LOADBANG (USA) : IRRATIONAL

Ranging from off-kilter grooves to apocalyptic soundscapes, the programme features works by some of their favourite collaborators including Eve Beglarian, Taylor Brook, Chaya Czernowin, George Lewis, Alex Mincek, and Angélica Negrón as well as a world premiere by Irish composer Fergal Dowling.

“cultivated, ” (The New Yorker); “an extra-cool new music group, exhilarating, ” (Baltimore Sun); “inventive, ” (New York Times); “a formidable new-music force, ” (TimeOutNY); “a sonic world unlike any other, ” (The Boston Musical Intelligencer)

New York City-based new music chamber group, loadbang, is a new kind of music for mixed ensemble of trumpet, trombone, bass clarinet, and baritone voice. Their unique lung-powered instrumentation has provoked diverse responses from composers, resulting in a repertoire comprising an inclusive picture of composition today.

In New York City, they have been recently presented by and performed at Miller Theater, Symphony Space, MATA and the Look and Listen Festival; on American tours at Da Camera of Houston, Rothko Chapel, and the Festival of New American Music at Sacramento State University; and internationally at Ostrava Days (Czech Republic), China-ASEAN Music Week (China) and Shanghai Symphony Hall (China).

loadbang has premiered more than 400 works, written by members of the ensemble, emerging artists, and today’s leading composers. Their repertoire includes works by Pulitzer Prize winners David Lang and Charles Wuorinen; Rome Prize winners Andy Akiho and Paula Matthusen; and Guggenheim Fellows Chaya Czernowin, George Lewis, and Alex Mincek.

They are an ensemble-in-residence at the Charlotte New Music Festival, and through a partnership with the Longy School of Music of Bard College in Boston, they are on the performance faculty of Divergent Studio, a contemporary music festival for young performers and composers held each summer.

As part of Music Current Festival 2022 – see the full line-up of events here!

PROGRAMME:
Alex Mincek (1975), Number May Be Defined (2012)*
Eve Beglarian (1958) [text by Rainer Maria Rilke], Island of the Sirens (2011)*
Taylor Brook (1985), Ouaricon Songs, Volume 2 (2014)*
– interval –
Fergal Dowling(1965), Everything is an Illusion (2022)**
Chaya Czernowin (1957), IRRATIONAL (2019)*
Angélica Negrón (1981), dóabin (2016)*
George Lewis (1952) [text by Fred Moten], Apis (2019)*

* Irish Premiere
** World Premiere

PERFORMERS:
Adrian Sandi, bass clarinet
Andy Kozar, trumpet(s)
Jeffrey Gavett, baritone voice
William Lang, trombone

CREDITS

Artistic Director: Fergal Dowling
Audio production, Studio4 Lighting: Eoin Lennon
PR: Conleth Teevan
Social Media : Aoife Browne

PRESS

‘Dublin Sound Lab is doing an important job for those in Ireland who remain passionate about music in the post-war avant-garde lineage and who rarely get the opportunity to hear such ‘difficult’ music performed… …flying the flag in Ireland over the past decade for European modernism.’ Liam Cagney, Journal of Music, June 2016

‘One of the pleasures of Music Current is the subtlety and sophistication of the sonic manipulation.’ Michael Dervan, Irish Times, 3 May 2017

‘One of the finest electroacoustic ensembles on the island at present, Dublin Sound Lab.’ Bernard Clarke, Nova, RTÉ Lyric FM, 26 May 2013

‘Where we are at musically these days in terms of technology’ Liam Cagney, Musical Criticism, December 2009

FUNDING

Supported by the Arts Council, Art Mentor Foundation Lucerne, MidAtlantic Arts Foundation, Contemporary Music Centre, Goethe Institute & IMRO