New Release: Colin Currie appears on Bryce Dessner album Solos

Colin Currie has released a solo track as part of Bryce Dessner’s first album on Sony Classical, Solos, which features a collection of solo instrumental works composed by Dessner over the past years.

Colin’s contribution to Solos is a marimba work, Tromp Miniature, which Currie often performs in his solo recitals. In this recording, Colin blends virtuosity with deep expressive impact, delivering a touching and emotional performance of this beautifully crafted solo piece.

Dessner expressed his admiration for the guest soloists featured on the album, stating, 'Writing a solo piece for me is always a great challenge and joy, as you have all the personality and talent of the player plus the physicality and resonance of the solo instrument. Currie’s performance exemplifies this sentiment, showcasing his profound musicality and the rich, resonant qualities of his percussion instruments.'

Solos is available now on all major streaming platforms and physical formats.

Colin Currie returns to Grafenegg Academy for fifth season

This month, Colin returns to Grafenegg in Austria to join the artistic team of the festival’s Academy training scheme for early-career professional musicians. In his role as Guest Soloist and Featured Artist, he will perform alongside the young musicians as the soloist in the Austrian premiere of Andrew Norman’s percussion concerto Switch, and will also play a special late night chamber event featuring music by Andy Akiho, Steve Reich and Julia Wolfe.

The mission of the Grafenegg Academy is to think holistically and to approach the profession of young musicians from different perspectives and to reflect this during the residency. It is important to respond to the diversity of the career paths of modern musicians. This is highlighted in various concert formats - but above all in the work that happens during the residency within the context of diverse rehearsal work, various formats, workshops, lectures, and much more. Previously Artistic Curator of the Academy, this is the fifth time Colin has been involved in the Academy’s artistic team.

The Hallé's 2024-25 season features FOUR concerts with Colin Currie

Manchester-based orchestra The Hallé has announced its 2024-25 season, in which Colin will perform four times.

On 28 November and 1 December, Colin joins the orchestra and their dynamic new Principal Conductor Kahchun Wong to play the virtuosic solo part in Sir James MacMillan’s Veni, Veni Emmanuel. One of the most-performed percussion concertos in the repertoire, the one-movement piece is based on the Advent plainsong of the same name and dedicated to the composer’s parents. In his programme note, MacMillan explains: “On one level it is a purely abstract work in which all the musical material is drawn from the 15th century French Advent plainchant. On another level it is a musical exploration of the theology behind the Advent message”.

In February the orchestra presents a three-day celebration of the music of living legend, Philip Glass. One of the most influential composers alive today and among the first proponents of the minimalist movement, Glass’s music was described as “a viscous bath of pure, thick energy” by electronica pioneer Brian Eno. On 14 February, Colin conducts his iconic 1981 chamber piece Glassworks. Intending it to be – aptly, for the decade – ‘Walkman-suitable’, Glass released both an LP and a tape cassette of the piece. Each had its own separate mix: the LP was intended for home listening and the cassette – with a headphone-specific mix – was intended for personal tape players.

The following day, Colin leads the Hallé in Glass’ multimedia piece LIFE: A Journey Through Time. The visuals that accompany Glass’ shimmering music comes from the culmination of National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting’s six-year journey of photographic discovery that parallels new scientific insights about the evolution of life on Earth. The result is a lyrical interpretation of life on our planet, from its earliest beginnings to its present diversity. From prehistoric trilobites to giant tortoises, delicate jellies to spiny octopus trees, and from erupting volcanoes to shimmering coral reefs.

Tickets for all concerts are on sale now via the Hallé’s website.

Colin Currie Quartet embarks on Scottish tour

The Colin Currie Quartet with composer Aileen Sweeney at the premiere of her Starburst in Glasgow

This week the Colin Currie Quartet embark on a recital tour around Scotland, supported by Chamber Music Scotland of which Colin Currie is Ambassador. The Quartet will perform at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, the Cumnock Tryst (in a concert marking the launch of the Festival’s 2024 programme), in Banchory with the Woodend Music Society and Aboyne Arts Group, in Castle Douglas with the Gatehouse Music Society, and in Biggar with Biggar Music. The Quartet will present programmes centred on works by Andy Akiho, Julia Wolfe, Dave Maric, Steve Reich, Kevin Volans, Rolf Wallin, and including the world premiere of a new work by Aileen Sweeney, Starburst.

The tour follows the Quartet’s performance at Wigmore Hall in February, where they unveiled a new programme that included the world premiere of Freya Waley-Cohen's Stone Fruit (specially written for the Quartet) and the London premiere of Amy Beth Kirsten’s may the devil take me.

“The CCQ – Currie himself, Owen Gunnell, Adrian Spillett and Sam Walton – is a phenomenal group… Sharing instruments, pairing off in rhythmical games, a floating sense of pulse, now a woody texture, now something metallic – and all at a ferocious pace – it was a sheer delight.”
— The Arts Desk

New Album: Danny Elfman's Percussion Concerto

Colin (right) recording at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall with conductor JoAnn Falletta and composer Danny Elfman

Following a successful US tour of Danny Elfman’s Percussion Concerto, Colin has released a recording of the piece for Sony Classical with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by JoAnn Falletta. The full album will be released on Friday 17 May, but you can listen to the first single now.

Elfman wrote the Concerto specifically for Colin, praising him as “an extraordinary musician who would be great to collaborate with”, and the piece exploits his typically lush and cinematic style. “The audience were captivated by Colin Currie’s every move as he performed the piece. Darting across the stage between instruments, Currie is a true showman,” wrote Amy Melling (Abundant Art) of the US premiere.

The album is completed by Elfman’s Wunderkammer, which he describes as a concerto for orchestra, and a short choral piece in French, ‘Are you lost?’, from Elfman’s song-cycle Trio.

The first movement from the concerto is available to stream now.

Colin Currie interviewed by Qobuz at Festival Présences 2024

Ahead of the this year’s Présences festival in Paris, Colin sat down with Qobuz streaming service for a chat about his love for the music of Steve Reich, what his label and ensemble have been up to, his vision for contemporary composition, and his cherished memories of being a soloist. This year’s Présences festival focused on Reich’s music, which has played a significant role in Colin’s performing and recording career.

Colin takes Danny Elfman’s Percussion Concerto on US tour

Over the next two weeks, Colin will perform Danny Elfman’s Percussion Concerto six times in three cities across America. He will be joined on-stage by conductors Christopher Dragon and David Danzmayr alongside local orchestras throughout the tour. 

The exuberant piece uses an impressive arsenal of percussion instruments (the soloist alone plays 12 instruments in total, including pots and pans, and a metal ‘gizmo’), and showcases Elfman’s classic sound so familiar from his many award-winning film scores. Elfman has described percussion as “a lifelong obsession”, while with this piece he was excited to “really go back to my roots with wood and metal, mallets and sticks and hands, and to really let loose and have some fun with it. I also knew Colin was an extraordinary musician who would be great to collaborate with”. 

Of the concerto, Colin said: “It’s been a joy to put together… it’s truly intriguing, and very beautiful and very unexpected.” 

Concert dates include 8, 9, 10 March at Boettcher Concert Hall in Denver, Colorado, 16 March at Steven Tanger Center in Greensboro, North Carolina, and 22, 23 March at Abravnel Hall in Salt Lake City, Utah. 

Watch Colin talk through the different movements and instruments in the concerto, ahead of his world premiere performance of the piece in 2022 with the London Philharmonic Orchestra:

Colin Currie Quartet premieres two works at the Wigmore Hall

Colin Currie Quartet

Tomorrow evening, the Colin Currie Quartet is set to deliver a evening of contemporary percussion music at London's renowned Wigmore Hall. Central to the concert is the world premiere of Freya Waley-Cohen's Stone Fruit.

Co-commissioned by the Wigmore Hall and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Stone Fruit draws its inspiration from the nuanced rhythms of everyday household activities. At its core, this piece features a distinct percussion instrument made from teacups. Through the work, Waley-Cohen draws parallels between the delicateness of the teacups and the surprising intensity of their sound, similar to the hardness of stones inside stone fruits, hidden by their soft exterior flesh.

The quartet also presents the London premiere of Amy Beth Kirsten’s may the devil take me. This work for four triangles delves into the enchantment of sound and the dichotomy between the true and the false, mirroring the interplay between reality and fiction seen in Cervantes' Don Quixote.

In addition to the two premieres, the quartet showcases works by other contemporary composers. These include Andy Akiho, whose rhythmic complexity and use of unconventional materials set him apart in the contemporary music scene; Dave Maric, known for his genre-blending compositions that often incorporate electronic and acoustic elements; Steve Reich, a pioneer in minimalism whose influence on contemporary music is profound.