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Welcome to robertfokkens.co.uk, home page of composer Robert FokkensThank you for visting robertfokkens.co.uk Please check the Diary for upcoming events. Select a year from the pull-down menu and click ’Go’ for a full listing of past and up-coming events. NEWSMAY 2009: The Louise T Blouin Foundation Concert SeriesPianist Andrew Matthews-Owen has devised and curated a fascinating series of concerts for the Louise T Blouin Foundation art gallery in Holland Park. Following an extraordinary opening recital by percussionist Joby Burgess in April and a fascinating music and video collaboration called Broken Voices on 7 May, Andrew teams up with soprano Claire Booth for a recital of contemporary song co-promoted with Sounds Underground on Wednesday 10 June. The recital includes the London premiere of Robert’s Africa, a setting of French-African poet David Diop’s visionary poem. For further information about the series, please visit www.ltbfoundation.org/foundation/events.htm APRIL 2009: The Times has been very nice recently...In January, The Times said of Clariphonics’ Purcell Room performance of Robert’s clarinet quartet Best of all was the world premiere of Glimpses of a half-forgotten future... More recently, in a glowing review of juice’s Wigmore Hall debut recital, their reviewer said ...I loved Robert Fokkens’s ’Words’... For the full comments on my pieces and other press about my music, please click on the Media button above. If necessary, select Reviews from the menu and click Go. APRIL 2009: A Curious Adventure featured on TV and radioRobert’s educational project with Combe Down and Newbridge primary schools in Bath - an oratorio written collaboratively with the pupils and performed by 300 children at the Bath Pavilion on 30 April - was featured on BBC Points West (regional TV news), BBC Bristol (regional radio) and in local newspapers on the day of the performance. The show itself, conducted by Robert, was a huge success, with the magnificent efforts of the young performers rewarded by a standing ovation from a capacity crowd.
MARCH 2009: An eventful morning... selected for ISCM World New Music DaysRobert’s concerto for violin and chamber orchestra An Eventful Morning Near East London has been selected for performance at the ISCM World New Music Days in Sweden. After a national call for submissions, the piece was selected to represent South Africa alongside a number of other works. The WNMD takes place in three cities in Sweden (Visby, Vaxjo and Goteborg/Vastra Goteland) this year between 24 September and 4 October. FEBRUARY 2009: The Wigmore gets juice-yWatch out for funky vocal trio juice’s Wigmore Hall debut on 6 April. Performing for the Park Lane’s Groups Monday Platform series, juice’s set includes a performance of Robert’s Words alongside a premiere by Gabriel Prokofiev and other contemporary pieces. JANUARY 2009: Flights into DarknessThe end of March sees the premiere of Flights into Darkness, a contemporary melodrama created collaboratively with actor Tom Frankland and pianist Jakob Fichert. The piece brings together texts from two disturbing fin-de-siécle novellas - Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Grey and Arthur Schnitzler’s Flight into Darkness. This will be heard at both The Warehouse in London (24 March) and the Jacqueline du Pré Hall in Oxford (27 March). Please see the diary pages for further details. JANUARY 2009: Africa premieredA song recital by Claire Booth (soprano) and Andrew Matthews-Owen (piano) for the BMIC Cutting Edge Tour on 30 January saw the world premiere of Robert’s song Africa, which sets a text by French-African poet David Diop. Hosted by Bromsgrove Concerts, the recital took place in the excellent acoustic of Bromsgrove’s Artrix arts venue. The Birmingham Post described the piece as a fascinating depiction of post-war liberation struggles...This began with the charm of a mesmerising rocking rhythm leading to angst and passion. The Cutting Edge Tour includes two more concerts by this duo - on 3 March at Cardiff University, and on 11 March at Cheltenham Town Hall for the Cheltenham Contemporary Concerts series. Please see the diary pages for more details of these concerts. More information about The Cutting Edge Tour can be found at www.bmic.co.uk JANUARY 2009: Clariphonics at the Purcell RoomAs part of their excellent recital for the Park Lane Group New Year Series 2009, clarinet quartet Clariphonics performed the world premiere of the piece commissioned from Robert, Glimpses of a Half-Forgotten Future. Both the recital and the piece received favourable reviews, with The Times having this to say: Best of all was the world premiere of Glimpses of a half-forgotten future by the South African composer Robert Fokkens: sad, strange and scarcely five minutes’ worth of unquiet fragments that expressed more than anything else they had played. DECEMBER 2008: A new choral piece publishedFor the January/February 2009 edition, Choir and Organ magazine commissioned Robert to write a motet for their regular New Music feature. The motet, Ave verum corpus, is for SSAATTBB and can be reproduced and used for free for 6 months. To view the score as a PDF and to read about the piece, please visit www.rhinegold.co.uk/magazines/choir_and_organ/features_and_reviews/choir_organ_new_music.asp DECEMBER 2008: We finally get to Langa...After a last-minute technical glitch prevented the first performance of Robert’s Cycling to Langa at rarescale’s 5th birthday concert in September, Carla Rees (alto and bass flutes) and Michael Oliva (electronics) of rarescale premiered the piece on 13 December 2008 at St Leonard’s, Shoreditch. DECEMBER 2008: Sounds Underground appointmentRobert has been appointed Artistic Director of independent new music organisation Sounds Underground. Please visit www.soundsunderground.org/index.html for more information about Sounds Underground. OCTOBER 2008: Strings and sticks and...Sounds Underground, an independent organisation devoted to the promotion of new music in the UK, presented a concert on 24 October at the remarkable Bishopsgate Institute in which Tom Hankey (violin) and Oliver Coates (cello) presented the UK premiere of the complete version of Robert’s Tracing Lines. The concert, entitled strings and sticks and... included some remarkable music by Larry Goves, Anna Meredith, Matt Rogers and others. SEPTEMBER 2008: Back in the UKRobert recently returned from South Africa, where he presented lectures and worked with young composers at UNISA (Pretoria), the University of Stellenbosch, the University of Cape Town, the University of Pretoria, and North West University (Potchefstroom), and gave a paper at the annual conference of South Africa’s musicological society SASRIM at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University in Port Elizabeth. During his visit he was also a faculty member for New Music South Africa’s annual New Music Indaba, held at UNISA and the University of the Witwatersrand between 1-7 September. For the Indaba, he ran composer workshops for emerging composers from South Africa and Nigeria with London-based ensemble The Chamber Music Company led by pianist Mark Troop. Along with the premiere of a short piece in response to Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time given by The Chamber Music Company, he was also privileged to hear Julie-Anne Derome (violin) and Gabriel Prynn (cello) of Canadian piano trio Trio Fibonacci give the premiere of the full version of Tracing Lines. At New Music South Africa’s AGM, held at the New Music Indaba, Robert was also honoured to be voted vice-president of NMSA. For more information about New Music South Africa, please visit www.newmusicsa.org.za/index.html MAY 2008: sheepdip in HoxtonMarvellous vocal trio juice will be performing sheepdip as part of their set for Nonclassical at the Macbeth pub in Hoxton on Wednesday 4 June. It should be a great night, with other acts including Laura Moody (amazing singer/cellist), Three and Easy Trio, and Richard Lannoy. MAY 2008: Tracing Lines to AustraliaThe excellent chamber ensemble The Fibonacci Sequence will perform Robert’s Tracing Lines for alto flute and cello at the Australian Chamber Music Festival in Townsville, Australia in July. The ACMF, an international chamber music festival held annually in July, features distinguished artists from around the world invited by the artistic director, Piers Lane. See www.afcm.com.au/ for further details. April 2008: Messiaen mutteringsRobert will give a short introduction to Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time at a recital of Messiaen’s chamber music at St John’s, Notting Hill. This should be an excellent concert, with some of London’s finest young players playing some of the best of Messiaen’s earlier work. Thursday 8th May at 7:30pm Chamber Music of Olivier Messiaen Organ Pieces St John’s, Notting Hill, Lansdowne Crescent, W11 2NN (Holland Park, nearest Underground) Tickets £10/£8 (conc) at the door. April 2008: Clockwise tour of South AfricaRobert’s new work for violin and harp approach, encounter will be performed by Clockwise - acclaimed South African musicians Jacqueline Kerrod (harp) and Marc Uys (violin) - in a tour around South Africa during June-July 2008. This enterprising duo will tour various programmes, including premieres and repeat performances of commissions written for the tour by 11 of South Africa’s finest composers. April 2008: 48 hours of contemporary music in the UkraineDuo Retorica - outstanding young British violinists Phillipa Mo and Harriet Mackenzie - perform my latest premiere yet in Odessa’s Two Days and Two Nights of New Music Festival. This remarkable Festival presents a programme of new music from 4pm to 4am two days running (18-20 April), leaving audiences exhausted but, hopefully, elated… Retorica go on at 12am on 20 April, performing a colour-themed set of duos written for them by various composers. April 2008: A visit (NOT a safari…) to South AfricaIn August 2008, Robert will return to South Africa to give presentations and classes at, amongst others, UNISA (Pretoria), the University of Stellenbosch and North West University (Potchefstroom). He will also be involved in the annual New Music Indaba to be held in Pretoria in early September, and will be present at a number of performances of his music. Full details will be available on the Diary page soon. March 2008: SAMRO awards commission for Belgian premiereSAMRO’s Endowment for the National Arts has recently awarded a commission for Robert’s collaboration with Belgian-based violin and piano duo Christy Collett and Sté phane de May. This will be premiered at De Rode Pomp in Ghent, Belgium on 19 September 2008. Full details on the Diary page. March 2008: rarescale celebrates its 5th birthdayPioneering flute-based ensemble rarescale celebrates its 5th anniversary on 13 September with a concert including world premieres by three of their most regular collaborators, one of which is a newly-commissioned work for alto and bass flutes with electronics by Robert. March 2008: Africa premiereLeading British soprano Claire Booth and her regular recital partner Andrew Matthews-Owen will perform the world premiere of Robert’s new setting of Davip Diop’s visionary poem Africa (commissioned by the SAMRO Endowment for the National Arts) as part of the Cutting Edge tour 2008. This concert takes place on 28 October 2008, and includes premieres of pieces by Arlene Sierra and Phil Cashian. January 2008: Histrionics at the Purcell RoomFunky vocal trio juice received rave reviews for their Park Lane Group concert at the Purcell Room in January. In addition to performing Robert’s Words as part of their programme, juice invited Robert to narrate a selection from Roger Marsh’s Pierrot Lunaire, leading Richard Morrison of The Times to observe that “they displayed their theatre skills in six surreal melodramas from Roger Marsh’s Pierrot Lunaire - with another composer, Robert Fokkens, matching them histrionic for histrionic as a highly-wrought narrator…” See the full review on the Reviews page of the site. juice repeats this programme with Robert at the Deal Festival on 10 July 2008 - see the Diary page for full details. July 2007: Dr Robert, I presume…Robert completed his PhD studies with Michael Finnissy at the University of Southampton in early 2007, graduating officially in July. His examiners, Christopher Fox and Michael Zev Gordon, described the portfolio as “an impressive submission…(it) reveals a composer with a distinctive compositional voice…”
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