LUCIAN BAN & MAT MANERI
TRANSYLVANIAN DANCE
More than a decade and a half since they started working together, Romanian pianist Lucian Ban and American violist Mat Maneri are renowned for their amalgamations of Transylvanian folk with improvisation, their mining of 20th Century European classical music with jazz, and for their pursuit of a modern chamber jazz ideal.
Drawing from their NPR Album Of the Year Transylvanian Folk Songs featuring legendary reeds-man John Surman and their new ECM duo release Transylvanian Dance, Ban and Maneri reimagine through improvisation the Béla Bartók Field Recordings of folk songs from Transylvania to bring back to life century old songs using live performance, audio from the original Edison wax cylinder recordings, rare handwritten manuscripts and photographs taken by Bartók himself in his field trips.
The 20th century Hungarian composer Béla Bartok loved the folk music of Transylvania in western Romania. He famously experienced an epiphany in 1904 when he heard an 18-year-old woman singing songs from her Transylvanian village and was soon on the road in search of more music. Between 1909 - 1917 he transcribed thousands of melodies, recording hundreds of folk musicians on wax cylinders and would call the completion of his research into Transylvanian folk music, as “my life’s goal”. The profound knowledge and beauty of these ancient folk songs will also change forever his compositional vision.
A century later, two outstanding improvisers – violist Mat Maneri and pianist Lucian Ban – draw fresh inspiration from the music that fired Bartók’s imagination, looking again at carols, lamentations, love songs, dowry songs and more through their unique duo sound and improvisatory concept.
“A lovely and restive new album on ECM – recorded in Mr. Ban’s native land – that reveals their shared interest in enfolding mystery” – The New York Times
“It has its own kind of melancholy, beauty, and plenty of wayward exuberance, too” – The Guardian
“Lucian Ban & Mat Maneri wrung out not only the great seriousness of this music but also its wit and joy” – London Jazz News
“Mesmerizing, evocative and sensually explicit. Listening may stir within you that which you can no longer suppress” – L.A. Times
“A gorgeously melodic and moody collaboration” – Baltimore City Paper
BRÌGHDE CHAIMBEUL
Brìghde Chaimbeul (photo by Jelmer de Haas) is a leading purveyor of celtic experimentalism and a master of the Scottish smallpipes – the bellows-blown, mellower and more emotive cousin to the famous Highland bagpipes – and she’s taken them to the global stage. A native Gaelic speaker from the Isle of Skye, Brìghde roots her music in her language and culture.
She rose to prominence as a prodigy of traditional music, but has since begun a journey to take the smallpipes into uncharted territory. She has devised a completely unique way of arranging for pipe music that emphasises the rich textural drones of the instrument; the constancy of sound that creates a trance-like atmosphere, played with enticing virtuosic liquidity.
She draws inspiration from the world of interconnected piping traditions, and her most recent album brings in influence from ambient, avant garde and electronic music. One can talk about Brìghde’s awards (BBC Young Folk Award; BBC Horizons Award; SAY Award nominee) and her wide array of collaborators (Caroline Polachek; Colin Stetson; Gruff Rhys; Aidan O'Rourke...) but after it all, her music speaks for itself.
Haunting, entrancing, breathtaking, beautiful – this open-eared, understatedly virtuosic performer is transforming and creating new definitions for Scottish folk in the 21st century.
"exciting, unique and gorgeous"
Songlines Magazine *****
"unforgettable deep atmosphere"
The Guardian ****
"unique, exciting and forward-looking"
The Quietus
"mesmerising"
Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2
We are most grateful to Canada Council for the Arts & the Department of Canadian Heritage for making this special series event possible.
Advance tickets $28 via Eventbrite or $35 at door
Lucian Ban / Mat Maneri photo by Claire Stefani
Brìghde Chaimbeul photo by Vladislav Steinbauer
Lucian Ban & Mat Maneri ECM album cover Transylvanian Dance
Lucian Ban & Mat Maneri photo by Mircea Albutiu
Brìghde Chaimbeul photo by Steve Bliss