NMC Listening Club: Tansy Davies 'Spine'

We are excited to introduce the second episode in a new online series called NMC Listening Club. In each live broadcast we’ll be exploring selected releases from our back catalogue, in conversation with the composers and artists involved in their creation, plus further insight from specialists.

Composer Tansy Davies is joined by consultant music advisor and ex-Artistic Director at BCMG Stephen Newbould to take a deep dive into Tansy's album Spine, released on NMC in 2012. The Guardian said 'It's hard to think of another British composer whose rise through the hierarchy of British music has been so rapid, fuelled by high-profile commissions. As this disc shows, her music is at its most compelling when it creates vivid textures, drawing on rock and pop idioms to give it edge and pungency'.

Our guests discuss the works on this album: make black white, a reconstruction of Dowland’s Flow, My Tears performed by viol consort Concordia; Loopholes and Lynchpins, a reworking – or unravelling even – of Scarlatti's keyboard sonata (Huw Watkins) the title work, spine, performed by Azalea; and Falling Angel inspired by a painting of the same name by the German artist Anselm Kiefer.

Viewers of the live stream will be able to leave comments and ask questions in the YouTube chat room feature or you can submit questions in advance at nmc@nmcrec.co.uk

This episode of our NMC Listening Club series was live streamed via YouTube on Monday 9 November 2020.