Elischa Kaminer curates: To paint over and to make sense


IKLECTIK and NONCLASSICAL present,

Elischa Kaminer curates: To paint over and to make sense

Saturday 9 April 2022 | 8pm [7:30pm doors]

Tickets: £12 adv / £8 concession / £15 on the door https://www.nonclassical.co.uk/events/elischa-kaminer-curates

PROGRAMME 

Kadosh* – Sarah Nemtsov 
Mayah Kadish, solo violin and electronics

Resurrection Games Vol. II: to paint over and to make sense*
* – Elischa Kaminer 
Mayah Kadish, Alex Paxton, Joseph Havlat 

* World Premiere
** UK Premiere

A paddling pool, a toaster and an inflatable dinosaur – whimsical props become unexpectedly profound tools to explore themes of play, sexuality, religion and loss in a programme celebrating experimental and radical Queer Jewish new music. Inspired by thoughts and words of Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur on “Jewish responses to crisis”, Associate Composer Elischa Kaminer curates an event featuring the premiere of Sarah Nemtsov’s Kadosh alongside his own work, Resurrection Games Vol. II: to paint over and to make sense.

Resurrection Games Vol. II: to paint over and to make sense was created in 2021 through an intimate collaborative process between violinist Mayah Kadish, trombonist Alex Paxton, pianist Joseph Havlat and composer and theatre maker Elischa Kaminer. Over the course of 75 minutes, the performers investigate the art of ‘living with brokenness’* through improvisation, song and collective play. Explosive energy and radical tenderness collide against a backdrop of plants and bizarre objects, as Kaminer highlights the humour, performativity and electric virtuosity of the three musicians in this highly personalised work.


The title of Sarah Nemtsov’s work Kadosh refers to the Hebrew word for holy, a bible verse (Isaiah 6:3) and the Kedusha, a central part of the daily Jewish Amida prayer. Writing for solo violin and electronics, Nemtsov recalls a melody from the synagogue of her hometown in Germany, layering and distorting fragments of the tune with an array of effects pedals. Kadosh was specially written for violinist Mayah early in 2021 and is dedicated to her and the Jewish Community of the City of Oldenburg.

* Delphine Horvilleur

https://www.nonclassical.co.uk/events/elischa-kaminer-curates

Elischa Kaminer

Elischa Kaminer is a composer, performer and theatre maker based in London and Frankfurt am Main. His work is located on the intersections of music theatre, sound art, electronic, concert, queer- pop and yiddish musics. Recent works often take on the form of continuously evolving electro- acoustic landscapes as well as musical and choreographic scores, moulded into and out of the specific performers’ very own artistry, humour, physicality and musicality and include scores for soloists like Mayah Kadish (La Vaghezza), Sara Cubarsi (Musikfabrik), Joseph Havlat (Ensemble x.y), guitarist An-Laurence Higgins and improvising trombonist Alex Paxton.

Mayah Kadish

Mayah Kadish was born in Rome and grew up in London. At university she studied philosophy at King’s College London, working for several years as a translator. She obtained her Master’s degree as a violinist from the Royal Academy of Music, London, and studied the baroque violin with Enrico Onofri in Sicily. Mayah plays internationally mainly with baroque and contemporary repertoire, equally at home in both worlds. She has played as soloist and chamber musician in halls such as the Barbican, Royal Albert Hall, Wigmore Hall, LSO St Luke’s, Lisbon’s Centro Culturel de Belem, Paris Philharmonie and the Köln Philharmonie amongst others. She is principle violinist of the Berlin-based genre-fluid contemporary ensemble s t a r g a z e directed by André de Ridder, principle violinist of London-based contemporary group Ensemble x.y, and has worked as soloist and Concertmaster with the European Union Baroque Orchestra. She writes music and often works collaboratively on making new music. Mayah has worked extensively with groups such as the Pomo d’Oro, London Contemporary Orchestra, London Contemporary Orchestra Soloists, London Sinfonietta, Holland Baroque Society, and worked as guest concertmaster with Oxford Baroque and Contro Corrente Orchestra. She has worked alongside artists such as Lars Ulrik Mortensen, Reinhard Goebel, Giovanni Sollima, Amandine Bayer, Enrico Onofri, Alina Ibramigova, Rachel Podger.

Joseph Havlat

Passionate about modern and contemporary music, he is a founding member and original artistic director of contemporary music collective Ensemble x.y. During his time studying he gave performances of concertos by Ligeti, Messiaen, Stravinsky and others, which has led him to collaborate with such composers as Michael Finnissy, Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Gerald Barry and Thomas Larcher. He is also an avid composer, having written for the aforementioned ensembles, and views his compositional work as intrinsic to his musical development and his most important form of artistic expression. Current post-Covid projects include the performance and subsequent recording of all of Finnissy’s piano concertos with conductor Jack Sheen, a short album of piano music by William Marsey, and the writing of a song cycle on texts of Australian poet Gwen Harwood. In real life he enjoys playing and watching cricket, hiking, playing video games and producing music of questionable artistic quality with his three siblings.


Alex Paxton

Alex Paxton (1990) is a composer and improvising-trombonist based in the UK. Alex’s work draws upon a range of classical, experimental, electronic & folk music traditions to create a unique and explosive voice. He was elected to the 9th International Composition Seminar, commissioned by Ensemble Modern (ILOLLIPOP), has won a Royal Philharmonic Society Composition Prize (OD ODY PINK’d), Dankworth Jazz Prize, Leverhume Art Scholar Prize (NOW WE are DUH-DUR) and Harriet Cohen Music Award (PURPLE-TREE TAPESTRY) and appointed as London Symphony Orchestra Panufnik Composer, SPAKE represented the Orchestral section of the International Society of Contemporary Music, commissioned by Wigmore hall and had music performed at BBC Proms. He is a commissioned contributor to John Zorn’s Arcana X 2021. He has performed his music as a soloist with leading orchestras including: Ensemble Modern (ILOLLIPOP), London Sinfonietta, The Philharmonia Orchestra (UK), Royal National Scottish Orchestra & Ensemble x.y. Further works include pieces for the London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Kammer Klang, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Psappa, National Youth Jazz Orchestra (UK).

Cover Image credit: Kathinka Schroeder