Press Release

11 December 2013

Strike gold this Winter with a new season that explores American roots and Americana at the Howard Assembly Room

The rich landscape of US folk, blues, bluegrass and gospel comes to the Howard Assembly Room this Winter, as film, music and performance combine at the most intimate and captivating performance venue in Leeds.

The ‘American Routes’ season takes flight from a new Opera North production ofPuccini’s The Girl of the Golden West, set during the American Gold Rush of 1849 (Leeds Grand Theatre and touring, from 17 January).

First stop on the trail is the music that became the sound of Hollywood Westerns. Go West! is a whistlestop tour, driving across country from Copland’s Appalachian Spring to film music from Westerns including Tiomkin’s High Noon and Bernstein’s Magnificent Seven Suite, performed by the Orchestra of Opera North (10 January).

Continuing the Stateside journey, multi-instrumentalist Frank Fairfield performs old time American folk on banjo, fiddle and guitar, with songs ranging from soaring hillbilly refrains to melancholy murder ballads (11 January). Electrifying jazz vocalistRené Marie’s powerful yet smooth vocals promise to dazzle in a night of love songs to America (23 April), while the fearless Sam Amidonbrings classic folk songs and country ballads, and even original reworkings of pop hits to the stage (11 April).

Bill Frisell, a prolific composer and guitarist, is firmly established as a visionary presence in American music. He performs with his trio (5 April), ahead of a screening of The Great Flood (12 April), his 2011 collaboration with filmmaker Bill Morrison. A collection of silent images matched to a searing original soundtrack, the film is a powerful portrait of a seminal moment in American history, when the Mississippi river broke its banks in 1927. Displacing rural sharecroppers to the cities of northern America, the great flood’s musical

legacy saw the Delta Blues electrified and transformed into Chicago Blues, Rhythm and Blues, and Soul.

Further film screenings continue tracing the channels of ‘American Routes,’ including a rare opportunity to see His People, set in Lower East Side New York with a live improvised soundtrack from violinist Sophie Solomon and her band (8 February), first seen at the Barbican in 2013. Sunrise - A Song of Two Humans brings together FW Murnau’s 1927 masterpiece of silent film, Sunrise, with a new Opera North Projects commissioned live score by pianist Joanna MacGregor and jazz saxophonist Andy Sheppard (26 April). Finally the 1954 film Johnny Guitar sees one of the most ambitious and theatrical westerns ever made hit the big screen (1 February).

‘American Routes’ continues into June later in 2014, with a brand new FILMusic commission from Portland-based musician Grouper (Liz Harris)and filmmaker Paul Clipson. HYPNOSIS DISPLAY, a meditation on contemporary America in sound and image, will premiere at the Howard Assembly Room on 5 June.

Two other brand new Opera North Projects commissions grace the Howard Assembly Room for Winter 2014. Hy Brasil is a mythic island which reveals itself to human ears in a new sound installation specially commissioned from sound artist Chris Watson. Best known as the sound recordist for BBC programmes including the award-winning Frozen Planet, Chris Watson was also a founding member of experimental music group Cabaret Voltaire. Hy Brasil is composed of compelling wildlife sounds, drawing visitors deep into an immersive, strange and magical world (28 February – 15 March).

New double bill The Commission and Café Kafka, is an adventurous juxtaposition of two brand new short operas directed by Annabel Arden. Commissioned by Aldeburgh Music, Opera North and the Royal Opera House, this project showcases the work of a new generation of opera composers and librettists. The Commission, by Elspeth Brooke (music) and Jack Underwood (words) explores the inner world of an artist contemplating murder, while Café Kafka, by Francisco Coll (music) and Meredith Oakes (words) interweaves Kafka’s darkly surreal short stories (22 March).

Classical music in the Howard Assembly Room’s Winter programme also includes The Prince Consort presenting Schubert in song(24 January),Fretwork with Elizabeth Kenny and Ian Bostridge performing music by Tudor composer John Dowland (30 January), and The Hilliard Ensemble, who stop by on their farewell tour (28 March). Finally, New Babylon, a 1929 masterpiece of avant-garde Soviet cinema, scored by Shostakovich, is screened with live accompaniment by the Orchestra of Opera North (29 March).

More highlights of Winter 2014 at the Howard Assembly Room:

·  Cult band Penguin Café bring their unique sound and energy, influenced by folk, bluegrass, pop and avant-garde classical (22 February)

·  American a cappella group Naturally 7 follow their 2013 late night Proms performance with an intimate and joyous evening at the Howard Assembly Room, reworking great gospel songs in inimitable style (18 March)

·  Grammy nominee Bassekou Kouyate and his band Ngoni Baperform electrifying desert blues from their latest album Jama Ko, recorded during the 2012 coup in Mali (19 March)

·  Double Man Booker Prize winner Hilary Mantel (Wolf Hall, Bring up the Bodies) gives a specially commissioned talk investigating the history of the human relationship with the devil (7 April)

·  Monday’s Child, a fun family play by Brendan Murray is for the child in us all. With live music and dance, this imaginative, dream-like story explores how we learn, grow old and cope with new challenges (24 May)

Tickets available for all shows from the box office on 0844 848 2727 or www.howardassemblyroom.co.uk

For further information, images or artist interviews please contact:

Molly Fetherston, Communications Assistant, 0113 223 3590

Rebekah Wadham, Press Officer, 0113 223 3528

Julia Gregg, Interim PR Manager, 0113 223 3526

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