Icebreaker (band)
Encyclopedia
Icebreaker is a UK
-based new music ensemble founded by James Poke
and John Godfrey
. The group have established themselves as one of the UK's leading new music interpreters specializing particularly in post-minimal and "totalist
" repertoire. They always play amplified and have a reputation for playing, by classical standards "seriously loud". More recently they have also incorporated more ambient repertoire, particularly in their version of the Brian Eno
album Apollo.
music festival in York
. The group currently consists of 12 musicians, with an instrumentation that includes pan-pipes, saxophone
s, electric violin
and cello
, guitar
s, percussion, drums, accordion
and keyboards
as well as a sound engineer and production assistant. Richard Witts is consultant to the ensemble.
Their repertoire encompasses music by a variety of well-known composers, including Louis Andriessen
, Diderik Wagenaar
, David Lang
, Michael Gordon
, Philip Glass
, Steve Reich
, Michael Nyman
, Brian Eno
, Donnacha Dennehy
and Yannis Kyriakides
. Icebreaker's unusual instrumentation gives the band's music a distinctive sound and allows the blending of contemporary classical, rock and alternative music. The instrumentation evolved from the line up of the Dutch group Hoketus
, who had operated between 1977 and 1987, and served as an inspiration and model for the formation of the group. The presence of pairs of pan-pipes and saxophones derives from Icebreaker's performances of several works from the by now defunct Hoketus's repertoire, including the eponymous work by Louis Andriessen.
, the Warsaw
, Aarhus
, Ghent
, Grenoble
and Budapest
festivals, Sonorities in Belfast
, the Baltic Gaida Festival and the NYYD Festival in Estonia
, as well as a dedicated Icebreaker festival with the Wiener Musik Galerie in Vienna
. In London
they have appeared at Meltdown, the ICA
, the Place Theatre, the South Bank
, the Barbican
, the Warehouse, Ocean and the Almeida
, among other venues. They have appeared on two Arts Council Contemporary Music Network tours of England. United States
appearances include New York
's Bang on a Can
Festival, the Lincoln Center Festival, and a performance at Carnegie Hall
with the American Composers' Orchestra in Stewart Wallace
's The Book of Five.
. 2005 saw the release of Cranial Pavement, including music by John Godfrey, Richard Craig, Yannis Kyriakides and Conlon Nancarrow
, as well as the worldwide release of the new version of Michael Gordon's Trance. This 52-minute work was originally released on Argo
in 1996 and has been completely re-worked and re-mixed for the Cantaloupe version.
Icebreaker's first album Terminal Velocity (music by Andriessen, Gordon, Lang, Gavin Bryars
and Damian LeGassick
), also originally on Argo, has also been produced in a remastered version for Cantaloupe.
In 2007 Icebreaker's version of Philip Glass
's "Music with Changing Parts" was released on Glass's own label Orange Mountain Music.
Other albums include Rogue's Gallery (NewTone), with works by Andriessen, Lang, Godfrey, Michael Torke
and Steve Martland
; a portrait of Diderik Wagenaar (Composers' Voice) and Extraction (between the lines), containing music by LeGassick and Gordon McPherson
plus a remix by Mel. Contributions to compilation albums include works by Graham Fitkin
(Argo), Steve Martland and John Godfrey (Century XXI A – M / NewTone).
Rumours suggest that Icebreaker's recording of Apollo, their recent project based on the Brian Eno album, will be released on Cantaloupe in 2011.
and the Pacific Northwest Ballet
of Seattle have used Icebreaker's recordings for performances. In June 1998, Ashley Page created Cheating, Lying, Stealing, featuring Icebreaker as guest performers, for The Royal Ballet
at Sadler's Wells, a programme which was revived in September/October 2003 and again in April 2009 for Scottish Ballet
. AtaXia, a collaboration with Wayne McGregor
's company Random Dance, based on Trance, premiered in Sadler's Wells, London in June 2004 with further performances in Amsterdam
and New York.
, and singer Christina Zavalloni, entitled Big Noise. The project, consisting of four new commissions from leading composers from Britain and Holland (Yannis Kyriakides
, Diderik Wagenaar
, Joe Cutler
and Cornelis de Bondt
, each working in conjunction with a video artist (H C Gilje, Hexstatic
, Jaap Drupsteen
and Thomas Hadley respectively), toured major venues in the UK and the Netherlands.
Other projects have included a further performance of The Book of Five with the Bochum Symphony Orchestra in Germany, recording the music to the independent American film Book of Love, and further work with film.
for the advanced composition course led by Louis Andriessen, and have held composition workshops for the SPNM
in Bangor
and Belfast as well as additional workshops in New York and London. In June 2005 they took part in the Popular Music course at Goldsmiths College
in association with John Paul Jones
. In April 2009 they performed four new student commissions for the RSAMD in Glasgow.
-based totallyradio.com, including interviews with composers and playing a wide range of music in mixed and contrasting genres.
's epic 1970 work Music with Changing Parts, which had remained unperformed since the early 1980s. Icebreaker's recording of the piece, based on material recorded live at Dartington College of Arts
, was released in spring 2007 on the Orange Mountain Music label.
In 2009 Icebreaker played further performances of Cheating, Lying, Stealing with Scottish Ballet, and appeared at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in two concerts celebrating Louis Andriessen's 70th birthday. In July 2009 Icebreaker, with guest B. J. Cole
on pedal steel guitar, premiered a new arrangement (by Woojun Lee) of Brian Eno
's Apollo
album at the IMAX
cinema at London's Science Museum
, alongside Al Reinert
's film For All Mankind
, for which the music was originally written. An expanded version of the arrangement received further performances at the Brighton Festival
in May 2010, before touring later in the year. The music has been recorded for release in 2012.
and The Independent
in enthusiastic terms: Robert Maycock in The Independent felt that "there is plenty of material here for British audiences to catch up with and Icebreaker have what it takes to deliver it," whilst Meirion Bowen wrote in The Guardian that "Icebreaker deserve an enthusiastic following.". Some more conservative critics have had more problems with the group and its musical direction: Nicholas Kenyon
, then a music critic at The Observer
, subsequently director of London's Proms
, described Icebreaker's music as "unbelievably banal" and Michael Dervan, writing in The Irish Times
, described it as "music for the aurally challenged ... or the braindead" and "ideal for the deaf and stoned".
, an April 1995 Icebreaker concert was "too loud and not short enough.". Others have been more enthusiastic: for Christopher Lambton, in The Guardian, a 2003 concert was "loud and all-enveloping, offering an experience closer to a rock concert: Icebreaker... creates the blueprint for live contemporary music."
as an "electrifying new disc ... superb" and it was described by the American Record Guide
as "a stimulating, well-filled disc". Trance was also well-received, particularly in its remastered version: the BBC Music Magazine
referred to its "furious precision", whilst Gramophone described parts of it as "genuinely mesmeric".
Responses to Music with Changing Parts included a 4-star review in The Times, and an appreciative review in The Wire
("appealing ... warmth ... vividness"), although Andrew Clements was less enthusiastic in The Guardian, awarding it two stars.
T J Medrek, in the Boston Herald
, wrote about Cranial Pavement and the re-released Terminal Velocity that "Icebreaker's music is not only marvelous ear candy but also work of real structure and substance, as demonstrated in two superb new discs"
, the group was "unabashedly virtuosic"; Kyle Gann
in The Village Voice
described them as "rhythmically engrossing"; Alan Rich
in Los Angeles Weekly as "amazing ... high-powered"; and Tristram Lozaw in The Boston Herald as "a harmolodic carnival of battling textures, symphonic discombobulations, and noisy innovations, all delivered with the visceral force of the best rock'n'roll".
In Europe Icebreaker have been "mercilessly exact" (Der Standard
, Vienna); "impressive ... fascinating ... almost ecstatic" (NRC Handelsblad
, Amsterdam); and "commanding ... impressive " (Niedersächsische Allgemeine).
David Bowie
cited Icebreaker in an interview for Q magazine in November 2006, stating that he "would drive a mile" to see Icebreaker play live, describing music from Cranial Pavement as phenomenal.
Terminal Velocity (Argo, 1994)
Trance (Argo, 1996)
Rogue's Gallery (New Tone, 1997)
Diderik Wagenaar (Composers' Voice / Donemus, 2001)
Extraction (between the lines, 2001)
Trance (Cantaloupe Music, 2004) (Remix and re-master of Argo album)
Cranial Pavement (Cantaloupe Music, 2005)
Terminal Velocity (Cantaloupe Music, 2005) (Re-master of Argo album)
Music with Changing Parts (Orange Mountain Music, 2007)
Apollo (release planned for 2011)
Short Cuts – Breaking the sound Barrier – An Argo Sampler (Argo, 1994)
Century XXI UK A–M (New Tone, 1996)
Bang on a Can plays Louis Andriessen (Cantaloupe Records)
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
-based new music ensemble founded by James Poke
James Poke
James Poke is a musician, primarily known as artistic director and co-founder of the ensemble Icebreaker .Poke studied music at the University of York and composition with Erich Urbanner at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Vienna. With John Godfrey he founded Icebreaker in 1989...
and John Godfrey
John Godfrey (composer)
John Godfrey is a composer and performer, co-founder and musical director of Icebreaker , founder member of Crash Ensemble , founder of the Quiet Music Ensemble, and lecturer in music at National University of Ireland, Cork....
. The group have established themselves as one of the UK's leading new music interpreters specializing particularly in post-minimal and "totalist
Totalism
In music, totalism is a term for a style of art music that arose in the 1980s and 1990s as a developing response to minimalism—parallel to postminimalism, but generally among a slightly younger generation, born in the 1950s....
" repertoire. They always play amplified and have a reputation for playing, by classical standards "seriously loud". More recently they have also incorporated more ambient repertoire, particularly in their version of the Brian Eno
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
album Apollo.
Founding and musical identity
Icebreaker was formed in 1989 to play at the new DutchNetherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
music festival in York
York
York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...
. The group currently consists of 12 musicians, with an instrumentation that includes pan-pipes, saxophone
Saxophone
The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
s, electric violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
and cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
, guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
s, percussion, drums, accordion
Accordion
The accordion is a box-shaped musical instrument of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone family, sometimes referred to as a squeezebox. A person who plays the accordion is called an accordionist....
and keyboards
Keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...
as well as a sound engineer and production assistant. Richard Witts is consultant to the ensemble.
Their repertoire encompasses music by a variety of well-known composers, including Louis Andriessen
Louis Andriessen
Louis Andriessen is a Dutch composer and pianist based in Amsterdam. He teaches composition at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague...
, Diderik Wagenaar
Diderik Wagenaar
Diderik Wagenaar is a Dutch composer and musical theorist.-Life and work:Wagenaar has lived and worked all his adult life in The Hague. Born to a musical family that includes Johan Wagenaar, he began playing piano at the age of eight and by the time he was fourteen had set his sights on a musical...
, David Lang
David Lang (composer)
David Lang is an American composer living in New York City. He was awarded the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Music for The Little Match Girl Passion.-Biography:...
, Michael Gordon
Michael Gordon (composer)
Michael Gordon is an American composer and co-founder of the Bang on a Can festival and ensemble. His music is associated with the genres of totalism and post-minimalism.-Early life:...
, Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
, Steve Reich
Steve Reich
Stephen Michael "Steve" Reich is an American composer who together with La Monte Young, Terry Riley, and Philip Glass is a pioneering composer of minimal music...
, Michael Nyman
Michael Nyman
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
, Brian Eno
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
, Donnacha Dennehy
Donnacha Dennehy
,Donnacha Dennehy is a composer, born in Dublin in 1970. He gained his secondary education in Templeogue College, Dublin. He studied Music at Trinity College, Dublin and later pursued graduate studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign...
and Yannis Kyriakides
Yannis Kyriakides
Yannis Kyriakides is a composer of contemporary classical music, and sound art. His music explores new forms and hybrids of media, synthesizing disparate sound sources and highlighting the sensorial space of music...
. Icebreaker's unusual instrumentation gives the band's music a distinctive sound and allows the blending of contemporary classical, rock and alternative music. The instrumentation evolved from the line up of the Dutch group Hoketus
Hoketus
Hoketus was an amplified musical ensemble founded by Dutch composer Louis Andriessen in the Netherlands in 1976. The group was originally formed to perform Louis Andriessen's minimal composition Hoketus, but remained together and began to perform music composed for the group by other composers...
, who had operated between 1977 and 1987, and served as an inspiration and model for the formation of the group. The presence of pairs of pan-pipes and saxophones derives from Icebreaker's performances of several works from the by now defunct Hoketus's repertoire, including the eponymous work by Louis Andriessen.
Performances
Icebreaker have made concert appearances in the UK, US and Europe, including the Huddersfield Contemporary Music FestivalHuddersfield Contemporary Music Festival
The Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival is held in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England. It has a repertoire of cutting-edge jazz, orchestral, choral and electroacoustic performances, along with film, dance and music theatre...
, the Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
, Aarhus
Aarhus
Aarhus or Århus is the second-largest city in Denmark. The principal port of Denmark, Aarhus is on the east side of the peninsula of Jutland in the geographical center of Denmark...
, Ghent
Ghent
Ghent is a city and a municipality located in the Flemish region of Belgium. It is the capital and biggest city of the East Flanders province. The city started as a settlement at the confluence of the Rivers Scheldt and Lys and in the Middle Ages became one of the largest and richest cities of...
, Grenoble
Grenoble
Grenoble is a city in southeastern France, at the foot of the French Alps where the river Drac joins the Isère. Located in the Rhône-Alpes region, Grenoble is the capital of the department of Isère...
and Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
festivals, Sonorities in Belfast
Belfast
Belfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...
, the Baltic Gaida Festival and the NYYD Festival in Estonia
Estonia
Estonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a state in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by Lake Peipsi and the Russian Federation . Across the Baltic Sea lies...
, as well as a dedicated Icebreaker festival with the Wiener Musik Galerie in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. In London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
they have appeared at Meltdown, the ICA
Institute of Contemporary Arts
The Institute of Contemporary Arts is an artistic and cultural centre on The Mall in London, just off Trafalgar Square. It is located within Nash House, part of Carlton House Terrace, near the Duke of York Steps and Admiralty Arch...
, the Place Theatre, the South Bank
South Bank
South Bank is an area of London, England located immediately adjacent to the south side of the River Thames. It forms a long and narrow section of riverside development that is within the London Borough of Lambeth to the border with the London Borough of Southwark and was formerly simply known as...
, the Barbican
Barbican
A barbican, from medieval Latin barbecana, signifying the "outer fortification of a city or castle," with cognates in the Romance languages A barbican, from medieval Latin barbecana, signifying the "outer fortification of a city or castle," with cognates in the Romance languages A barbican, from...
, the Warehouse, Ocean and the Almeida
Almeida Theatre
The Almeida Theatre, opened in 1980, is a 325 seat studio theatre with an international reputation which takes its name from the street in which it is located, off Upper Street, in the London Borough of Islington. The theatre produces a diverse range of drama and holds an annual summer festival of...
, among other venues. They have appeared on two Arts Council Contemporary Music Network tours of England. United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
appearances include New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
's Bang on a Can
Bang on a Can
Bang on a Can is a multi-faceted classical music organization based in New York City. It was founded in 1987 by three American composers who remain its artistic directors: Julia Wolfe, David Lang, and Michael Gordon...
Festival, the Lincoln Center Festival, and a performance at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
with the American Composers' Orchestra in Stewart Wallace
Stewart Wallace
Stewart Wallace is an American composer and cantor. He has spent much of his career composing experimental operas, from the dance-centered Kabbalah to the surrealist Hopper's Wife...
's The Book of Five.
Recordings
Since 2005 most of Icebreaker's albums have been released on the New York-based label Cantaloupe MusicCantaloupe Music
Cantaloupe Music is a record label founded in March 2001 created by the three founders of New York's legendary Bang on a Can Festival: Michael Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe, and Bang on a Can Managing Director Kenny Savelson. Cantaloupe Music has made a massive impact in the new music...
. 2005 saw the release of Cranial Pavement, including music by John Godfrey, Richard Craig, Yannis Kyriakides and Conlon Nancarrow
Conlon Nancarrow
Conlon Nancarrow was a United States-born composer who lived and worked in Mexico for most of his life. He became a Mexican citizen in 1955.Nancarrow is best remembered for the pieces he wrote for the player piano...
, as well as the worldwide release of the new version of Michael Gordon's Trance. This 52-minute work was originally released on Argo
Argo Records (UK)
Argo Records was a record label founded in 1951 by Harley Usill , and musicologist Cyril Clarke with £500 capital, initially as a company specialising in "British music played by British artists" , but it quickly became a company primarily specialising in spoken-word recordings and other esoteric ...
in 1996 and has been completely re-worked and re-mixed for the Cantaloupe version.
Icebreaker's first album Terminal Velocity (music by Andriessen, Gordon, Lang, Gavin Bryars
Gavin Bryars
Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
and Damian LeGassick
Damian LeGassick
Damian LeGassick is a British musician and producer. LeGassick trained at York University and has worked professionally in many diverse areas of the music business as a pianist, composer, producer, and lecturer. As a pianist, he specializes in late 20th century solo repertoire and chamber music...
), also originally on Argo, has also been produced in a remastered version for Cantaloupe.
In 2007 Icebreaker's version of Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
's "Music with Changing Parts" was released on Glass's own label Orange Mountain Music.
Other albums include Rogue's Gallery (NewTone), with works by Andriessen, Lang, Godfrey, Michael Torke
Michael Torke
Michael Torke is an American composer who writes music influenced by jazz and minimalism. Sometimes described as a post-minimalist, his most postminimal piece is Four Proverbs, in which the syllable for each pitch is fixed and variations in the melody produce streams of nonsense words. Other works...
and Steve Martland
Steve Martland
Steve Martland is an English composer.-Life and Music :Martland was born in Liverpool, England and studied composition at Liverpool University and in the Netherlands with Louis Andriessen...
; a portrait of Diderik Wagenaar (Composers' Voice) and Extraction (between the lines), containing music by LeGassick and Gordon McPherson
Gordon McPherson
Gordon McPherson is a Scottish composer. He studied at the University of York, England, returning there for his doctorate, continuing with post-doctoral research at the Royal Northern College of Music....
plus a remix by Mel. Contributions to compilation albums include works by Graham Fitkin
Graham Fitkin
Graham Fitkin is a British composer, pianist and conductor. His compositions fall broadly into the minimalist and postminimalist genres...
(Argo), Steve Martland and John Godfrey (Century XXI A – M / NewTone).
Rumours suggest that Icebreaker's recording of Apollo, their recent project based on the Brian Eno album, will be released on Cantaloupe in 2011.
Work with dance
Tanzwerk Nürnberg, West Australian BalletWest Australian Ballet
The West Australian Ballet is the premier ballet dance company of Western Australia and is based in Perth at His Majesty's Theatre, Western Australia. The company was founded in 1952 by Madame Kira Bousloff and is one of the oldest ballet companies in Australia. Artistic directors have included...
and the Pacific Northwest Ballet
Pacific Northwest Ballet
Pacific Northwest Ballet is a ballet company based in Seattle, Washington in the United States. Founded in 1972 as part of the Seattle Opera and named the Pacific Northwest Dance Association, it broke away from the Opera in 1977 and took its current name in 1978. It is said to have the highest per...
of Seattle have used Icebreaker's recordings for performances. In June 1998, Ashley Page created Cheating, Lying, Stealing, featuring Icebreaker as guest performers, for The Royal Ballet
Royal Ballet, London
The Royal Ballet is an internationally renowned classical ballet company, based at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, London, England. The largest of the four major ballet companies in Great Britain, the Royal Ballet was founded in 1931 by Dame Ninette de Valois, it became the resident ballet...
at Sadler's Wells, a programme which was revived in September/October 2003 and again in April 2009 for Scottish Ballet
Scottish Ballet
Scottish Ballet is the national ballet company of Scotland and one of the four leading ballet companies of the United Kingdom, alongside the Royal Ballet, English National Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet...
. AtaXia, a collaboration with Wayne McGregor
Wayne McGregor
Wayne McGregor CBE is a British choreographer of contemporary modern dance. His work is highly distinctive in its vocabulary of movement, for its integration of dance with film and visual art, and for his active interest and incorporation of computer technology and biological science...
's company Random Dance, based on Trance, premiered in Sadler's Wells, London in June 2004 with further performances in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
and New York.
Multi-media work
The 2003/4 season saw a major multi-media collaboration with the renowned Dutch ensemble Orkest de VolhardingOrkest de Volharding
Orkest de Volharding is a Dutch music ensemble, founded in 1972 by Louis Andriessen and saxophonist Willem Breuker, named after the eponymous Andriessen work. The line up for the original concert, on May 12, 1972, was three each of trumpets saxes and trombones, plus Andriessen on the piano...
, and singer Christina Zavalloni, entitled Big Noise. The project, consisting of four new commissions from leading composers from Britain and Holland (Yannis Kyriakides
Yannis Kyriakides
Yannis Kyriakides is a composer of contemporary classical music, and sound art. His music explores new forms and hybrids of media, synthesizing disparate sound sources and highlighting the sensorial space of music...
, Diderik Wagenaar
Diderik Wagenaar
Diderik Wagenaar is a Dutch composer and musical theorist.-Life and work:Wagenaar has lived and worked all his adult life in The Hague. Born to a musical family that includes Johan Wagenaar, he began playing piano at the age of eight and by the time he was fourteen had set his sights on a musical...
, Joe Cutler
Joe Cutler
Joe Cutler is a British composer who studied music at the Universities of Huddersfield and Durham, before a scholarship at the Chopin Academy in Warsaw, Poland. He has taught composition at the Birmingham Conservatoire since 2000, and since 2005 he has been the Head of Composition there...
and Cornelis de Bondt
Cornelis de Bondt
Cornelis de Bondt is a Dutch composer. Born in The Hague, de Bondt attended the Royal Conservatory there and currently teaches composition and music theory at the same institution.-References:...
, each working in conjunction with a video artist (H C Gilje, Hexstatic
Hexstatic
Hexstatic is a UK music duo, consisting of Stuart Warren Hill and Robin Brunson, that specializes in creating "quirky audio visual electro." Formed in 1997 after Hill and Brunson met while producing visuals at the Channel Five launch party, they decided to take over for the original members of the...
, Jaap Drupsteen
Jaap Drupsteen
Jaap Drupsteen is a Dutch graphic designer.Drupsteen worked as a graphic designer for NOS and VPRO; he specialized in making leaders, music videos, and other video and television productions....
and Thomas Hadley respectively), toured major venues in the UK and the Netherlands.
Other projects have included a further performance of The Book of Five with the Bochum Symphony Orchestra in Germany, recording the music to the independent American film Book of Love, and further work with film.
Educational work
They have been resident ensemble at the Dartington International Summer SchoolDartington Hall
The Dartington Hall Trust, near Totnes, Devon, United Kingdom is a charity specialising in the arts, social justice and sustainability.The Trust currently runs 16 charitable programmes, including The Dartington International Summer School and Schumacher Environmental College...
for the advanced composition course led by Louis Andriessen, and have held composition workshops for the SPNM
Society for the Promotion of New Music
The Society for the Promotion of New Music was founded in London in 1943 with the intention of promoting the creation, performance and appreciation of new music...
in Bangor
Bangor, County Down
Bangor is a large town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is a seaside resort on the southern side of Belfast Lough and within the Belfast Metropolitan Area. Bangor Marina is one of the largest in Ireland, and holds Blue Flag status...
and Belfast as well as additional workshops in New York and London. In June 2005 they took part in the Popular Music course at Goldsmiths College
Goldsmiths College
Goldsmiths, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom which specialises in the arts, humanities and social sciences, and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It was founded in 1891 as Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute...
in association with John Paul Jones
John Paul Jones (musician)
John Paul Jones is an English multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, composer, arranger and record producer. Best known as the bassist, mandolinist, and keyboardist for English rock band Led Zeppelin, Jones has since developed a solo career and has gained even more respect as both a musician and a...
. In April 2009 they performed four new student commissions for the RSAMD in Glasgow.
Internet radio show
Since 2006 Icebreaker have had a monthly show on BrightonBrighton
Brighton is the major part of the city of Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England on the south coast of Great Britain...
-based totallyradio.com, including interviews with composers and playing a wide range of music in mixed and contrasting genres.
Recent work
In 2005 Icebreaker were invited to revive Philip GlassPhilip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
's epic 1970 work Music with Changing Parts, which had remained unperformed since the early 1980s. Icebreaker's recording of the piece, based on material recorded live at Dartington College of Arts
Dartington College of Arts
Dartington College of Arts was a specialist arts institution near Totnes, Devon, South West England, it specialized in post-dramatic theatre, music, choreography, Performance Writing and visual performance, focusing on a performative and multi-disciplinary approach to the arts. In addition to this,...
, was released in spring 2007 on the Orange Mountain Music label.
In 2009 Icebreaker played further performances of Cheating, Lying, Stealing with Scottish Ballet, and appeared at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in two concerts celebrating Louis Andriessen's 70th birthday. In July 2009 Icebreaker, with guest B. J. Cole
B. J. Cole
Brian John Cole is an English pedal steel guitarist. Coming to prominence in the early 1970s with the band Cochise, Cole has played in many styles of music, ranging from mainstream pop and rock, to jazz and eclectic experimental music.He played and is heavily featured with Deke Leonard's Help...
on pedal steel guitar, premiered a new arrangement (by Woojun Lee) of Brian Eno
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
's Apollo
Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks
-Credits:* Musicians: Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois, Roger Eno* Cover Art : Russel Mills* Mastered by Greg Calbi, at Sterling Sound-Versions:-Chart performance:-Uses in other media:* "An Ending ":** TV - James May on the Moon - opening sequence...
album at the IMAX
IMAX
IMAX is a motion picture film format and a set of proprietary cinema projection standards created by the Canadian company IMAX Corporation. IMAX has the capacity to record and display images of far greater size and resolution than conventional film systems...
cinema at London's Science Museum
Science museum
A science museum or a science centre is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in museology have broadened the range of...
, alongside Al Reinert
Al Reinert
Al Reinert is an American film director, screenwriter and producer. He co-wrote the screenplays for the Ron Howard film Apollo 13 and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, but is best known for directing and producing For All Mankind, an Award-winning documentary about NASA's Apollo program.-Awards...
's film For All Mankind
For All Mankind
For All Mankind is a 1989 documentary film documenting the Apollo missions of NASA. It was directed by Al Reinert.Music for the film was originally composed in 1983 by Brian Eno and released as an album entitled Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks...
, for which the music was originally written. An expanded version of the arrangement received further performances at the Brighton Festival
Brighton Festival
The Brighton Festival is an annual arts festival which takes place in the city of Brighton and Hove in England each May. It was founded in 1966, and is the largest multi-art form festival in England...
in May 2010, before touring later in the year. The music has been recorded for release in 2012.
Early critical response
Critical response to Icebreaker has generally been positive. Their London debut in 1989 was greeted by The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
and The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
in enthusiastic terms: Robert Maycock in The Independent felt that "there is plenty of material here for British audiences to catch up with and Icebreaker have what it takes to deliver it," whilst Meirion Bowen wrote in The Guardian that "Icebreaker deserve an enthusiastic following.". Some more conservative critics have had more problems with the group and its musical direction: Nicholas Kenyon
Nicholas Kenyon
Sir Nicholas Roger Kenyon CBE is an English music administrator, editor and writer on music. He was responsible for the BBC Proms 1996-2007 following which he was appointed Managing Director of the Barbican Centre, Europe's largest multi-arts centre.-Education and career:After attending St Bede's...
, then a music critic at The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
, subsequently director of London's Proms
The Proms
The Proms, more formally known as The BBC Proms, or The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hall in London...
, described Icebreaker's music as "unbelievably banal" and Michael Dervan, writing in The Irish Times
The Irish Times
The Irish Times is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Kevin O'Sullivan who succeeded Geraldine Kennedy in 2011; the deputy editor is Paul O'Neill. The Irish Times is considered to be Ireland's newspaper of record, and is published every day except Sundays...
, described it as "music for the aurally challenged ... or the braindead" and "ideal for the deaf and stoned".
Volume
A number of critics have had difficulty with the very loud volumes of Icebreaker's concerts, which, whilst not excessively loud by rock standards, have challenged the ears of more classical critics. Keith Potter, a critic who has often praised Icebreaker's work ("Icebreaker's performers ... play with a passionate commitment as well as the requisite and highly demanding rhythmic precision"), nevertheless complained of the high volume of Icebreaker's 1996 concert at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall: "This concert ... was loud. Seriously loud. It was also designed ... to "ramp up the audience's visual input to an equal energy level" to that of the sound. ... I found all this rather too much to take.". For Brian Hunt, writing in The Daily TelegraphThe Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, an April 1995 Icebreaker concert was "too loud and not short enough.". Others have been more enthusiastic: for Christopher Lambton, in The Guardian, a 2003 concert was "loud and all-enveloping, offering an experience closer to a rock concert: Icebreaker... creates the blueprint for live contemporary music."
Releases
Icebreaker's albums have met with a very positive response. Terminal Velocity was described by Joshua Kosman in the San Francisco ChronicleSan Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
as an "electrifying new disc ... superb" and it was described by the American Record Guide
American Record Guide
The American Record Guide is a classical music magazine. It has reviewed classical music recordings since 1935.Since 1992, with the incorporation of the Musical America editorial functions into ARG, it started covering concerts, musicians, ensembles and orchestras in the US.The magazine prides...
as "a stimulating, well-filled disc". Trance was also well-received, particularly in its remastered version: the BBC Music Magazine
BBC music magazine
BBC Music Magazine is a magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom by BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the BBC. Reflecting the broadcast output of BBC Radio 3, the magazine is devoted primarily to classical music, though with sections on jazz and world music. Each edition comes...
referred to its "furious precision", whilst Gramophone described parts of it as "genuinely mesmeric".
Responses to Music with Changing Parts included a 4-star review in The Times, and an appreciative review in The Wire
The Wire (magazine)
The Wire is a British avant garde music magazine, founded in 1982 by jazz promoter Anthony Wood and journalist Chrissie Murray. The magazine initially concentrated on contemporary jazz and improvised music, but branched out in the early 1990s to various types of experimental music...
("appealing ... warmth ... vividness"), although Andrew Clements was less enthusiastic in The Guardian, awarding it two stars.
T J Medrek, in the Boston Herald
Boston Herald
The Boston Herald is a daily newspaper that serves Boston, Massachusetts, United States, and its surrounding area. It was started in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States...
, wrote about Cranial Pavement and the re-released Terminal Velocity that "Icebreaker's music is not only marvelous ear candy but also work of real structure and substance, as demonstrated in two superb new discs"
Further international response
Icebreaker have garnered further plaudits in the United States and Europe. For Alan Kozinn in The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, the group was "unabashedly virtuosic"; Kyle Gann
Kyle Gann
Kyle Eugene Gann is an American professor of music, critic and composer born in Dallas, Texas. As a critic for The Village Voice and other publications he has been a supporter of progressive music including such Downtown movements as postminimalism and totalism.- As composer :As a composer his...
in The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...
described them as "rhythmically engrossing"; Alan Rich
Alan Rich
Alan Rich was an American music critic who served on the staff of many newspapers and magazines on both coasts. Originally from Brookline, Massachusetts, he first studied medicine at Harvard University before turning to music...
in Los Angeles Weekly as "amazing ... high-powered"; and Tristram Lozaw in The Boston Herald as "a harmolodic carnival of battling textures, symphonic discombobulations, and noisy innovations, all delivered with the visceral force of the best rock'n'roll".
In Europe Icebreaker have been "mercilessly exact" (Der Standard
Der Standard
Der Standard is an Austrian national daily newspaper which is published in Vienna . It was founded by Oscar Bronner as a financial newspaper and the first edition was published on 1988-10-19...
, Vienna); "impressive ... fascinating ... almost ecstatic" (NRC Handelsblad
NRC Handelsblad
NRC Handelsblad, often abbreviated to NRC, is a daily evening newspaper published in the Netherlands by NRC Media. The newspaper was created on October 1, 1970, from merger of the Nieuwe Rotterdamsche Courant and Algemeen Handelsblad . In 2006 a morning newspaper, nrc•next, was launched...
, Amsterdam); and "commanding ... impressive " (Niedersächsische Allgemeine).
David Bowie
David Bowie
David Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
cited Icebreaker in an interview for Q magazine in November 2006, stating that he "would drive a mile" to see Icebreaker play live, describing music from Cranial Pavement as phenomenal.
Members (2011)
- James PokeJames PokeJames Poke is a musician, primarily known as artistic director and co-founder of the ensemble Icebreaker .Poke studied music at the University of York and composition with Erich Urbanner at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Vienna. With John Godfrey he founded Icebreaker in 1989...
(artistic director, flutes, pan-pipes, wind-synthesiser, keyboard programming) - Rowland SutherlandRowland SutherlandRowland Sutherland is a British flautist, who studied flute at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Kathryn Lukas, Philippa Davies and Peter Lloyd and participated in master classes given by the late Geoffrey Gilbert. He studied jazz with the late pianist Lionel Grigson...
(flutes, pan-pipes, voice) - Christian ForshawChristian ForshawChristian Forshaw is a British saxophone virtuoso and composer.Christian Forshaw comes from Yorkshire and graduated from the Guildhall School of Music & Drama in 1995 with distinction...
(saxophone, clarinets) - Bradley Grant (saxophones, clarinets)
- Dominic Saunders (keyboards)
- Andrew ZolinskyAndrew ZolinskyAndrew Zolinsky is a British pianist.Zolinsky won the first prize in the San Francisco International Piano Concerto Competition. Performances have included a concert with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, London Concert Orchestra, Sinfonia 21 and the New London Orchestra...
(keyboards) - Walter Fabeck (keyboards)
- Ian Watson (accordion, keyboards)
- Emma Welton (electric violin)
- Audrey RileyAudrey RileyAudrey Riley is a cellist and string arranger based in the UK. Riley trained at the Guildhall School of Music with Leonard Stehn and was a cellist for Virginia Astley from 1983 to 1986 and a one-time auxiliary member of The Family Cat. She has been a member of the post-minimalist band Icebreaker...
(electric cello, keyboards) - Dan Gresson (percussion, drums)
- James Woodrow (guitar, bass guitar)
- Pete WilsonPete Wilson (bass-player)Pete Wilson is a bass guitarist who has been an exponent of the instrument in the UK contemporary music scene for twenty years. He also works as bass player in regular pop setting...
(bass guitar) - Mel (production assistant)
- Ernst Zettl (sound engineer)
Albums
Official Bootleg (ICC, 1991, live album, cassette only)Terminal Velocity (Argo, 1994)
Trance (Argo, 1996)
Rogue's Gallery (New Tone, 1997)
Diderik Wagenaar (Composers' Voice / Donemus, 2001)
Extraction (between the lines, 2001)
Trance (Cantaloupe Music, 2004) (Remix and re-master of Argo album)
Cranial Pavement (Cantaloupe Music, 2005)
Terminal Velocity (Cantaloupe Music, 2005) (Re-master of Argo album)
Music with Changing Parts (Orange Mountain Music, 2007)
Apollo (release planned for 2011)
Appearances on other albums
Hook, Mesh, Stub, Cud (Argo, 1993)Short Cuts – Breaking the sound Barrier – An Argo Sampler (Argo, 1994)
Century XXI UK A–M (New Tone, 1996)
Bang on a Can plays Louis Andriessen (Cantaloupe Records)