Dragon Voices: The Giant Celtic Horns of Ancient Europe John Kenny
Album Info
Album Veröffentlichung:
2016
HRA-Veröffentlichung:
22.09.2016
Das Album enthält Albumcover Booklet (PDF)
- 1 Liadain and Cuirithir [Loughnashade and Deskford duo] 03:00
- 2 Dance of Herne [Loughnashade duo] 02:20
- 3 Forest Camp [Loughnashade and Tintignac duo] 03:01
- 4 The Hunt [Loughnashade solo] 01:07
- 5 After the Hunt [Loughnashade trio] 06:42
- 6 Calanais [Deskford trio, with skylark and waves] 02:26
- 7 The Shaman [Tintignac solo] 01:56
- 8 Ships in the Night [Tintignac solo with crotales] 03:11
- 9 Shaman 2 [Conch solo] 03:19
- 10 Cu´ Chulainn [Tintignac solo] 02:21
- 11 Ocean Stone [Deskford solo] 06:58
- 12 Invocation [Loughnashade solo] 02:48
- 13 Shaman 3 [Shamanic drum] 01:22
- 14 Gaels and Gauls [Tintignac duo, Loughnashade duo, Shamanic drum] 02:20
- 15 Dragon Voices [Tintignac quintet with crotales] 03:35
- 16 Tintignac Lament [Tintignac solo] 03:47
- 17 Danse sacrale [Loughnashade solo] 02:08
- 18 Cailleachan [Deskford solo with seed and pod shakers] 03:30
- 19 Cave of Shells [Conch quartet] 02:12
- 20 Mo´r-ri´oghain [Loughnashade trio with solo Deskford] 03:13
- 21 Loughnashade Lament [Loughnashade solo] 05:17
Info zu Dragon Voices: The Giant Celtic Horns of Ancient Europe
People of Celtic culture all over ancient Europe were fascinated by lip reed instruments, and made great horns and trumpets in many forms - including the carnyx, a two-metre-long bronze trumpet surmounted by a stylised animal head. One of these was found at Deskford, Scotland, in 1816 and reconstructed in the early 1990s; it is joined here by the magnificent Tintignac carnyx, discovered in southern France in 2004 and reconstructed specially for the current project. A new reconstruction has also been made of the Loughnashade horn from Ireland, with its exquisite decorated bell disc.
Recent developments in music archaeology have vastly increased our knowledge and understanding of both the physical construction of these instruments and their likely playing techniques. John Kenny has specialised in their performance for a quarter of a century, and his newly created music explores the voices of these instruments in solo, duo and ensemble textures, drawing upon Celtic mythical characters, echoes of ancient ritual in modern society, and impressions of real places in Ireland, Scotland and France.
'The project, half funded by the European Union, with the rest coming from an assortment of institutions and state agencies, covers the Paleolithic Era to around A.D. 1000 and the Dark Ages. Calling on the skills of archaeologists, philologists, acousticians, metal workers and others, it has brought back to life instruments ranging from ancient bagpipes to 30,000-year-old vulture- bone flutes...
'Mr. Kenny, influenced by that striking head, initially played the carnyx as a war instrument. But he soon realized it 'was just like a human.'
'If you shout all the time, you lose your voice,' he said. 'So I decided to explore its other voices. And the minute I did, I realized it could produce the most enormous amount of colors - far more than a trumpet or trombone.' That range is evident on his album for Delphian, due out in September, a record that at some points sounds like a dragon awakening, at others like avant-garde jazz.' (Alex Marshall, New York Times)
John Kenny, various brass instruments
John Kenny
Trombonist and composer John Kenny is internationally acclaimed for his interpretation of contemporary music, having performed and broadcast in over 50 nations to date. He also works extensively with improvisation and early music and is particularly active in collaboration with dance and theatre. In 1983 he began his long collaboration with playwright Paul Stebbings and the TNT Theatre Company performing, composing and directing music for productions which continue to tour worldwide including Cabaret Faust, Tempest Now, The Wizard of Jazz, Moby Dick, Moon Palace, The Taming of The Shrew, Romeo and Juliet, The Mystery of Edgar Allan Poe, The Ghost of Illiam Dhone, The Wave, The life and death of Martin Luther King and The Merchant of Venice. He has also received commissions from London Contemporary Dance Theatre, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the International Trombone Association, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Edinburgh Contemporary Arts Trust, Chamber Group of Scotland, Dance Umbrella, St Magnus Festival, BBC Proms in The Park, American Drama Group Europe, The New Haven International Festival of Arts and Ideas (USA) the Festival d’ Angers, (France), Vokal Nord (Norway), CCMIX Institut (France), the Swedish Arts Council, Spanish Brass and the city of Wroclaw (Poland).
John is a professor at both the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London and The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. He has lectured and performed at many of the world’s leading institutions, including Juilliard, Manhattan, Peabody and Eastman colleges in the USA, and the conservatoires of Paris, Angers, Angouleme, Bordeaux, Perpignan, Den Haag, Wroclaw, Gdansk, Moscow, Helsinki, Tromso, Munich, Berlin, Cologne, Stuttgart, Hannover, Sofia, Athens, Madrid, Seville, Porto, Tokyo and Beijing.
Since the early 1990’s he has also become increasingly involved with musical archaeology. In 1993 he became the first person for 2000 years to play the great Celtic war horn known as the carnyx. He now lectures and performs on the carnyx internationally in the concert hall and on radio, television and film. In March 2003 he performed his composition “The Voice of The Carnyx” to an audience of 65,000 in the Stade De France, Paris. In 2009 he undertook a month long lecture recital tour of the USA which included the world premier of his composition “Wild Stone” for alto flute and carnyx, and released his seventh solo album, “Embracing the Unknown” for trombone with harp & string quartet.
John Kenny is a founder member of the European Music Archaeology Project (EMAP) with whom he has worked to bring to fruition the reconstruction of many lip reed instruments of antiquity, including the magnificent Tintignac Carnyx, recently discovered in the Correze region of France, and the Etruscan litus and cornu.
Booklet für Dragon Voices: The Giant Celtic Horns of Ancient Europe