“We’re friends. And we also have huge respect for each other,” one member of Façades told me at their Sunday evening launch concert in Palmers Green. After all, there has to be a good reason why four creative singers, all of whom each lead their own projects, and also are in constant demand from top instrumentalists all over Europe, and who have full teaching schedules…. should decide that they want to form a vocal quartet.. in order to write pieces which will challenge the group, rather than be gentle and give it a easy start.
The results are spectacular, and this first concert had a lot of support and goodwill from other musicians and supporters.
The group has a palpable start-up energy about it. They were having a wry laugh that only two pieces (of the eight works being performed) weren’t receiving “world premieres”. I also keep hearing that the name of the group “Façades” might not last. Uncertainty, it seems, is part of the excitement.
Fini Bearman’s piece had the group operating both in four-part harmony and as soloist with backing vocalists. Brigitte Beraha’s three-section piece seemed to give each singer lots of freedom. Lauren Kinsella’s composition brought them into the realm of expression tantalisingly near silence, and Clare Wheeler set the bar high, and differently, by expecting the co-existence in the moment of complexity with total emotional commitment.
We also heard the group’s first commission from a third-party composer, Kevin Figes’s “Yielding”. With its tone clusters and clashes, it certainly wasn’t designed to soothe.
The singers’ own compositions, then, explored a big range. But one fascinating unknown with this group might be in its future commissioning from composers. These singers are so good, their presence as performers so assured, the knowledge of what they can do (and the level at which they can do it) so secure, it means that they could be placed in front of any professional large ensemble in the world, and right from now, from day one.
The stage had been set earlier by a short solo peroration from tenor saxophonist George Crowley. You have to have a very mischievous and knowing sense of humour indeed to do a solo set in a church which sets embraces and lives the “Lush Life”….and fills every nook in the church with gorgeous, luxuriant sound as you do it. Risqué, yes, but also magical.
SET LIST
‘Jellied Eels’ by Fini Bearman
‘Façades’ Part I “Hurry”, Part II “A(another) Window’” Part III- “Where they Don’t Exist” by Brigitte Beraha
‘Will We Ever Meet Again’ by Fini Bearman
‘Is This What it Takes’ by Lauren Kinsella
‘Yielding’ by Kevin Figes
‘Fugue for Autumn’ by Clare Wheeler
‘Coventry Carol’ 16th Century English Melody arranged by Clare Wheeler
‘Mother Sun’ by Clare Wheeler
