Aldeburgh Music

Taking place during the Aldeburgh Festival every June, these free events display an array of original, extraordinary and wonderful happenings, steadily attracting audiences, composers, artists and performers alike to Aldeburgh.

Grimes relay (2000)
Britten’s opera Peter Grimes was performed at Snape Maltings Concert Hall by English National Opera in 2000 and to celebrate this, a simultaneous audio relay was arranged for Aldeburgh Beach. This was attended by approximately 1000 people.

Syzygy (2000)
An experimental project involving two former world champion kite flyers, Jo Joelson and Bruce Gilchrist. Using sensor technology, they collected weather data from a specially designed kite, sending this to a central computer together with their recorded brain activity. Four sound sculptures were positioned on Aldeburgh Beach, designed to look like four singers had been buried in the pebbles; the collected data was taken from the central computer and converted into sounds that were projected through the buried heads as if they were singing.

Eine Brise (2003)
To celebrate our Chairman and Chief Executive’s achievement in September 2002 when they cycled from Lands End to Lowestoft, we presented Kagel’s Eine Brise, a piece performed by 111 cyclists. Written in 1996, this transient action for 111 cyclists – with bell or horn for the sequence of sound events – lasted about 90 seconds and was ‘conducted’ by Matthew Rowe.

Musical Memory Box: Sea Chanteys (2008)
A world premiere from Joseph Phibbs. Over a period of four months, musical memories were gathered from people of all ages and from all walks of life throughout Aldeburgh. These memories provided the stimulus for a new vocal piece performed by a massed army of voices on Aldeburgh Beach. Composer Mike Challis created additional soundscape material and the whole event was directed by Matthew Rowe. 

Sea Calling (2008)
A series of variations created and performed by students from King Edward VI Upper School and University Campus Suffolk, working with Simon Limbrick. The students used electronic processing to manipulate deconstructed and extended vocal sounds.