New Friday – Eight Songs for a Mad King

The mad King George III was an English monarch (1738–1820) who walked about in a nightshirt, shouted, chattered and tried to teach the bullfinches he kept in a cage to sing. He wanted them to learn eight melodies that were in his mechanical music box. This is the background and inspiration for Peter Maxwell Davies’ legendary Eight Songs for a Mad King.

The king’s madness manifests in spectacularly masterful passages and pathetic groans. Olle Persson’s baritone gurgles and sputters, rattles and howls in vain attempts to teach the birds to sing. The expressive arsenal leaves nothing out when Maxwell Davies unifies music and theatre.

In addition to Eight Songs for a Mad King, Norrbotten NEO will perform the acclaimed Scottish composer Helen Grime’s Seven Pierrot Miniatures, inspired by the jesting Pierrot of Italian Commedia dell’arte. In this all-British programme, we will also hear Rebecca Saunders’ refined and tone-shifting the under-side of green.

The concert is part of New Friday – a concert subscription for forward-looking listeners who want to open their ears to innovative music of today, late on Friday evenings in Grünewald Hall, in close proximity to the music and musicians.

Come early, stay late – the bar will be open before and after the concert with drinks and appetizers.