Join us for a workshop offering a new perspective of performance and collaboration. Four different practitioners provide multiple aspects of a new piece of music, Androgynette for female pianist and players. These aspects relate to the body, how it moves and what this feels like.

Caroline Scott is a Feldenkrais practitioner and will lead a self-exploration into the sensations and feelings that accompany everyday movements. This will be an accessible session, inclusive of all bodies and abilities. Kate Ledger is a pianist interested in the lesser-known, unappreciated details of performance. She has worked with Caroline to locate these, and will demonstrate examples as they appear in Androgynette.

James Redelinghuys is a composer who prioritises the role of the body when composing. They have worked with Kate to incorporate located details of performance into Androgynette. Angela Guyton is a visual artist whose focus on the dramatic elements of performance are encapsulated in her illustrations and diagrams. These images will accompany the performance of Androgynette, some of which will be shared in this workshop.

This video was submitted as part of the Nott-Far Midlands Contemporary Music Symposium, 5-6 Dec 2020. It presents three people doing something together with a piano: Angela Guyton, James Redelinghuys and Kate Ledger. They centre around a piece of music that has been written for a pianist but incorporate the interplay between their subjective and objective views. Individually, they deal with delivery and success; physical separation and interpretation; priority and preference. Collaboratively, they capture seemingly pleasing qualities, attempting to tell the story from all sides by not leaving anything out. What may be found when working this way? What are the challenges when working this way?

Today’s version of the piece attempts to showcase its current stage in the process. With the finished performance scheduled for next year, the circumstances of which are still unknown, we present our hopeful yet fractured utterance. We listen and wait to see what happens next, and what arises through such vulnerable workings.

(I type this on the 8 Dec 2020 – the same day as the first Covid vaccination.)

— Kate Ledger (December 2020)