Oval 5.30 & 6.30pmM31 TALK: Barfoot on Bliss PPR, Oval 7.30pmM32 James Rhodes & Festival Academy PPR 8.30pm

Monday 4 JulyM33 CONCERT FOR SCHOOLS TH 10.30amM34 Escher Quartet/Buniatishvili PPR 11amM35 Gloucestershire Young Musician TH 1.30pmM36 Milos Karadaglic PAC 5.30 & 7.30pm M37 Gloucestershire Youth Orchestra TH 8pm

Tuesday 5 JulyM38 NGA Trio 1: Eberle/ Piemontesi/ Altstaedt PPR 11amM39 Katharine Gowers Trio PAC 5.30pmM40 Leif Ove Andsnes TH 7.30pmM41 FILM: Fables, Streetwise Opera PAC 7.15pmM42 FILM: Latcho Drom PAC 8.30pmM43 Ragnhild Hemsing TH, PR 10pm

Wednesday 6 JulyM44 Dante Quartet/NLCE PPR 11amM45 WALK: People & Places Statue 3.45pmM46 NGA Trio 2: Eberle/ Piemontesi/Altstaedt PAC 5.30pmM47 TALK: Stephen Johnson on Bach TA, PH 6.30pmM48 Magdalena Consort TA 7.30pm

Thursday 7 JulyM49 Jean-Efflam Bavouzet PPR 11amM50 TALK: Turnage with Christopher Cook PAC 7pmM51 Festival Academy at National Star College NSC 7.30pmM52 Music Theatre Wales: Turnage’s Greek PAC 8pmM53 Penguin Café TH 7.30pm

Friday 8 JulyM54 Carducci Quartet PPR 11amM55 Flotilla PAC 5.30pmM56 BSO/Karabits/Giltburg TH 7pmM57 FILM: Phase to Face PAC 7pmM58 At Twilight: Oriel Singers/St Cecilia Singers CCC 9.30pm

Saturday 9 JulyM59 Dvorak Quartet: Dvorak and Mozart PPR 11amM60 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Ella Bella Ballerina PAC 11amM61 FIESTA MG 12noonM62 Beatboxing Workshop TH, PR 1.30pmM63 Brabant Ensemble ASC 2pmM64 Berkeley: Collision PAC 5pmM65 The Swingle Singers TH 7.30pmM66 FILM: Cool and Crazy PAC 7.30pmM67 Late Night Lullabies TH, PR 10pm

Sunday 10 JulyM68 Counterpoise: Classical Façade PAC 11amM69 TALK: Occult Arithmetic PAC 2pmM70 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Tam Tam Tambalay! QH 2pmM71 CHILDREN’S EVENT: Tam Tam Tambalay! QH 3.30pmM72 WALK: Cheltenham’s Architecture TH 4.30pmM73 TALK:The Maths of Harmony PAC 4pmM74 Dvorak Quintet: Dvorak and Chopin PPR 6pm

Venue Key PPR Pittville Pump Room PPR, Oval Oval Room, Pittville Pump Rooms TH Town Hall TH, PR Pillar Room, Town Hall TH, DR Drawing Room, Town Hall PAC Parabola Arts Centre GC Gloucester Cathedral TA Tewkesbury Abbey TA, PH Tewkesbury Abbey Parish Hall CC Cirencester Church SC, Q St Swithin Church, Quenington CCC Cheltenham College Chapel Bredon Bredon Church ASC All Saint’s Church, Pittville QH Queens Hotel MG Montpellier Gardens Statue Holst Statue, Imperial Gardens

Documents

Fanfare - Cheltenham Music Festival 2011