05Nov

The Charles Hazlewood All Stars is an ensemble dedicated to improvisation, featuring artists from right across the musical spectrum.

From Portishead’s Adrian Utley to former Jazz Warriors saxophonist Jason Yarde, from Goldfrapp’s Will Gregory to composer Graham Fitkin, the conductor Charles Hazlewood first assembled the band to play Glastonbury in 2008. Terry Riley’s seminal A Rainbow in Curved Air is one of the great psychedelic experiments, a barrage of skirling organ loops which exploded out of his San Francisco studio in the late sixties.

Hazlewood and his All Stars take the work as a starting point for a serious sonic adventure; a performance that will exploit to the full the magnetic intimacy of the Bristol Old Vic.

Do not miss this unique performance in the stunning surrounds of Bristol Old Vic on 5th Nov 2010.

The following is an extract from a recent interview with Charles Hazlewood about the work:

Despite the fact that I conduct orchestras across the world, I have always had much broader musical tastes. Mozart is my God, but I’m as likely also to be exploring Squarepusher & Bobby Conn, Stockhausen or Tangerine Dream. Music is a universal language: who’s to say that if you like Wagner you won’t also like drum n bass?

I’m also obsessed with improvisation. I’d started exploring new musical horizons with Adrian Utley (Portishead) & Will Gregory (Goldfrapp) – a couple of fellow sonic adventurers – and we were asked to play Glastonbury in 2008. We invited Andy Sheppard and Graham Fitkin, soon followed by Jason Yarde, Tony Orrell and Ruth Wall – all fearless improvisers.

I think it was Will suggested we take as a starting point Terry Riley’s “A Rainbow in Curved Air”; a rampantly hypnotic and gorgeously trippy piece, musical hallucinogenics. Music from a particular point in time: late Sixties…everything up for grabs…fierce young artists like Terry Riley with NEW WORLD ORDERS

Rainbow is a brilliant starting point for us – layer upon layer of almost cosmic (but sensual) musical protein: the effect for the listener should be like sitting inside a giant lava lamp.

These collaborations are now leading us in various directions: Will & Ade wrote a score to epic silent “The Passion of Joan of Arc” which we’ll shortly play in London, New York, Toronto & Sydney; Will’s also writing a new opera which I’ll conduct with the BBC Concert Orchestra at SouthBank Centre’s Ether in April; Jason Yarde & I are doing Urban Classic in Croydon – a mix of Dubstep & my orchestra Excellent Device, and the All Stars will appear en masse at my festival Play the Field in Somerset Summer 2011

Every time we play together new possibilities arise. It’s all borne out of trust – we get along, we love eachother’s skills… This gig (like all our gigs) will be for our own pleasure! And hopefully for yours too! It will definitely be unlike anything else you’ve heard this year.

07.30PM - 11:00PM | £14.00