Kosmos Ensemble and Marit & Rona Duo

Five musicians from four countries have been awarded a week’s residency at Lyth exploring how to weave together their wide musical influences and heritage. Come and enjoy an evening of new, mostly string music performed by classically trained, yet keenly innovative musicians, premiered at Lyth.

Kosmos consists of Harriet Mackenzie (violin) and Meg Hamilton (viola) both from England and MilošMilivojevic (accordion) from Serbia. The Marit & Rona duo consists of Marit Fält(mandola) from Sweden and Rona Wilkie (fiddle) from Scotland. Harriet is well-known to Lyth audiences as half of The Sutherland Duo and to local string players as an inspiring workshop leader.

The Kosmos Ensemble is re-defining classical and world music. Sophisticated jazz glides magically into wild Gypsy fiddling; emotive Jewish music into hot-blooded tango; Arabic and Turkish improvisation into Greek melodies. As described by Richard Morrison, chief music critic of The Times: “telepathic rapport, dazzling virtuosity, serious scholarship, intellectual curiosity and impeccable musicianship. I defy you not to be mesmerised.” Making extensive use of their own arrangements, alongside vibrant new compositions, entrancing dance rhythms, soulful improvisation and passion delivered with panache and virtuoso technique.

Marit and Rona’s music is playful, borderless and thrilling. It glides from evocative near-classical movements through elegant polskas to buoyant reels, brought to life by Rona’s multi-personality fiddle virtuosity and Marit’s breath-taking mastery of the versatile låtmandola.

So you can imagine how exciting it will be for these five to spend a week hosted by Lyth’s new Residency Coordinator, Karlyn Sutherland. They’ll be working on new music inspired by the Scottish, Balkan, middle eastern, north African and South American flavours in their respective repertoires and plan to premiere these pieces during their Scottish tour this autumn.

http://www.kosmosensemble.com/

http://maritandrona.co.uk/

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