The primary locations for these events are two iconic sites in the Old Village part of Ryton; the Holy Cross Church, and the Function Room of its near neighbour, the community owned Ye Olde Cross public house.
Experimental, DIY, unusual, fun, free form, challenging,
and at times with an element of voluntary participation, these events will be
multifarious and suitable for all ages, interests and abilities.
THE ACOUSTICS OF THIS
800-YEAR-OLD CHURCH ARE WONDERFUL, AND WE HOPE AUDIENCE MEMBERS WILL FULLY
ENJOY, AND BECOME IMMERSED IN THE EXPERIENCE. YOU ARE THEREFORE ACTIVELY ENCOURAGED
TO CHANGE SEATS AND TO WANDER AROUND THE COMPLETE SOUND SPACE (excluding
the bell tower), IN A RESPECTFUL AND COURTEOUS MANNER THROUGHOUT
THE DURATION OF THE PERFORMANCE.
There will be no introductions, no breaks, no
mid-performance applause.
At the rear of the
space (by the kitchen), there will be a seating area where audience members can
relax and enjoy light refreshments
AUNTIE JOY 3. At
4.30pm The Bells of the Holy Cross Church will
commence ringing to herald the start of this continuous and uninterrupted
150-minute performance. They will be silent for 2-minutes as NofC and TQ promenade the space to soothing percussion. The bells will
then recommence and be joined by John Pope, who will continue as a soloist before being accompanied by Christian Alderson and Sally Pilkington.
After a short set by this trio, John fades out, leaving the space to the duo, who are eventually accompanied by Faye McCalman in a free-form piece that culminates in a solo performance by Faye who is eventually joined by a number of improvising musicians from the early afternoon Tyneside Improvisers Workshop being ‘conducted’ by Chris Bartholomew. The event culminates in a 10-minute finale with the previous performers (including a single tolling bell), joining the throng for a multiple ensemble climax concluding at 7.00pm.
The Bells
“A ring of eight bells was installed in December 1999 just in time to ‘ring in’ the new millennium. Four new bells joined three cast in 1763 and one installed in 1868 placed in a cast iron frame. The heaviest bell, the tenor in E, weighs three quarters of a tonne.
During the performance the bell order will change to create a range of different sounds. Ringing always begins and ends with the bells in order 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8.
By ‘calling’ in stages different patterns are formed.
·
Rounds 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
·
Queens Change. 1 3 5 7 2 4 6 8
·
Kings Change.
7 3 5 1 2 4 6 8
·
Titums 1 5 2 6 3 7 4 8
·
Reverse. 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 8
Other orders will also be heard” (John
Robinson – Tower Captain)
John Pope – double bass, electronics.
John is an open-hearted improviser from the North of England. A double
bass player and composer with a rising profile on the UK creative music scene,
John leads his own acoustic avant-jazz quintet, is a founding member of
genre-crossing alt-jazz trio Archipelago and has collaborated with a host of
musicians from across the spectrum of modern music, from Evan Parker and Joe
McPhee to Richard Dawson and Field Music. Described by The Guardian as a
“powerful Tyneside bassist”, John’s boundless dedication to spontaneous music
and his tactile, intuitive voice on the instrument have made him a favourite of
adventurous audiences across the UK.
Christian Alderson - drum kit, percussion and found objects.
Christian is a percussionist and improviser based
in Newcastle. He spent his teens and early twenties gaining a very much
informal musical education playing drums, recording and touring internationally
in a variety of post-punk / post-rock groups.
His formal education in, and subsequent working within visual arts have focused an inherent love for deconstruction and re-invention which informs his approach to percussion. As such his practice often explores the imprecise, fluid and immediate possibilities of acoustic percussion using a range of conventional / extended techniques and devices.
The last two decades have seen him working across various areas from avant-rock to jazz to noise, as well as forays into film and theatre. He can be currently found performing and recording with, amongst others, “jazz-art-rock” trio Archipelago, the avant-rock trio The Unit Ama, free-improvising trio The Long Lonesome Go, as well as regular procrastination on the idea of solo work.
Sally Pilkington – Church organ, Roland JDxi, Roland VT3 vocoder.
Sally is a multi-instrumentalist, vocalist and composer
hailing from Blackburn via the Yorkshire Dales and now living in nearby Clara
Vale. She's a member of wonky-pop band Hen Ogledd with whom she's made two
highly-eclectic albums on Domino Records, 'Mogic' and 'Free Humans'.
Over the past three years her primary musical emissions have been in the form of Bulbils, a home-spun duo with partner Richard Dawson which began as a way of keeping sane and connecting with the outside world throughout the anxiety of Covid-19 lockdowns. Initially aiming to put out one release a day through Bandcamp (though at the this point the pace has slowed to a comparative crawl), the duo have coughed up no less than 72 albums of resolutely lo-fi, spontaneous, relaxing, frankly shonky music employing all manner of dilapidated synths, bad bass, drum machines and plenty of 'oooohs' and 'ahhhhhs'.
She is currently working extensively with the pipe organs at Holy Cross Church in Ryton and St. Matthew's Church in Newcastle, exploring the instrument's rich textures and vast harmonic possibilities. Today sees the first performance of her new collaboration with percussionist Christian Alderson. Their music together reaches from the widest plains of deep pedal drones through cloudbursts of vigorous sticksmanship to soaring celestial heights.
Faye
MacCalman will be blending improvised woodwind/voice
with fragments of pre-existing compositions/songs, merged with electronic
delays and the sounds of the bellringers.
She is an imaginative performer, composer-songwriter and improviser on saxophone, clarinet, electronics and voice, fusing experimental song writing with off kilter patterns, heartfelt melodies and surreal atmospheres inspired by under the surface emotional worlds and jazz, folk, rock and improvisation.
Faye leads jazz-art-rock trio Archipelago, nominated for UK Jazz Act of the Year in the 2021 Jazz FM Awards, and was awarded a Jerwood Arts/Cheltenham Jazz Fellowship, creating performance-installation ‘Invisible, Real’ for Cheltenham Jazz Festival 2022 which illuminated anonymous experiences with mental illness through ‘floating’ projections, live performance and sound spatialisation. “Moving…I lost myself” - Huw Stephens, BBC6 Music
Chris Bartholomew is a composer, improviser and electronic musician based in Newcastle. Whilst studying at the Guildhall School of Music, Chris developed his improvisatory practice in two duos: “Umami Music” with composer and Shakuhachi player Laonikos Psimikakis, and “perCloop” with jazz drummer Dave Ingamells. With these duos Chris performed variously at Shunt, the ICA, RichMix and the Sibelius Music Academy in London.
Chris’s improvisation practice is constantly developing, and he greatly varies the tools to adapt to different contexts. The commonalities that exist are live sampling of other improvisers and diverse sound sources and gestural playback rather than static looping. Feeding into his setups are a range of esoteric noise makers - from electro-magnetic-field sonifiers to amplified frying pans and found percussion.
Whilst studying for a Masters Degree at Goldsmiths University, Chris began studying Sound Painting - a language for leading group improvisation and real-time composition invented by Walter Thompson. Sound Painting is a language of physical gestures that prompt improvisors to respond and shares aspects with Butch Morris’s Conduction and John Zorn’s Cobra. After traveling to Sweden to study with Walter Thompson, Chris formed Skulk ESP, combining Sound Painting with live electronics, culminating in a performance at The Albany, Deptford. As he becomes more established in the North East, Chris is excited to bring Sound Painting to the improv community through regular workshops.
Curators
NofC and TQ wish to thank;
o
Charlie McGovern – Broadcast Sound –
for engineering, sound balance and recording.
o
John Robinson and the bell ringers for
their time, contributions and understanding.
o
Glynis Thompson – Church Warden - for
her unwavering support, advice and encouragement.
o
All performers
o
Audience members
o
Behind the scenes grafters.
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