Music / Previews
Hiding in plain sight
It’s a short thing – only two days of music, talks and films – yet Stroud’s Hidden Notes festival (September 21-22) has established a nationwide reputation as a showcase of left field creativity.
This year sees its fourth outing with a range of performances from improvising saxophonist Rachel Musson to immersive sonics from William J. Stokes, virtuoso theremin playing from Icelandic exile Hekla and Mary Lattimore’s electro-acoustic harp ambience.
The word is clearly getting round and early signs are that the festival will probably sell out.
is needed now More than ever
One performer more involved than most is composer/pianist Daniel Inzani, one of the three directors of Hidden Notes, mainly responsible for their record label.
“For the festival I’m a reluctant stage manager and I make sure that the technical side is scheduled. It’s more Alex Hobbis that’s the programmer and it’s not an easy task, actually.
“We approach all sorts, and sometimes they are just wildly out of budget, but other times there are people who are keen to perform.
“It’s quite a singular event in the UK from what I can tell, to have back to back modern classical acts billed like a festival, so it’s become a little bit of a hub, I think, for the community who are into it. A lot of them are musicians themselves.”
Inzani’s piano trio will be appearing on the Sunday, and he’s hoping his technical responsibilities will allow him to catch some of the other acts: “I’m very curious to see (electronic pioneer) Suzanne Ciani, I’m really excited to see Katherine Tinker: she’s worked with Johnny Greenwood, Philip Glass … she’s one of the top UK pianists of classical concert standard who is wildly out there.
“There’s Echo Collective coming from Belgium, a string quartet but with electronics, and Mary Lattimore – I haven’t seen her before.”
One big attraction for 2024 will be the Will Gregory Moog Ensemble, a 10-strong collective playing old-school synthesisers. They’ve been going for nearly twenty years yet have only just released their first album. How come?
Gregory explains: “It’s been a long time, but everyone involved has active musical careers so it’s always been a bit of a side project that we haven’t really promoted. It was just careless!”
The project’s roots lay in Gregory’s efforts to rescue analogue equipment being cast aside as digital synthesisers became more attractive.
Inspired by the work of Wendy Carlos, Vangelis and others he resolved to celebrate the special analogue sound and began gathering fellow enthusiasts.
“They are people I’ve come across in the Bristol scene and while working in London. In the beginning I had to hand out synths for them to learn on and play but they ended up buying their own, which was great.”
The Ensemble’s first repertoire drew on those revered predecessors but over time Will has composed more music and the album Heat Ray is an original suite for the band and orchestra inspired by a Greek mathematician.
“Archimedes – he was a genius from over 2000 years ago – an inventor and a mathematician. He invented a massive claw to lift ships out of the water and worked out how to use mirrors to focus the sun’s light and set fire to invading boats out at sea,” said Gregory.
“The music is a soundtrack to an imaginary biopic about Archimedes and there are a few maths-y things going on – tunes that are palindromes, some triangular melodies, that sort of thing.”
Combining with an orchestra was an important ambition of Gregory’s: “I think there’s a great interplay between these synthesisers and acoustic instruments. It’s not about robots though, there’s a human being behind them.
“What’s interesting is using those raw electronic sounds and making a musical landscape that’s new, not based on previous instruments. It’s a marker to where we think the future of synths might go, not trying to be at all retro.
“You get this contrast between the slightly sci-fi , slightly inhuman attempt at human-ness which is what synths are so good at and then you get the real orchestral human-ness and the juxtaposition between the two.”
Unfortunately the whole orchestra shebang was a bit too much for the Hidden Notes performance, which will feature the nine synthesisers playing a selection from their back catalogue alongside some of the tracks from Heat Ray.
For Will Gregory the festival represents the start of a new energy in the project: “It’s just great to be out there again, playing with the group – it’s been a while since we’ve done it. And it’s great to be part of the movement that a festival like that represents and to be amongst all the people on the bill.”
Hidden Notes takes place in various venues in Stroud on Saturday and Sunday, September 21-22. The Will Gregory Moog Ensemble will be touring with the Britten Sinfonia from October 8. Find all information at hiddennotes.co.uk
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