Psappha Commissions Psappha

• John Casken (b. 1949): Winter Reels:
• 1 Casken: Winter Reels: I. A Warming Dance 06:14
• 2 Casken: Winter Reels: II. A Cold Song 06:03
• 3 Casken: Winter Reels: III. A Spirited Gathering 08:02
• Ninfea Cruttwell-Reade (b. 1989): Patdeep Studies:
• 4 Cruttwell-Reade: Patdeep Studies: I. A Study in the Elements of Ālāp (The Unveiling of the Rāg Pathway) 03:17
• 5 Cruttwell-Reade: Patdeep Studies: II. A Study in the Elements of Jor 03:45
• 6 Cruttwell-Reade: Patdeep Studies: III. A Study in the Elements of Gat Composition 03:12
• 7 Cruttwell-Reade: Patdeep Studies: IV. A Free Study in Tāns 01:47
• 8 Cruttwell-Reade: Patdeep Studies: V. A Study in the Elements of Ālāp (The Shadowing of the Rāg Pathway) 02:17
• Tom Harrold (b. 1991): Dark Dance:
• 9 Harrold: Dark Dance 08:08
• Mark-Anthony Turnage (b. 1960): Black Milk (Live):
• 10 Turnage: Black Milk (Live) 09:57
• Tom Coult (b. 1988): Two Games and a Nocturne:
• 11 Coult: Two Games and a Nocturne: No. 1, Game I. Fidgety, Skittish 02:43
• 12 Coult: Two Games and a Nocturne: No. 2, Game II. Meccanico ma accelerando 04:50
• 13 Coult: Two Games and a Nocturne: No. 3, Nocturne. Drifting, Malleable 03:37
• George Stevenson (1781 - 1848): Trees Made of Air:
• 14 Stevenson: Trees Made of Air 08:32
• Alissa Firsova (b. 1986): Songs of the World, Op. 44:
• 15 Firsova: Songs of the World, Op. 44: No. 1, Secret of the World 03:52
• 16 Firsova: Songs of the World, Op. 44: No. 2, Song of the World 01:18
• 17 Firsova: Songs of the World, Op. 44: No. 3, What Is the World? 03:49
• Total Runtime 01:21:23

Info for Psappha Commissions

Psappha, the North West’s only stand-alone professional contemporary classical music ensemble, celebrates its 30th anniversary with a new album of world-premiere recordings. Commissions features seven works commissioned and first performed by Psappha over the last 12 years – and collectively, they show the breadth of the group’s repertoire, the scope of its ambition and the esteem in which it is held by just seven of the hundreds of composers with whom it has worked since it was founded in 1991.

Mark-Anthony Turnage, Psappha’s Patron since 2018, contributes a major new work written for jazz singer Ian Shaw and a 16-strong ensemble – Black Milk, a potent and powerful setting of Paul Celan’s post-war poem ‘Todesfuge’ (‘Death Fugue’). John Casken, a long time associate, is represented by Winter Reels, a three-movement work inspired by landscapes in winter and written for Psappha’s core group of six musicians (violin, cello, flute, clarinet, piano and percussion).

Commissions also features world-premiere recordings by four of the UK’s brightest young talents. Tom Coult, the BBC Philharmonic’s Composer in Association, contributes Two Games and a Nocturne – first playful, then sombre. Ninfea Cruttwell-Reade’s Patdeep Studies, written for sitarist Jasdeep Singh Degun, is a fascinating exploration of the traditional Hindustānī rāg Patdeep. Tom Harrold describes his exhilarating Dark Dance as a ‘perverse viola concertino’, written for violist Heather Wallington. And George Stevenson takes his cues for the restless Trees Made of Air from a quote by theoretical physicist Richard Feynman.

"When I went to a bookshop in Vienna to discover some Viennese poets, it was Hugo von Hofmannsthal whose work sprang out to me. Hofmannsthal is famous for his libretti for Strauss operas, but I loved the philosophical and mystical aspects of his poetry, and found three poems exploring questions about the world.

The first poem suggests there are secrets in this world that we just cannot grasp and at the same time questions whether everything is purely just a dream. Love saves everything and makes us understand the depth of life through its kisses – and yet does it all fly away in a cycle of dreams?

Hofmannsthal wrote the second poem later in his life when he started losing hope following the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Ironically, it is a much lighter poem, and I tried to bring out its humour reflected through a Viennese ballroom.

The last poem is the most contemplative and has a certain sadness. A ray of hope does come in – ‘and yet, it is also a world for one’s self’ – followed by my favourite line of all: ‘Voll süss-geheimer, nievernommner Töne’, or ‘full of sweetly-secret, never-heard sounds’, each one unique without any other’s echo. Even so, Hofmannsthal concludes that no matter how much we try to decipher the meaning, we cannot ever grasp this eternal poem." (Alissa Firsova)

Alissa Firsova is a British-Russian pianist, composer and conductor. Since winning the BBC Proms/Guardian Young Composer Award in 2001, she has received two world premieres at the BBC Proms, both conducted by Andrew Litton: Bach Allegro (2010), premiered by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and Bergen’s Bonfire Op.31 (2015), premiered by the Bergen Philharmonic in its 250th anniversary Prom. Her music has also been performed by the likes of Julius Berger, Britten Sinfonia. Imogen Cooper, the Dante Quartet, Tim Hugh, the Interface Quartet, Henning Kraggerud, the Netherlands Blazer Ensemble, Northwest Sinfonietta, Seattle Chamber Players, the Tana Quartet and the Xenia Ensemble.

"No two are the same and part of the joy in this selection is seeing how far-ranging the music can be, when composers are restricted in the scale of resources they can use." (Financial Times)

Daisy Brown, soprano
Conrad Marshall, flute
Dov Goldberg, clarinet
Benjamin Powell, celesta
Tim Williams, percussion
Benedict Holland, violin
Sophie Rosa, violin
Heather Wallington, viola
Jennifer Langridge, cello
James Manson, double bass
Stephen Barlow, conductor

Psappha
is the North West’s only stand-alone professional contemporary classical music ensemble. Founded in 1991 by Artistic Director Tim Williams, the group is dedicated to commissioning, performing and promoting new music – particularly by living composers and emerging musicians.

Throughout its 30-year career, Psappha has commissioned and premiered music by more than 500 composers and has performed across the UK and worldwide on five continents. In the process, it has worked with the likes of Aldeburgh Music, the BBC Philharmonic, the BBC Proms, BBC Radio 3, Glyndebourne Festival, NMC, Opera North, Phoenix Dance Theatre, the Royal Northern College of Music, University of Manchester and the Royal Opera House in the UK; Guggenheim New York, the New York Philharmonic and Princeton University in the USA; and Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, the Jerusalem Festival and Muziektheater Transparant worldwide.

Psappha supports composers at all stages of their careers, inviting them to work with its core musicians to create, develop and present new work. Through its pioneering ‘Composing For…’ scheme, which launched in 2014, the group has worked directly with more than 140 emerging composers on brand new compositions. All these works are premiered via high-quality films on the group’s extensive YouTube channel, which contains more than 230 free-to-view films of live performances and has received more than 120,000 views in the last 12 months alone. The group also launched its own record label in 1997, and its catalogue of recordings are set for re-release in 2021 through its new relationship with NMC Recordings.

Composer Mark-Anthony Turnage was appointed as Psappha’s Patron in 2018 – succeeding Peter Maxwell-Davies, former Master of the Queen’s Music, who served as Patron for 20 years and was an enthusiastic supporter of the group’s work until his death in 2016. An Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation and PRS Foundation Talent Development Partner, Psappha is based at Hallé St Michael’s, the former Italian Chapel in the central Manchester neighbourhood of Ancoats.

Booklet for Psappha Commissions