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<<  -- 6 --  Robert Hugill    EMOTIONAL CONTOURS

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He is currently engaged on writing a new opera, with poet Lavinia Greenlaw, for next year's Feldkirch Festival in Austria. This will be his second collaboration with Greenlaw. They first worked together on Wilson's first opera, Hamelin, which was premièred in Germany in 2002 and has subsequently been taken up by the Dublin based Opera Theatre Company. Wilson first got to know Greenlaw's work through a review of her poetry in The Times. He subsequently used one of her poems and whilst corresponding with her the subject of opera came up. Greenlaw had not then written an opera libretto but their first collaboration, Hamelin, was successful, and they hope to collaborate on a number of other works in addition to their current project. Last year Wilson commissioned a set of four poems from Greenlaw -- poems which were in turn inspired by Cy Twombly's Quattro Staggioni series at Tate Modern in London. These poems form the structural and emotional basis for his new orchestral work, Winter Finding, which will receive its première by the RTÉ NSO in Dublin on 16 September 2005.

Reviewing the première of Wilson's orchestral piece, Man-o'-War, The Independent on Sunday said that 'Wilson's talent is an exciting one'. We must be grateful that the Presteigne Festival is providing us with an opportunity to get to know not just one but six of Wilson's pieces. Wilson will also be talking at Presteigne; he features in two of the Festival's Composers in Conversation events.

Composer David Matthews and Artistic Director George Vass, with members of the Festival Orchestra, celebrate at the 2004 Presteigne Festival of Music and the Arts. Photo © Keith Bramich
Composer David Matthews and Artistic Director George Vass, with members of the Festival Orchestra, celebrate at the 2004 Presteigne Festival of Music and the Arts. Photo © Keith Bramich

Wilson himself is looking forward to the festival: 'Obviously I'm delighted to be the featured composer at what is a very well put together and prestigious festival. The performers are all first-class and I am excited about working with them and about hearing a lot of good music.'

Copyright © 14 August 2005 Robert Hugill, London UK

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Presteigne Festival of Music and the Arts 25-30 August 2005'Presteigne ... may be a festival known for having more composers per square yard than the others, but it never makes its commitment to new music seem uncompromising or remote. Rather, it succeeds in creating an ambience where, far from feeling intimidated by commissioned work, the audience accepts it as a kind of aural orienteering, more challenging than rambling in familiar foothills and potentially more rewarding.' - Rian Evans, The Guardian.

The 2005 Presteigne Festival of Music and the Arts, Thursday 25 - Tuesday 30 August 2005, in venues around the Border Marches area where Wales meets England, and centred on St Andrew's Church, Presteigne in Powys, joins the centenary celebrations for English composers Michael Tippett and Alan Rawsthorne. The festival takes the opportunity this year to focus on British music, including that of its 2005 composer-in-residence, Belfast-born Ian Wilson, and specially-commissioned song cycles by David Matthews, John McCabe and Cecilia McDowall.

The programming, by artistic director George Vass, also includes music from further afield, including works by C P E and J S Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Handel, György Ligeti, Messiaen, Mozart, Ravel, Schubert and Richard Strauss, and there are also conversations with featured composers, talks, poetry, literature, children's events, a Festival Eucharist in St Andrew's Church sung by the Canterbury Chamber Choir, and even an organised ramble in those familiar foothills, following in the steps of Lord Byron and Florence Nightingale.

IAN WILSON

THE PRESTEIGNE FESTIVAL

A REVIEW OF THE 2004 PRESTEIGNE FESTIVAL

A REVIEW OF THE 2003 PRESTEIGNE FESTIVAL

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