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Concerts for Syria facilitates and promotes fundraising concerts and music events that support Syrian refugees.

After more than four years of conflict the ensuing refugee crisis has become one of the greatest humanitarian crises of today, affecting each and every one of us. Today 12 million Syrians have fled their homes because of conflict, 6 million of whom are children, and c.4 million Syrians in total are now refugees.

As musicians we have the tools and the opportunities to raise much-needed funds for refugees and to raise awareness of their situation and ways in which we can help.

The aim of this project is to harness the power of these tools and opportunities and seek to make a difference through music-making.

Fatima Lahham, founder of Concerts for Syria says:

I’m part-Syrian myself (and a postgraduate recorder player at the RCM, London), and have found not only that lots of musicians would like to support this important cause, but also that many concert venues would be happy to facilitate collections at events. To bring these two factors together I decided to start up Concerts for Syria in October 2015.

We help to organise concerts, as well as advertising and promoting them, and assisting performers and venues with the whole collection process. In the last 6 months we’ve been involved with venues such as the Foundling Museum in London, the Keble Early Music Festival in Oxford, St Albans Cathedral, and Great St Mary’s Church in Cambridge. A wide range of musicians have expressed interest in getting involved, with my own chamber ensemble, IMPROVISO performing at several of the concerts.

My aim for the next six months and further ahead is to really expand and reach new musicians and audiences, as well as to look at securing funding for future, more ambitious projects.

The tragic crisis that faces new generations of Syrian children today is not one that can be ignored nor one that will disappear soon. As musicians we have the privilege of being able to communicate with so many diverse groups of people around the world, and this project seeks to harness that power by raising awareness, collecting funds, and making a difference through music-making.

Anyone interested in getting involved in any capacity is encouraged to contact us via:
concertsforsyria@gmail.com

concertsforsyria.com

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Ever since its reinvention as a concert hall, St John’s Smith Square has played a pivotal role in supporting the most promising young musicians. Simon Rattle, Steven Isserlis, Nigel Kennedy and Jacqueline du Pré are just a few of the musicians who performed at St John’s Smith Square before going on to begin internationally renowned careers.

St John’s Smith Square Young Artists’ Scheme 2016/17

“The Young Artists’ Scheme at St John’s Smith Square is a vital part of our mission as one of the UK’s leading concert halls. By investing in the development and nurturing of exceptional talent we are helping to ensure that music making and creative opportunity is refreshed and renewed for future generations. It is also, of course, incredibly exciting simply to observe the young performers as they develop across the course of their involvement with the scheme and a real reward for our audiences to be able to share this process of development.” – Richard Heason: Director, St John’s Smith Square

Pianist Christina McMaster is amongst the line up of the 2016/17 Young Artists’ Scheme (which also includes the Minerva Piano Trio, harpist Oliver Wass and the Ferio Saxophone Quartet). A champion of contemporary repertoire, Christina has been praised for her innovative programming, and her collaborations with a diverse mix of genres and arts, recently working with the Brodowski Quartet, violinist Lizzie Ball, rapper Tor Cesay, director Richard Williams, actors from Central Saint Martin’s and a number of designers for London Fashion week. She also commissions and performs a wide range of new music, and has worked with established composers including Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Tansy Davies and Stephen Montague as well as emerging composers – collaborating most recently with Freya Waley-Cohen and Richard Bullen.

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Christina launched her debut album ‘Pinks & Blues’ in October 2015 on her own label to a sell-out audience at St James’ Theatre, the album is a fusion of jazz and blues influenced classical and contemporary music with two new commissions.

“Thanks to the St John’s Smith Square Young Artists’ Scheme I am able to design and deliver my ambitious vision of an exciting ‘mini-festival’ across 2016/17 season with an array of concerts from solo piano music by Bartók, Scarlatti, Ligeti, Debussy, to a concert where 120 school children take over the galleries of SJSS! Responding to the building’s rich history I’ll perform music by Dowland, Shostakovich, Britten and Birtwistle with the Ligeti Quartet; and the brilliant sisters Kristine and Margarita Balanas will join me for piano trios by Schumann and Arvo Pärt. The scheme has also provided the wonderful opportunity to commission new music by Richard Bullen and Ayanna Witter-Johnson; Ayanna will pay homage to one of her heroines in celebration of International Women’s Day alongside some of my musical heroes including Ruth Crawford-Seeger, Charles Ives and Meredith Monk.”  –

Christina McMaster

Meet the Artist……Christina McMaster

Review of Pinks & Blues

St John’s Smith Square Young Artists’ Scheme

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Who or what inspired you to take up composing, and pursue a career in music?

Music has been my number one passion since I was a child. I started with classical piano, but then had a realization that I wasn’t fully fulfilled performing others’ music, and that I needed to take a risk and try to find my own musical voice. I went on to study electronic music composition and piano at the university, and have been on an obsessive never-ending journey since!

Who or what were the most significant influences on your musical life and career as a composer?

Growing up my biggest influences were my grandmother and father. Both were very passionate about classical music. My grandmother played classical piano and organ until her early 90’s, and my dad listened to classical music constantly and took our family to Chicago Symphony Orchestra concerts. Then in my teens the big influence was Chicago house and Detroit techno, and then next IDM music on labels like Warp and Ninja Tune, pre-fusion jazz, and soul music. It was inspiring to be in Chicago in the 90’s when post-rock took off too. Thrill Jockey and bands like Tortoise were combining electronics into rock music in a new way, and it was an exciting time to experience music evolving.

What have been the greatest challenges of your career so far?

The biggest challenge was rising above being a local musician. Taking my career from local shows to other cities in the states, and then touring and releasing music internationally, took a lot of hustle. My husband is also from Chicago, so it wasn’t easy for us to pick-up and leave. He agreed we could move to London if I was accepted into the Royal College of ‘Music Composition for Screen’ Masters program. The program accepts about ten students per year, but I was determined! I felt trapped and like I’d hit a creative wall in Chicago. So I think the greatest challenge was extracting myself from that situation, and putting myself in a better place to create and expand.

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working on a commissioned piece?

I love working on commissioned pieces. Whether a film score, a song for a compilation, or a bespoke piece for a performer, I really enjoy having set parameters going into it. Like Stravinsky’s famous quote, “The more constraints one imposes the more one frees one’s self. And the arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution.”

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working with particular musicians, singers, ensembles and orchestras?

The biggest challenge is organizing it! We’re all busy people, so finding a time we can all be in the same room can be like a Tetris game. There are so many pleasures. I’ve met so many incredible people who dedicate their lives to their passions and bettering themselves. It’s a a great little bubble of a world.

Which works are you most proud of?

The debut London Electronic Orchestra album. This is a few years of exploration and experimentation all coming together, and I’m very excited for it’s release.

Who are your favourite musicians/composers?

John and Alice Coltrane are two of my favorite musicians. My favorite composers are Chopin (piano works), Eric Satie, Philip Glass, and Steve Reich.

What is your most memorable concert experience?

The first big London Electronic Orchestra concert in 2014 for a 36-piece orchestra at the Britten Theatre. I was figuring it out as it went along, but we pulled it off! It gave me the confidence to keep going with the project.

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians?

Believe in yourself and focus on your craft.

Where would you like to be in 10 years’ time?

I would like to be touring internationally with London Electronic Orchestra, composing new music, and writing film scores. Basically continuing on the same path.

London Electronic Orchestra

DEBUT ALBUM RELEASED MAY 6, 2016 ON THE VINYL FACTORY LABEL

Purchase the album

Kate Simko has carved an international career as an electronic music producer, film composer, live performer, and DJ. Hailing from Chicago, Kate’s music reflects the influences of the city’s underground sounds, as well her background in classical piano and jazz music.

www.katesimko.com

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Guest post by Georgina Imberger

My German teacher at school came from Prague. Frau, we called her. I shrink a little now, on first instinct, when I think that we did that. On second instinct, I think that she probably liked it.  It was a simplistic, naïve affectation and we were predictably naughty little people whose views were yet to expand. I like to think that she had a rueful smile for our cheek. Frau was different from anyone else I had met, and I thought that she and her world were fascinating. I can’t remember any of the words she used to talk about Prague, but I do remember, and still have, the picture of Frau’s Europe that ended up in my teenage head.

In a scene that well dates me to a pre-millennial high school education, we spent much of German class listening to audiotapes. The content on those things was appalling, boring and irrelevant to us, and we had no grace in tolerating it. But the tapes had a piano soundtrack, and while we were raucous, Frau would lose herself a little and sail away in the musical bridges. In those moments, I fancied I saw something that was more real than our suburban lives and more interesting than I yet understood. These memories are where I place the birth of my own love of a sideways turn and where I learnt that a true human story often plays slightly below the script.

Many years later, I finally went to Prague. I was well into my thirties by then, my life was still messy at every turn and my questions spilling out in disruptive mayhem. I went to Frau’s city hoping to meet the Europe that she had packaged for me. I walked the rambling outer suburbs for days, loving every minute. I scoffed at the tourism-gone-mad. I found gigs in dodgy venues, jumping train tracks and drinking booze too cheap to be decent. And on the word of a Czech friend made on one such night, I found myself with a ticket to a local piano recital.

As with most experiences in that chapter of my life, I was slightly hungover and a little wrought when I went. As the audience started coming in, however, my mind sharpened. We were in a community building, in a northern suburb of Prague, beautiful in its scale and simple in its set-up.  There was a chunky great grand in the front and mis-matched chairs. Here it was, Frau’s Prague. And it was filling with warm, searching faces. In an instant, it all felt like an over-due pause in my busy, busy conversation and I sensed a million noisy questions being quietly answered. The young man who came out to play that piano had a smile that knew thirteen-year-old-me. His hair was out of control and his hands were everywhere, even before they hit the keys. It was Rachmaninoff that he started with, the Prelude in C sharp minor, Op. 3, No. 2. And it was unspeakably beautiful.  I had never before, and never since, been in the presence of hands and space that could shift the landscape like they did that night.

So here is my Rachmaninoff Dreaming. A tribute to the stories told with 88 keys that drift us away and tell truths like no words can. And a toast to Frau, who had the wisdom to let us see her dream.

 

Georgina Imberger runs Piano Project, a Melbourne-based venture that sponsors piano lessons for children who are new immigrants to Australia. There is a fundraising concert at the Meat Market in North Melbourne on May 29 at 5.30pm, presenting the New Palm Court Orchestra, lead by pianist/composer Gemma Turvey and featuring flugelhornist Gianni Marinucci. Tickets are $20 and proceeds go to lessons for the kids. Details and tickets are on the website – www.pianoproject.org.au

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