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ARTISTS

Melinda Maxwell, oboe

Melinda Maxwell read music at York University and studied in Germany with Ingo Goritzki and Helmut Winschermann. She has performed as soloist at many major UK and European festivals, and is frequently heard in recital and on BBC Radio 3. Numerous works have been written especially for Melinda, by composers including Nicholas Maw, Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Simon Holt. Melinda is also an accomplished composer herself.

In addition to her work as a recitalist, Melinda is principal oboe of the Endymion Ensemble and BCMG, and performs regularly as principal with the London Sinfonietta.

She has taught at the Royal Academy of Music and Trinity College in London and has been giving master-classes at the Dartington International Summer School since 1992. She also coaches at the Britten-Pears and NYO summer courses, and is Consultant in Woodwind Studies at RNCM in Manchester.

Her numerous recordings include Melinda Maxwell in Manchester: Music for Oboe from the RNCM, Birtwistle's 26 Orpheus Elegies and Pulse Sampler for NMC.

Website: http://www.endymion.org.uk/Melinda_Maxwell.html
Richard Benjafield, percussion
Richard Benjafield has led a distinguished career performing in contemnporary classical music, both as soloist and ensemble musician. He studied at the RNCM (with Ian Wright and Graham Johns), University of Ghana (with Afadina Tsikpa and Bernard Woma) and Tanglewood Music Centre (with John Wyre and Frank Epstein). Early in his career he performed in ensembles led by Jane Manning, James Wood and John Woolrich. Since then he has performed as principal percussionist with Nash Ensemble, BCMG, London Sinfonietta, Composers' Ensemble, Endymion, Lontano and Almeida Opera.
For ten years Richard led Ensemble Bash, the first percussion quartet to establish a career in Britain. As well as commissioning and continually performing a new repertoire of over forty pieces, many now established as standard repertoire, the group performed twice at the BBC Proms, at the 1997 handover ceremony in Hong Kong, and at major festival and concert halls in Europe, Africa and Australia. Ensemble Bash were also artists-in-residence for Chance for Children.
Richard's recent projects have included Carnyx & Co with John Kenny and Sarah Leonard, Morton Feldman's four-hour trio For Philp Guston at the Royal Academy of Art, an a UK tour with thethreestrangeangels of Steve Reich's Sextet and music by Peter Garland. Richard was both soloist and conductor in an acclaimed performance by Guildhall Percussion Group at the BBC's John Cage festivalUnCaged at the Barbican.
Richard's solo work has included collaboration with Jurgen Simpson (sound diffusion) and Simon Doyle (video artists) in Dublin, and a solo improvised concert to live graphic projections at Kettle's Yard, Cambridge. He has performed the solo works of Cage and Feldman in Berlin and Vienna, Xenakis with the Richard Alston Dance Company, Vinko Globokar's ?Corporel? at the Aldeburgh Festival, and created inna-groove dimensions with drum 'n bass artist Marque Gilmore at London's National Portrait Gallery for the PRS. He has also collaborated on projects with Graham Fellows (aka John Shuttleworth), Django Bates, Joanna MacGregor and Orphy Robinson.
Richard has been Professor of Percussion and Director of Percussion Ensemble at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama since 1995.
 
Website: http://www.gsmd.ac.uk/music/people/senior_staff/department_of_wind_brass_and_per...
Jan Gruithuyzen, Piano

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Tracks

Disc 1
1
9'
21"
2
13'
25"
3
10'
06"
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COMPOSERS

Harrison BIRTWISTLE
Melinda MAXWELL
Simon HOLT

DESCRIPTION

The renowned oboist is heard in this sequence: from the dignified simplicity of her own Elegy, to the rhythmic economy of Birtwistle's Pulse Sampler and the eerie keening of Holt's Banshee.
 

REVIEWS

"Melinda Maxwell displaying that phenomenal range of colour and superfine technical control which inspired these composers to write to for her in the first place. This well-conceived and excellently recorded programme is an attractive introduction to much that is most appealing in contemporary British music."
Gramophone 1997

RECORDING CREDITS

Recording date: 29-30 May 1996

Recording venue: Chapel Studio Tilburg

Engineer: Bert Kraaijpel
Producer: Maarten Hartveldt 
Editing & mastering: Maarten Hartveldt 

Cover image: Francois Hall

(P) 1997 NMC Recordings Ltd

Catalogue number:
NMC D042S
Release Date:
1 May 1997