Ed Hughes: Music for the South Downs New Music Players, Primrose Piano Quartet & Ed Hughes

• Ed Hughes (b. 1968): Flint:
• 1 Hughes: Flint: I. — 04:15
• 2 Hughes: Flint: II. — 04:13
• 3 Hughes: Flint: III. — 05:18
• Nonet:
• 4 Hughes: Nonet: I. Con moto 05:31
• 5 Hughes: Nonet: II. Tranquil 05:54
• 6 Hughes: Nonet: III. Flowing 05:49
• Lunar 1:
• 7 Hughes: Lunar 1 06:07
• Lunar 2:
• 8 Hughes: Lunar 2 08:43
• Chroma:
• 9 Hughes: Chroma 10:04
• The Woods so Wild:
• 10 Hughes: The Woods so Wild: I. — 05:31
• 11 Hughes: The Woods so Wild: II. — 02:29
• 12 Hughes: The Woods so Wild: III. — 04:38
• Total Runtime 01:08:32

Info for Ed Hughes: Music for the South Downs

Judith Weir, CBE, composer and, Master of the Queen’s Music, writes: “Ed Hughes’ refreshing, cultured, lovingly patterned music is built around a thoroughly contemporary theme; our present-day contemplation of landscape, and how we give it the attention and respect it deserves. Via music, the composer suggests, which works like the weather on a hilly walk in the South Downs. Our perceptions constantly change and re-energise as we encounter familiar objects while colours, shadings and vegetation are in a constant flow of development. The same can be certainly said of all the works in this rich collection, which surge forward with textural warmth and harmonic continuity.”

Ed Hughes’ music has been recognised for its outstanding craft and originality; operas, silent film, chamber, orchestral and piano works have been premiered around the world and recorded for Métier with commissions from Mahogany Opera Group, Brighton Festival, Glyndebourne, London Sinfonietta, I Faglioni and other leading ensembles.

The South Downs is a range of chalk hills extending about 260 square miles across the South East of England. Ed Hughes’s music has special qualities which, like the area that inspired it, have universal appeal.

Primrose Piano Quartet
New Music Players

The Primrose Piano Quartet
was formed in 2004 by pianist John Thwaites and three of the UK’s most renowned chamber musicians (Lindsay, Allegri, Edinburgh, Maggini Quartets). It is named after the great Scottish violist, William Primrose, who himself played in the Festival Piano Quartet. Their award-winning recordings feature works by Dunhill, Hurlstone, Quilter, Bax, Scott, Alwyn, Howells and Bridge. Sir Peter Maxwell Davies wrote his Piano Quartet for the Primrose in 2008, which was recorded in 2009 for the Meridian label. Annually they tour UK and internationally, including Denmark, Bulgaria, Romania, Portugal and Germany. 2018 saw the première of a new piano quartet written for the Primrose by the leading British composer Anthony Payne at London’s Kings Place, with a new CD of Elgar, Payne and Bowen released later that year. In 2019 the Quartet released the complete Brahms piano quartets, the culmination of years of research, and recorded in the historic Ehrbar Saal, Vienna (where Brahms himself frequently performed), using three different pianos of the period from the famous Gert Hechner collection. The result has been hailed by critics as “revelatory”. The Quartet’s own festival is in the Hampshire Village of West Meon, and they are ensemble-in-residence at the Battle Festival.

New Music Players
was founded by Ed Hughes in 1990. Early projects included commissions from Michael Finnissy and Howard Skempton, and the first UK performance of John Cage’s Europera 5. The ensemble appeared at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the Brighton Festival, ICA, Purcell Room and in many other festivals and venues during the 1990s. In the 2000s NMP held residencies at York, Bristol and Nottingham Universities and broadcast regularly on BBC Radio 3.

The ensemble features some of the UK’s finest musicians, and draws inspiration from the range and versatility of their collective experience. Core players are also members of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Royal Opera House, Manchester Camerata, the English Chamber Orchestra, Psappha, notes inégales and others extending to period instrument performance, jazz and improvisation. The ensemble developed major touring projects in 2005 and 2007, the latter funded by Arts Council England. These featured Ed Hughes’s scores for Eisenstein’s silent films “Battleship Potemkin” and “Strike”, which were taken to venues ranging from the Hove Engineerium to the Atrium of the British Library. In 2010 a concert for the Out Hear series at Kings Place explored music and photography with several film and musical premieres. New Music Players recorded five of its commissions (Ed Hughes, James Wood, Gordon McPherson, Rowland Sutherland, Rolf Hind) for the London Independent Records label in 2003. A CD of works by Japanese composer Jo Kondo appeared in 1996 on the Japanese ALM records label.

NMP recorded Ed Hughes’s scores for Eisenstein’s films “Battleship Potemkin” and “Strike” on a DVD box set released by Tartan Video in 2007. Ozu’s 1932 film “I was born but…” with a score by Ed Hughes was released by the BFI in a new recording by NMP in January 2011. Most recently their concert performance of Ed Hughe’s opera “When the Flame Dies” has been released on DVD and CD by Metier.

Booklet for Ed Hughes: Music for the South Downs