Xenakis 10th anniversary festival features across Europe

(March 2011)

The music of Iannis Xenakis is much in evidence this year, the 10th anniversary of his death, with festival features across Europe, a London conference, and stagings of his Oresteia.

4 February 2011 was the 10th anniversary of the death of Iannis Xenakis, the pioneering modernist composer, whose bracing works continue to find new international audiences. London plays host to an all-Xenakis concert by the London Sinfonietta on 2 April, as part of the Southbank Centre's Ether Festival, paying tribute to Xenakis's integration of sound and architecture. The programme ranges from the computer-calculated piano solo in Eonta, to the architecturally organised sound structures in Phlegra, the unique polyphony created by a solo cello in Kottos and the chaotic blend of organic and electronic in La Légende d'Eer. The concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall is conducted by André de Ridder with sound projection by Sound Intermedia.

The Iannis Xenakis International Conference at the Southbank Centre (1-3 April) is organised by the Centre for Contemporary Music Cultures of Goldsmiths, University of London to tie-in with the Ether Festival's Xenakis focus. Distinguished scholars Benoît Gibson, Peter Hoffmann and Makis Solomos have been invited to provide keynote talks. The programme includes talks from researchers around the world, as well as a master class, and is contextualised with the performances of Xenakis' music and tributes at Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room including a programme by Ensemble Exposé directed by Roger Redgate and a Xenakis film documentary by Efi Xirou. Foyer events include music and dance inspired by Xenakis, workshops with his UPIC computer composition system, and performances by students from the Royal College of Music.

> Visit the Ether Festival website

Xenakis's powerful setting of Aeschylus's Oresteia was staged in February on a Belgian and Dutch tour by Muziektheater Transparant and the Asko/Schoenberg Ensemble and Choir. The production by Caroline Petrick conducted by Alejo Perez travelled to Bruges, Antwerp, Amsterdam and Rotterdam. A further production of Oresteia opens in Vienna in May, a co-production between the Wiener Festwochen, Wiener Taschenoper, Remix Ensemble Porto and the Anton Webern Kammerchor. The staging by Carlus Padrissa, a member of La Fura del Baus, promises a pyrotechnic realisation in the open air on the Karlplatz in Vienna on 19, 20 and 21 May. Oresteia is scored for solo baritone, chorus and percussion rich ensemble, lasting 50 minutes. In addition to the new productions, the work has been performed over the past five years in New York, Istanbul, Warsaw and Wuppertal.

Music festivals in Geneva, Amsterdam and Reims host Xenakis features over the coming months. Archipel in Geneva includes Xenakis works performed by the Ensemble Contemporain de l’HEMU, cellist Arne Deforce and the Centre International de Percussion (19-23 March). The Holland Festival presents a Xenakis weekend (4-5 June) culminating in a performance of his major 75 minute ballet score for ensemble and electronics, Kraanerg, performed by Asko|Schönberg directed by Arturo Tamayo, with visuals from the Brussels collective Visual Kitchen. The Flâneries Musicales de Reims presents five days of Xenakis concerts (13-18 July) with many leading interpreters of his music including pianist Roger Woodward, Les Percussions de Strasbourg, cellist Rohan de Saram, the Jack Quartet and the Asko Ensemble conducted by Diego Masson. Highlights include Kraanerg, a concert performance of Oresteia, and a programme by the Orchestre de Lille conducted by Arturo Tamayo including his ground-breaking early stochastic score Metastaseis A.

> Oresteia at Wiener Festwochen
> Archipel, Geneva
> Holland Festival
> Les Flâneries Musicales de Reims

For a full calendar of Xenakis performances visit
> www.xenakis.org

Xenakis works up to 1969 are published wordwide by Boosey & Hawkes, works from 1970 are published by Editions Salabert (Universal Music Publishing) represented for hire in the USA, Canada and Mexico by Boosey & Hawkes Inc in New York.

> Further information on Work: Oresteia

Drawing by Iannis Xenakis, photo by Ralph A Fassey

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