Black Milk

Tonight’s highlight is a major new work from one of our country’s greatest living composers. Commissioned by Psappha and written for incomparable jazz singer Ian Shaw and a 16-strong ensemble, Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Black Milk receives its world premiere in this free livestreamed concert – exactly 12 months after its planned premiere fell victim to COVID-19.

There are echoes of Stravinsky in Gavin Higgins’s sparkling Dance Suite, a crackpot kaleidoscope of transatlantic jazz colours and rhythms; and in a work written 85 years earlier, Edgar Varèse’s elusive Octandre. Grace-Evangeline Mason’s tender piece for solo harp and Matthew Grouse’s invigorating bassoon solo were both written for Psappha’s Composing for… scheme, while Lisa Illean’s Januaries pays fragile, haunting homage to her native Queensland. Watch live on YouTube in the company of presenter Tom McKinney – or catch up on demand any time for a week after the livestream.

Ian Shaw – vocalist
Jamie Phillips – conductor
Psappha Ensemble

PROGRAMME
Matthew Grouse – wood.pulse (World premiere)
Varèse – Octandre
Mark-Anthony Turnage – Black Milk (World premiere, Psappha commission)
Lisa Illean – Januaries
Grace-Evangeline Mason – Glass Cathedrals
Gavin Higgins – Dance Suite