This is a recurring event: View all events in the series “Summer Sounds”
Pianist Ben Smith explores the intricacies of rhythm and repetition in a programme that includes dance forms of the French baroque, middle-eastern drum patterns, phasing, and microtimings of rubato and swing. Grooves considers what happens when numerical abstractions collide with the physicality of performed music. That is, what happens when rhythms become grooves.
Presenting old and new work with radically different formulations of rhythm, the programme is bookended by two ultra-virtuosic works from the 1970s avant-garde: Ichiyanagi’s very rarely performed Time Sequence, and Xenakis’ monumental Evryali.
Please note, this event is free to attend, but seats are limited. Please sign up to attend, via the 'register now' button above.
Programme
- Toshi Ichiyanagi, Time Sequence (1976)
- Richard Beaudoin, Chopin Desséché (2009)
- Ruth Crawford Seeger, Piano Study in Mixed Accents (1930)
- Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, Suite No. 1 in D minor (1687)
- Martin Iddon, Mönch (2024) *
- Conlon Nancarrow (arr. Ben Smith), Study No. 11 for Player Piano (1965-69) *
Interval
- Olivier Messiaen, Ile de feu II (1949)
- Ryuichi Sakamoto, hibari (2009)
- Iannis Xenakis, Evryali (1973)
* London premiere.
About Ben Smith
Ben Smith is a pianist and composer specialising in contemporary and experimental music. Hailed as one of “the finest new-music pianists in London” (Tempo) and a player of “extraordinary precision and insight” (The Guardian), he is in demand both as a soloist and chamber performer (An Assembly, Apartment House, Athelas Sinfonietta, Apartment House, Explore Ensemble, London Sinfonietta, Riot Ensemble, Uproar Ensemble).
Known for daring and virtuosic performances which traverse the extremes of the contemporary repertoire, he has given dozens of world premieres across the UK and Europe (Aldeburgh Festival, BBC Total Immersion, Cafe OTO, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, inn:pust festval, London Contemporary Music Festival, Musicon, Ny Musik i Birkerød, Spitalfields Music, Transit: Festival voor nieuwe muziek, and at London venues Ambika P3, Barbican Hall, Hackney Round Chapel, Kings Place, Milton Court Concert Hall, St John’s Smith Square, Queen Elizabeth Hall, and Wigmore Hall).
In recent years he has conducted premiere performances of Sarah Angliss’s Giant (Royal Opera House; Aldeburgh Festival), Alastair White’s RUNE, (Tête-à-Tête Opera Festival) and regularly works as deputy MD on Operation Mincemeat (Fortune Theatre). Recording projects include works by Nomi Epstein and Paul Newland (another timbre), Brian Ferneyhough and Alastair White (métier), and the complete piano works of Evan Johnson (all that dust). Ben was a Junior Fellow at Guildhall School of Music & Drama from 2020-2022, where he previously studied with Laurence Crane, Rolf Hind, and James Weeks.
Attendance at City events is subject to our terms and conditions.