Date: Tuesday 17th November, 7.30pm
Venue: Brixton East 1871

A concert jam-packed with new music from new composers. More than 150 composers from 14 countries applied to the Riot Ensemble’s 2015 Call for Scores.  Three composers –  Thanasis Deligiannis, Jessica Rudman & Patricia Alessandrini were chosen by Riot’s musicians to write new works for this concert. We also perform a brand-new work by Jose Manuel Serrano (our 2015 composer-in-residence), give the UK premiere of Amy Beth  Kirsten’s beguiling L’ange Pâle and premiere a virtuosic harpsichord solo from Drew Schnurr.

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Date: Wednesday 11th November, 1pm
Venue: Guy’s Chapel, Guy’s Hospital, London Bridge
In our 9th concert with Breathe AHR – a charity dedicated to improving health and outcomes for patients, staff and communities – three Riot musicians perform a concert of music reflecting on war & peace.

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Date: Monday 15th June, 7pm
Venue: The Cockpit Theatre, Marylebone
A chance to see a new chamber opera in the making.  As part of Rough for Opera, a scratch night for new opera hosted and curated by Second Movement, four scenes from this new opera will be presented as a work-in-progress followed by a Q&A with audience feedback.

Created by Riot Ensemble’s Artistic Director Aaron Holloway-Nahum and librettist Peter Jones, the opera will star baritone Benedict Nelson and countertenor Rupert Enticknap in the single, tragic character of Donald Crowhurst.

See a full press release here.

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Date: Thursday 28th May; 7.30pm
Venue: Orgelpark, Amsterdam
Last year, as part of our Les Citations project, we commissioned UK composer Chris Roe to write a new work for Oboe, Harpsichord, Percussion and Double Bass.  Chris’ piece WIRED was recorded for our first CD, and has now been selected as a finalist for the Prix annelie de Man.  We are thrilled to be heading to Amsterdam – our first international appearance – to perform Chris’ piece in the finals.

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Date: Wednesday 1st July, 7.30pm
Venue: The Forge, Camden
The closing ‘summer party’ on the second season of the critically acclaimed Wednesdays at the Forge concert series.  The concert is built around Kevin Malone’s cabaret based around A Clockwork Orange, which sets the “songs” that Burgess included in his own script for the film (which Kubrick was eventually to reject in favour of his own).  The concert also includes music by Charles Dodge and George Crumb.

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Date: Friday 15th May; 7.30pm
Venue: Palmers Green United Reformed Church
In association with the foreSOUND school of music, we’re running an education project to encourage and train the next generation of composers.  Five young foreSOUND students have been selected to attend an instrument introduction day with our players (28th Feb) and take composition lessons with our Artistic Director Aaron Holloway-Nahum.

We’ll then perform these pieces alongside George Crumb’s Vox Balanae and Djuro Zivkovic’s I Shall Contemplate at a Gala where our players will select one of the new pieces to be performed again on our 2016 season.  Recordings of all the pieces will be released on our media pages.

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Date: Saturday 31st October; 5.00pm
Venue: St. Nicholas Church, Brighton
Jonathan Harvey’s “Death of Light, Light of Death” was inspired by Grünewald’s ‘Crucifixion’ in the Issenheim Altarpiece.  Harvey wrote that the “unflinching sense of catastrophe that hangs over this picture has given it a special appeal to the sensibilities of our own time.”  The Riot Ensemble returns to Brighton for the third consecutive year, to perform a concert centred around this beautiful and haunting music.  Other music will include composers from the New Music Brighton composers collective, Helen Grime’s Oboe Quartet, and NMB Composers Patrick Harrex, J.C. Clark, Peter Copley & Phil Baker.

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Date: Friday 30th January; 7.30pm
Venue: MeWe360
The opening concert of our 2015 season! Built around Jonathan Harvey’s raucous trio for Flute, Clarinet and Piano (The Riot) this concert also includes the UK premiere of music by Marco Momi (Reloading Vanishing), our first 2015 performance of composer-in-residence Jose Manuel Serrano (Espantajo de Resaca), Arne Gieshoff’s Invocation to Ate, Capricci by Augusta Read Thomas, a special performance of Aaron Copland’s Piano Variations, Felipe Lara’s Livro dos Sonhos, and Speak to Me by our 2014 composer-in-residence Amy Beth Kirsten.

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Date: Monday 6th April; 11am – 5pm
Venue: Unannounced
Fields, by David Bird, is for two percussionists at a linear distance of 150 yards.  A total of six microphones record the resulting sound at specific distances between the two. “As sound travels from one microphone to the next, one hears the entire lifespan of a sound in an instant”.  We will be performing the piece a dozen times – unannounced – in various parks and locations around London.

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Date: Saturday 6th June; 7.30pm
Venue: MeWe360
Presented as part of our Sound and Music Portfolio Scheme, this concert sees three emerging UK composers writing pieces for three international soloists.  They are: Chloe Knibbs (writing for Accordionist Rafal Luc), Daniel Kidane (writing for Bass Clarinetist Heather Roche), and Ed Nesbit (writing for Viola d’Amore, Marco Fusi). The concert will also feature new works for all three soloists by Athena Corcoran-Tadd, Pedro Alvarez and Oliver Brignall.

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Date: Wednesday 4th February; 7.30pm
Venue: MeWe360
A spectacular evening of virtuosic music for four-hands piano, including Stravinsky’s Petrushka and Concertino, Kurtág’s Játékok I and IV, Amy Williams’ Crossings and transcriptions four of Conlon Nancarrow’s studies for player piano.

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Date: Monday 24th August; 1.00pm
Venue: St. Thomas’ Central Hall, South Wing
Presented with live visual artist, this concert will feature a number of pieces for piano duo including Debussy, Kurtag, and “Variations for Judith“, a set of variations on Bist du Bei Mir, written for the chair of our board.

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