1 October 2024
Hong Kong, HKSAR

I have somehow – truly unsure how! – made it through September, surely one of the busiest months of my life. October will make a valiant effort for the title, however! I’m off on Thursday to Helsinki for the world premiere of Otherhood (2022), the thirty-minute song cycle commissioned by the Finnish Cultural Foundation on newly written (and absolutely gorgeous) poetry by Taneli Viljanen, performed by Martti Anttila, Iris Oja, and Anna Kuvaja. The world premiere, as I am a broken record and have linked it far too many times already, is on October 6th at the Musiikkitalo!

Later in the month brings me to Zurich, Switzerland for the European premiere of Vivacissimo (2023) in a new version with a video by Pavel Otdelnov, the award-winning Russian painter, and Kihako Narisawa, a brilliant Germany-based dancer and multidisciplinary artist who will design a new choreography to Pavel’s new film. Though I originally wanted to bring as much of the original production as possible, this become unrealistic due to the intransigence of the original creative partners, and I must say I’m excited beyond words to see what will come out of this new collection of truly great artistic spirits. Of course, LiLa, the brilliant Chinese cellist who premiered the work will reprise it, and I wouldn’t have it any other way!

And new work- it’s been slightly too long since something truly ambitious and new has been on the horizon, but certain projects are either back on track or, beyond that, taking shape. But before any more announcements, the digital collaboration for the Hong Kong Ballet with Anandi Bhattacharya on vocals (and, genuinely, co-composer), Joby Burgess, percussion, Shen Jie as the soloist-dancer, Yuh Egami, choreographer, and Giorgio Biancorosso as conceptual lead and director, which we have dubbed Apparition, is almost here. I’m incredibly proud of what we did, the level of music, choreography and, indeed, special effects stands up to the very best globally and considering the modest budget- it’s simply magic. More on that next time.