Lauren Sarah Hayes and Christos Michalakos

23 Feb 2012 1:10PM - 23 Feb 2012 2:11PM
Description: Lauren Sarah Hayes is a composer and performer from Glasgow who primarily works with combinations of acoustic instruments and live electronics. Her background is in piano, mathematics and philosophy, all of which inform her solo performance work and current research towards a PhD in Creative Music Practice. She is also a regular improviser, her instruments of choice including prepared piano, analogue synthesizer, laptop and Cracklebox. She has performed her music at festivals around the world. She will be guest composer in residence at the Elektronmusikstudion, Stockholm in late 2011, and a featured artist at Bangor University’s Symposium on Interactive Electronic Music in 2012. www.laurensarahhayes.com Christos Michalakos was born in 1983 in Greece and studied mathematics, acoustics and music technology. Working predominantly with live electronics in recent years, his music explores the relationship between the acoustic and electronic sound worlds. Aside from working as a composer and solo percussionist, he often performs on projects ranging from small laptop outfits, to large-scale free jazz and improvisation ensembles such as Edimpro. In 2007 he was awarded an EPSRC scholarship for postgraduate study at the University of Edinburgh, where he continues his research pursuing a PhD in Creative Music Practice. His works have been presented at several international festivals. www.christosmichalakos.com cmichalakos.bandcamp.com/
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

International Festival of Chamber Music

23 Feb 2012 7:15PM - 26 Feb 2012 4:31PM
Description:

Belfast Music Society presents the International Festival of Chamber Music 23-26 February. Click here to download the festival brochure  

How to book:
SUBSCRIPTION TICKETS (includes all events except Summer Celebrity Recital and post-concert reception) Only £60 — represents a massive saving of £17 (more than 20%)

ON-LINE www.belfastmusicsociety.org or www.gotobelfast.com

POST : BMS Tickets, c/o Begbies Traynor LLP, 5th floor, donegall House, 7 donegall Square North, belfast bT1 5Gb

BY PHONE 028 9024 6609 (belfast Welcome Centre)

IN PERSON Belfast Welcome Centre, 47 donegall Place, belfast (opposite M&S) Opening hours: Mon–Sat 9.00am–5.30pm Sun 11.00am–4.00pm Tickets £5 for under 25’s (subject to availability) Up to 30 free tickets per concert for QUB music students – details available from the School of Creative Arts.

Venue: multiple venues - consult the brochure
Booking info:

Book online

Film at the Lab - SCREENING

24 Feb 2012 5:00PM - 24 Feb 2012 6:31PM
Description: A showcase of recent audiovisual work associated with the School of Creative Arts including the premier of The Benson Brother’s “Tosser” (Northern Ireland Screen/De Novo Pictures Ltd) with sound by SARC’s Pedro Rebelo and Felipe Hickmann and “We are Not Afraid”, a documentary on Sarajevo by Declan Keeney. Keeney’s film explores first hand accounts of life during the siege and reflects on the notion that post-conflict societies in the rebuilding of lives, space and a sense of place, cannot ignore the legacy of the past, however difficult.
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

Dr Maria McHale (DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama)

29 Feb 2012 1:00PM - 29 Feb 2012 2:01PM
Description: Dublin’s Operatic Life: Joseph Holloway and the Gaiety Theatre, 1880-1922. Dublin’s Gaiety Theatre was the source of much of the city’s musical and, more specifically, operatic life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Numerous travelling opera companies made frequent and lengthy trips to the theatre in which a substantial number of operas were staged in the years between 1880 and 1922. In addition to contemporary press reports and theatre programmes, the unpublished diaries and notebooks of avid theatre goer, Joseph Holloway, reveal an operatic life in Dublin that has been barely acknowledged, let alone thoroughly examined. Indeed, while theatre historians have made use of the Holloway Collection (NLI), musicologists have not, and it has been entirely absent from discussions of Ireland’s musical life. This paper provides an overview of The Gaiety in Dublin’s musical past gleaned largely from Holloway’s papers. It addresses issues of audience, repertory and reception, as well as assessing the value of diaries and other personal writings as a reliable source for examining musical culture.
Venue: McMordie Hall, Music
Booking info: free

Rebekah Coffey (soprano) and David Quigley (piano)

1 Mar 2012 1:10PM - 1 Mar 2012 2:11PM
Description: Programme: Benjamin Britten - On This Island Philip Martin - Three Jazz Pieces Hamilton Harty - Ode to a Nightingale Winner of the 2004-2006 Young Artist Platform Scheme, Rebekah Coffey’s career is developing on both the operatic stage and the concert platform. Rebekah graduated from Queen’s University Belfast with a Bachelor of Music (First Class) and from the Royal Northern College of Music in June 2003 with a Postgraduate Vocal Diploma. Rebekah’s musicality has won her a number of prizes including awards from the Countess of Munster Musical Trust, the Peter Moores Foundation, the D’Oyly Carte Opera and the Lawrence Atwell Charity. In September 2009 Rebekah appeared in the Proms in the Park Celebrations with the Ulster Orchestra at Hillsborough Castle. This concert was broadcast live on BBC 4. Recent debuts also include her appearance on the BBC Radio 2’s Friday Night is Music Night. Award-winning pianist David Quigley rose to international attention in 2002 by representing the UK in the highly acclaimed ‘Rising Stars’ series. He has performed as soloist in many of the world’s greatest concert halls. As a concerto soloist he has appeared with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, the Ulster Orchestra, Northern Sinfonia, RTE Concert Orchestra, Camerata Ireland and Cairo Symphony Orchestra. He has collaborated with distinguished conductors such as Barry Wordsworth, Barry Douglas, Takuo Yuasa, Sachio Fujioka and David Porcelijn.
Venue: Harty Room, Music
Booking info: free

Elizabeth Hoffman (Faculty of Arts and Science, New York University)

7 Mar 2012 1:00PM - 7 Mar 2012 2:01PM
Description: Semblance, make-believe, and narrative structures: toward a theory of listener embeddedness in electroacoustic soundscapes This is a paper about the roles of the bodies on both sides of the divide. “If a tree falls in a forest but no one hears it...” it makes neither a sound nor an aesthetic impact. Music that is inherently sound rather than also score or action configures the listener in the music’s very conception in ways that are unique. Electroacoustic music that alludes to the environment engages with this practice or phenomenon even more directly. Elizabeth Hoffman has lived in NYC since joining the NYU Faculty of Arts and Science in 1999. Initially a classical pianist, she later studied with Bülent Arel and worked in Stony Brook’s analog studio, then pursued computer music at the University of Washington. Hoffman now writes for acoustic, fixed, and live electronic media, inclined to a sonic focus on timbre and texture. Additional interests are instrument design, spatialization, and technology’s impact on creative thought. Recognition from Bourges and Prix Ars competitions. Ongoing computer projects with Uillean piper Ivan Goff, (SARC M.A.). Hoffman is Associate Professor in NYU’s Department of Music.
Venue: SARC
Booking info: free

SARC Composers Concert

8 Mar 2012 1:10PM - 8 Mar 2012 2:11PM
Description: This concert is a showcase of new electroacoustic works by PhD composers currently working at the Sonic Arts Research Centre.
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

Professor David Charlton (Royal Holloway, University of London)

14 Mar 2012 1:00PM - 14 Mar 2012 2:01PM
Description: ‘The Bouffons in Paris: What Rousseau (and the others) heard and saw’
Venue: McMordie Hall, Music
Booking info: free

PSAPPHA

15 Mar 2012 1:10PM - 15 Mar 2012 2:11PM
Description: Richard Casey piano and Tim Williams percussion A coruscating programme of contemporary work: piano meets percussion in an encounter electric with rhythmic energy and colour. Both the main pieces in the programme are homages: Harrison Birtwistle wrote (and titled) The Axe Manual for the versatile and adventurous American pianist Emanuel Ax, the result being one of his most exciting - and mysterious - sound dramas, a big thing trembling with life; in Tombeau in Memoriam Gerard Grisey, meanwhile, Philippe Hurel spins a glittering memorial for his great forebear, Gerard Grisey. The piano is a kind of percussion instrument itself, making sounds when objects bump up against one another - felt-covered wooden hammers striking lengths of wire; Birtwistle has the percussionist focused on sounds from wood (marimba) and skin (drums), while Hurel prefers the ringing, metallic sounds of vibraphone, glockenspiel and bells. Manchester-based ensemble Psappha have made many acclaimed visits to the School over recent years, most recently for Henze’s El Cimarron in 2006; Richard Casey is himself a regular visitor to this series both as virtuoso soloist and in duo partnership with pianist Ian Buckle.
Venue: Harty Room, Music
Booking info: free

R. Luke DuBois (Polytechnic Institute New York University)

21 Mar 2012 1:00PM - 21 Mar 2012 2:01PM
Description: Sex, Lies, and Integrated Digital Media R. Luke DuBois is a composer, artist, and performer who explores the temporal, verbal, and visual structures of cultural and personal ephemera. He holds a doctorate in music composition from Columbia University, and has lectured and taught worldwide on interactive sound and video performance. He has collaborated on interactive performance, installation, and music production work with many artists and organizations including Toni Dove, Matthew Ritchie, Todd Reynolds, Jamie Jewett, Bora Yoon, Michael Joaquin Grey, Elliott Sharp, Michael Gordon, Maya Lin, Bang on a Can, Engine27, Harvestworks, and LEMUR, and was the director of the Princeton Laptop Orchestra for its 2007 season. Stemming from his investigations of “time-lapse phonography,” his recent work is a sonic and encyclopedic relative to time-lapse photography. Just as a long camera exposure fuses motion into a single image, his work reveals the average sonority, visual language, and vocabulary in music, film, text, or cultural information.
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

Paul Dunmall

22 Mar 2012 1:10PM - 22 Mar 2012 2:11PM
Description: SONORITIES FESTIVAL Festival Opening and Moving on Music Concert Paul Dunmall will improvise sounds and melodies with reed instruments from around the world, including bagpipes and saxophone. He will be playing a set of pipes that was specially designed for his improvisation style with 3 melody chanters that allow for a unique combination of pitches. He will approach this distinctive instrumentation via his backgrounds in jazz and folk music to create a powerful and extraordinary performance. For thirty years Paul Dunmall has carved out a reputation for himself and is now widely recognised as one of the most uncompromising and talented reed players on the International jazz/improvised music scene. Whether playing in small groups or big bands his musical sensitivity and imagination combined with a powerful sound make him one of the most distinctive improvisers playing today. His octet and Moksha big band showcases his abilities both as a composer drenched in the Jazz and Folk traditions and as a sympathetic leader able to give maximum freedom to a elite group of fellow improvisers. http://www.pauldunmall.com
Venue: SARC
Booking info: free

Official Welcome and Reception

22 Mar 2012 6:30PM - 22 Mar 2012 7:31PM
Description: SONORITIES FESTIVAL The Sonorities Festival is the longest-running new music festival in Ireland and is one of the cornerstone Festivals in Europe presenting innovative new music. Run by the School of Creative Arts and the Sonic Arts Research Centre at Queen’s University Belfast, the Festival has always brought to Northern Ireland innovative ideas and sounds from across the world and the 2012 Festival is no exception in this regard. We are hosting a special event which has at its core the theme of The Body’s Music. As digital technologies permeate and often dominate our daily lives, creative disciplines likewise become influenced, shaped and altered by those technological advances. The body’s relations to musical instruments, its connection and dis-connections with technological devices as well as the ways in which our bodies are being made audible (as well as visual) is a heightened concern for sonic arts practitioners. The grounding of music in / within the body can provide a familiar touchstone for listeners, and represents one of the strategies for engaging a broad spectrum of audience members with contemporary music. Practitioners continue to define and critically examine the threshold conditions between body and instrument and challenge continuities and discontinuities of body, as well as the changing role of the instrument itself.
Venue: SARC
Booking info: free

Open Fader

23 Mar 2012 1:10PM - 23 Mar 2012 2:31PM
Description: SONORITIES FESTIVAL - Open Fader Christopher Haworth, Juan Parra, Eduardo Nespoli and Jean Penny.
Venue: SARC
Booking info: free

Atau Tanaka

23 Mar 2012 7:30PM - 23 Mar 2012 8:31PM
Description: SONORITIES FESTIVAL Performance by internationally renowned artist and Chair of Digital Media at Newcastle University / Director of Culture Lab Newcastle.
Venue: SARC
Booking info: free

Chamber Choir: `Summer is icumen in

1 May 2012 7:30PM - 1 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: Chamber Choir: `Summer is icumen in Tickets: £6 (£3)
Venue: Harty Room, Music
Booking info: Tickets: £6 (£3)

Dr Chris Marsh (School of History, Queen’s University Belfast)

2 May 2012 1:00PM - 2 May 2012 2:01PM
Description: ‘Seventeenth-century England’s top ballads: identification and interpretation.’ Dr Marsh is a social and cultural historian, specialising particularly in religion and music. His most recent study Music and Society in early modern England was published by Cambridge University Press in 2010.
Venue: McMordie Hall, Music
Booking info: free

New PhD Compositions

2 May 2012 7:30PM - 2 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: This concert is a showcase of works by current PhD composers in the School of Creative Arts and features new works written especially for and with saxophonist Franziska Schroeder. Featured composers include Robert Casey, Abdullah Jamal Ashraf and Diogo Alvim. The compositions constitute a mix of works for various saxophones, other instruments and live-electronics. http://www.somasa.qub.ac.uk/~fschroeder/Showcase.html
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

Jonathan Powell, piano

3 May 2012 1:10PM - 3 May 2012 2:11PM
Description: Ibeniz: Iberia During the recent autumn season Jonathan Powell has travelled continuously, giving concerto performances in Russia (the second concerto of contemporary British composer Michael Finnissy), Slovakia (two performances of Liszt’s Malédiction with the Slovak Sinfonietta under Petr Vronsky) and Kiev (Liszt with the Kiev Soloists) in addition to chamber music in Moscow and Prague, solo recitals in Bratislava, Germany, London and elsewhere, as well as recording a disc of Rachmaninoff including the Second Sonata, Etudes-Tableaux op.33 and Chopin Variations. Next year will see him touring Albeniz’ complete Iberia and concertos by Rachmaninoff and Scriabin. In addition to performing, Powell wrote a doctoral thesis on Scriabin and modernism in Russian music during the early 20th century; he has also published articles on this and related subjects. He is also a composer, mainly of chamber music; his works have been performed by the Arditti Quartet, London Sinfonietta and others. His repertoire extends from 16th-century England (Byrd), via John Field and Schubert to the present day.
Venue: Harty Room, Music
Booking info: free

QUBensemble

3 May 2012 7:30PM - 3 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: directed by Steve Davis The School’s forum for experimental and improvised music, QUBensemble promises to deliver an exciting, quirky and eclectic mix of free improvisation and some structured compositions. Tickets: £6 (£3)
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: Tickets: £6 (£3)

Queen’s University Brass Band

5 May 2012 7:30PM - 5 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: The Queen’s University Band explores the lighter side of the brass band repertoire with a selection of works from the movies and jazz arrangements. Tickets: £6 (£3)
Venue: Whitla Hall, QUB
Booking info: Tickets: £6 (£3)

The Emergence of Political Song

8 May 2012 1:00PM - 8 May 2012 2:01PM
Description: Eckhard John (German Folk Song Archive Freiburg) David Robb (School of Creative Arts QUB) Songs of the 1848 Revolution and the History of their Reception How does a Scottish anthem (‘For a’ that and a’ that’) become a German revolutionary song (Trotz alledem)? What roles do songs take on in a revolutionary context? Why does the term ‘political song’ in Germany come to have a positive connotation from 1848 onwards? Musicologist Eckhard John and David Robb (School of Creative Arts) present the results of their AHRC and DFG funded research project. Over three years they have created critical editions in text and music of thirty representative songs of the 1848 Revolution in Germany. These have been published on the online Critical Historical Liederlexikon (www.liederlexikon.de). In the course of this work John and Robb have scrutinised popularly held assumptions about the origins and dissemination of these songs. These were myths which emerged particularly in the context of the folk and protest song revival of East and West Germany where the songs of the 1848 Revolution became part of the new democratic self image and cultural memory of both German states.
Venue: McMordie Hall, Music
Booking info: free

Queen’s University Symphony Orchestra (QUSO)

8 May 2012 7:30PM - 8 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: Join QUSO (conducted by Alexander Stead) for their annual May concert. The programme will include Beethoven’s King Stephen overture and Dvorák’s Symphony No.9 From the New World. Tickets: £6 (£3)
Venue: Whitla Hall, QUB
Booking info: free

Benjamin Boretz

10 May 2012 1:10PM - 10 May 2012 2:11PM
Description: Old, new, performed, projected, music, words, images, ideas. Ben Boretz has been composing most of his natural life, as well as writing and exploring noncategorical expressive languages, in solo and collective episodes. His youthful avidity as a reader about music, and a deep interest in community-making, inspired (in 1955) the idea that led to the founding of Perspectives of New Music (with Arthur Berger as co-editor) in 1961, and to the American Society of University Composers in 1964. More recently, he has been part of the composers’ collective Open Space (founded with Elaine Barkin and J. K. Randall), producing CDs, printbooks, scores, and a periodical (The Open Space Magazine), whose issue 12/13 was released in 2011. Much of his music and writing has been issued under the Open Space imprint since 1989.
Venue: Sonic Lab, SARC
Booking info: free

Queen’s University Big Band conducted by Steve Barnett

10 May 2012 7:30PM - 10 May 2012 9:01PM
Description: The popular jazz ensemble gives a programme of big band classics. Tickets: £6 (£3)
Venue: The Cube, Crescent Arts Centre
Booking info: Tickets: £6 (£3)

JAM Concert

16 Jun 2012 10:15AM - 16 Jun 2012 11:31AM
Description: The Junior Academy of Music (JAM) at the School of Creative Arts presents their end-of-the-year concert. During the morning more than 130 children from four different JAM programmes will be showcasing their musicianship through choir singing, brass band playing as well as through performing with current digital technologies. Everyone welcome. Entrance free of charge.
Venue: Whitla Hall, QUB
Booking info: free