Carpe Vitam

Carpe Vitam is a live music and visuals performance currently touring the UK that documents women making their own way in the world, including footage from 100 years ago, women working during WW1, the struggle for women’s rights to work and votes for women, through to present day.  

Music by Laura Rossi

Film & live visuals by Romana Bellinger & Mike Eden

DerbyshOramiCoda composed and performed by Henry Dagg  

Performed by:

Jemma van der Byl Faversham Choir

Conductor – Ben Saul    

Violin – Sophie Langdon    

Cello – Miriam Lowbury    

Electric Guitar – Mike Outram    

Piano – Laura Rossi    

Electronics – Henry Dagg  

Vibrant imagery, live camera work, electronics and acoustic instruments are joined by the voices of the Jemma van der Byl Faversham Choir.   Carpe Vitam goes on a journey documenting women making their own way in the world, including footage from 100 years ago, women working during WW1, the struggle for women’s rights to work and votes for women, through to present day, with video/projection art created from new and archive footage of great female role models. The text for Carpe Vitam, with music composed by Laura Rossi, is from quotes and poems from inspirational women (which are sung by the choir and spoken). Multi-instrumentalist and sound sculptor, Henry Dagg has composed, created and will perform the last 10 minutes of the work – the ‘DerbyshOramiCoda’, which segues in from Rossi’s composition and is inspired by electronic music pioneers Delia Derbyshire and Daphne Oram.   

The Performers: 

Laura Rossi is a composer for Film, TV & Concert Works. Credits include London to Brighton, Song for Marion, Silent Shakespeare, The Cottage and Hurricane. In 2016/17 Laura was artistic director for Somme100 FILM, a project coordinating 100 live orchestral performances of her score for the 1916 film, The Battle of the Somme. The project was attended by an audience of over 37,000 people, involved over 4,200 musicians, and was televised live on BBC1 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Concert works include Voices of Remembrance, a choral/ orchestral work featuring poems read by Ralph Fiennes and Vanessa Redgrave performed multiple times to critical acclaim, including with Chetham’s at Jersey Opera house & Manchester Cathedral. Her music has been performed by the Philharmonia, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, London Contemporary Orchestra and BBC Concert Orchestra, at the Barbican, Royal Festival Hall and Queen Elizabeth Hall, London. Laura is lecturer for film music at the London Film Academy and regularly gives masterclasses about film composition. www.laurarossi.com 

Henry Dagg is composer, multi-instrumentalist and creator of sound-sculptures. He joined the BBC with the aim of creating special music for radio and television, and after a short attachment to the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in 1983, was commissioned to compose music for numerous programmes, often using advanced tape manipulation techniques. A BBC TV documentary was made about his work as a composer and performer in 1989. His commissions for sound sculpture include a suite of musical gates and railings given a premiere performance by Dame Evelyn Glennie, O.B.E. which featured on ‘Richard & Judy’, and a stainless steel automatic harp known as ‘The Sharpsichord’, resulting in a collaboration and many live performances with Bjork for her project / album ‘Biophilia’. His most recent sound-sculpture is a 6-octave instrument incorporated into a suite of Gates and Railings at Rochester Independent College.   

Romana Bellinger and Mike Eden are the directors of RouteStock, which explores routes to uncover the roots of people, by collecting and sharing the lives of individuals using the medium of video, stills, sound, projection and live shows. They also create live projected visuals for musicians such as Michael Nyman and Max Richter, and for live performance at venues including Royal Festival Hall, The British Film Institute, and Tate Britain as well as churches, cathedrals, old cinemas, town halls and their own new venue ‘The Hot Tin’ in Faversham. They have also done extensive work on restoring silent film prints for digital projection including the London Coliseum with full orchestra and will be performing again at The Barbican in 2019. They have worked in broadcast video and live events in producing, directing, educational and technical roles for clients including BBC, Pepsi, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros. Pictures, Paramount, British Council, Imperial War Museum, Royal Opera House, Lost Lectures and Sadler’s Wells Theatre.  

Sophie Langdon is one of Britain’s leading violinists. She has appeared as soloist with many major orchestras: the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia, BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic and the Berlin Radio Orchestra. She broadcasts regularly for BBC Radio 3, has appeared at most of Britain’s music festivals, and is a familiar figure on London’s concert platforms. Her CD recordings include the Ethel Smyth Concerto for violin and horn on the Chandos label, and two volumes of Spohr violin and harp music with harpist Hugh Webb on the Naxos label – both of which were released to critical acclaim. Recognised as a violinist and musician of great versatility, Sophie is active in many different spheres: as chamber player, soloist and recitalist, orchestral leader and director, and teacher. Langdon is Professor of Violin at the Royal Academy of Music.   

Miriam Lowbury studied at Bristol University, the Royal Collage of Music, and the Royal Academy of Music with the Amadeus Quartet on a Leverhulme Scholarship. As a chamber player she has toured widely, played on radio and TV, and appeared with artists including Raphael Wallfisch, Jack Brymer, Michael Collins and Peter Donohoe. Her highly acclaimed recordings have been nominated for a Gramophone Award, and gained the top rating of five stars in the BBC Music magazine. Miriam is a member of Fourth Dimension String Quartet, Solarek Piano Trio, and Double Image. She has played as guest cellist in many chamber groups, and worked many orchestras, most recently BBC Concert Orchestra, ENO, LMP, CLS, Chroma, also for ballet, sessions and West End shows, frequently as principal cellist. Education work includes workshops in schools, universities and prisons, and teaching at the Junior Royal College of Music.   

Mike Outram is a guitarist & improviser. He has toured internationally and made music with Carleen Anderson, Tim Garland, Theo Travis, Steven Wilson, Nikki Iles, Steve Lawson, Gareth Lockrane, Martin Speake, Hadrien Feraud, Julian Siegel, and Laura Rossi. He is Guitar Professor at The Royal Academy, Trinity Laban & The Guildhall, London, and leads an online community of over 650 guitarists at ElectricCampfire.com 

This performance is part of a UK tour including the Women’s Work festival featured in 2018 at Stoller Hall, Manchester https://stollerhall.com/whats-on/carpe-vitam/    200 years ago, Clara Schumann was born in Vienna. 100 years later, some women won the right to vote in British elections. Yet in 2018, only one female composer featured in Classic FM’s 300-strong ‘Hall of Fame’. The Stoller Hall marks these auspicious anniversaries with a series of performances, commissions and conversation bringing women’s musical voices to the fore.   

From November 2018 through to International Women’s Day in March 2019 and beyond, Manchester’s superb new concert hall celebrates the vital role of women in music – as performers, teachers, learners, and especially as composers.  

£10 (+ booking fee)

Doors: 18:30

Performance: 19:30

Fully licensed bar until 11pm