Time Machine is the racy title of Sinfonia Cymru’s latest concert series, a collaboration with the brilliant and versatile guitarist Sean Shibe, assembled by him and putting the electric guitar centre stage. This substantial programme embraced both American and British scores whose fabric involves technology, whether specifically making the connection with audio or film or simply engaging with styles where pulse and rhythm condition thrusting propulsion.
Within the sequence were deliberate progressions from smaller, gentler works to more dynamically sweeping affairs for the full ensemble of 15 players. Of the former, guitarist-composer Laura Snowden’s Into the Light, ostensibly about bird migration was quietly engaging, with Freya Waley-Cohen’s Amulet for solo classical guitar later invoking a graceful calm. Julia Wolfe’s Reeling, using the time-weathered voice of a French-Canadian folk singer as its starting-point, had a wholly infectious spirit, while, in Pamela Z’s zany Ethel Dreams of Temporal Disturbances, fitful slumber suggested by string quartet is interrupted by audio-tape interpolations of random television snippets.
Judd Greenstein’s Change was conceived to accompany Joshua Frankel’s mixed-media film in which a quintet playing out and about in New York is incorporated into animated footage, with fantasy meeting Nasa footage, the notion of machines and propulsion given a surreal element. The moments when Shibe and the excellent Sinfonia Cymru’s live rendering coincided with those on screen had a not-quite-exact synchrony which was plain fun.
David John Roche’s arrangement of a short suite of Philip Glass’s music for The Truman Show showed his sensibilities, but his new concerto for electric guitar, Chorus in Alto, written for Sean Shibe and jointly commissioned by the Britten Sinfonia, was the main focus. Roche unselfconsciously indulged his own background to include metal and rock with a more classical approach, while at the same time indulging Shibe’s remarkable virtuosity. One of two cadenzas was for classical guitar, offering an expressive interlude but the final movement’s play on the exchanges between ensemble and soloist – where rhythmic patterns always defied expectation - made for a vibrantly energetic conclusion.
The poise of Shibe’s Mompou encore set the seal on a fascinating evening. And, yes, this is one electric performer.
• Broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 9 April and then on BBC Sounds.
