Omega Ensemble Will Perform HOWL in May

Omega Ensemble will present Howl, a three-city regional tour to Sydney, Oberon and Sutherland, featuring two Australian debuts, and the world premiere of a new work by award-winning French electro-acoustic composer, Daniel Wohl from Saturday 2nd to Wednesday 6th May.

In four extraordinary performances at ACO On The Pier (May 2nd at 2pm and 7pm), the Malachi Gilmore Hall, Oberon (May 3rd) and The Pavilion Performing Arts Centre, Sutherland (May 6th), Australia's most dynamic chamber group unites five leading contemporary classical voices, Missy Mazzoli, Anna Meredith, Pierre Jalbert, Danny Elfman, and Daniel Wohl, in a program of musical defiance and untamed brilliance.

Described as one of this generation's most “imaginative, skillful creators” (New York Times), award-winning Paris-born, LA-based composer Daniel Wohl blends electronics with acoustic instrumentation to often “surprising and provocative effect” (NPR). A prolific composer of immersive electronic pieces, music for film and television, and intimate chamber music, Wohl's works have been performed at Carnegie Hall, The Barbican Centre, The Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Broad Museum, and the Hollywood Bowl.

For this offering, Omega Ensemble presents the world premiere of Wohl's brand-new work for string quartet and electronics, fusing electronic and acoustic forces into a three-dimensional sound world.

On this new work, Daniel Wohl said, “Interference Pattern is written for string quartet and electronics, exploring the role of information and noise in contemporary life. In writing the piece, I was thinking about the constant stream of signals and interruptions that surrounds us, and how that flow can make it increasingly difficult to simply experience a moment as it is.”

Also featured are two highly anticipated Australian premieres by Scottish composer Anna Meredith and American Pierre Jalbert. Meredith's Tuggemo is a “part-string-quartet-part-rave" that thrums with electricity and passion, while Jalbert's Howl features a clarinet-led incantation of ritual and outburst.

The concert is bookended by two works from legends of the contemporary classical music scene, Danny Elfman and Missy Mazzoli. Best known as the musical mind behind Tim Burton's dark cinematic worlds, Elfman's mischievous Piano Quartet is a rare and revealing gem, written with the same sardonic humour and manic intensity that define his film scores. His quartet is presented alongside Mazzoli's folk-infused Tooth and Nail, a wild work for solo violin and live electronics mimicking the overtones of a jaw harp.

Omega Ensemble's Artistic Director David Rowden said, “Howl is music at full voltage - fearless, electrifying and alive. It brings together some of the most distinctive voices in contemporary music in a program that is visceral, immersive and impossible to ignore, where electronics and chamber music collide in unexpected ways.”