Pestova and Meyer bring MANTRA to NZ

Pianists Xenia Pestova and Pascal Meyer will visit New Zealand in July to present a series of concerts. As well as premiering works by Chris Watson and Dugal McKinnon in concerts in Wellington and Dunedin the pair will collaborate with Philip Brownlee (as sound projectionist) in a performance of Karlheinz Stockhausen's masterpiece MANTRA for two pianos and live electronics. This will take place in the Hunter Council Chamber of Victoria University of Wellington on 19 July at 6 pm.

"MANTRA is an exciting and highly virtuosic work that calls for an unconventional approach to piano playing," Xenia comments. "The pianists are required to play antique cymbals and woodblocks, as well as use their voices. The two grand pianos are processed electronically in real-time to create two "super-instruments" with scintillating and beautiful sonorities that approach the exotic sound worlds of the prepared piano of John Cage, high-energy electric guitar distortion, and mysterious Morse-code radio signals.

"Our approach to this piece is original due to the fact that we will be using digital technology for the electronic processing, resulting in a contemporary reinterpretation of a classic piece on the verge of technological obsolescence with a simple set-up and arguably superior sound quality. The hardware and software for our version of this piece was especially designed by Mark T. Marshall (McGill University) and Jacob Sudol (UCSD). This equipment was tested during a career development residency at the Banff Centre in February 2007, and with Stockhausen's former sound projectionist and assistant Jan Panis in Luxembourg in January 2008."