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Events

Keyboard Evolution (part of the Being Human Festival 2018)

20 November 2018

Time: 1:00 - 7:45pm
Venue: The Octagon, Queens’ Building, Queen Mary University of London, E1 4NS

Explore the development of the keyboard instrument from the early clavichord to today’s cutting edge technologies.

Through interactive workshops and performances, discover how the keyboard has evolved over five hundred years. Learn how composers use the human body itself as extra-musical stimuli. Experience at first hand the differences between clavichord, harpsichord, early and modern pianos and modern digital keyboards.

Hear brand new music for the Magnetic Resonator Piano.

Professors Elaine Chew, Pier Lambiase, Peter Taggart and John Irving and Dr Andrew McPherson are joined by world-renowned pianist Rolf Hind.

 

Times as follows:

1pm short talk & concert: Music & Heart (Professors Elaine Chew and Pier Lambiase) – Music by Joseph Haydn, Cheryl Frances Hoad, Jonathan Berger, Dorien Herremans and Frédéric Chopin.

2.30pm to 3pm: About Heart & Music – Professor Elaine Chew and Professor Pier Lambiase reflect on music, mind, and heart interactions, the works performed and the stimulus that created them

3.15pm to 3:45pm: The Early Keyboard – Professor John Irving demonstrates the mechanisms and music of the early keyboards – clavichord, harpsichord and fortepiano. Opportunities to try these instruments

4pm to 4:30pm: The Modern Keyboard – Dr Andrew McPherson, Rolf Hind and Dr Paul Max Edlin discuss and demonstrate the development of the keyboard from the modern grand piano to new innovations including TouchKeys

4.45pm to 5:15pm: opportunities to try instruments

5.30pm concert: The Early Keyboard (Professor John Irving) – Music by W.A. Mozart, J.S. Bach and Beethoven.

7pm concert: The Modern Keyboard (Rolf Hind) includes world premiere of new work for Magnetic Resonator Piano – Music by Rolf Hind, Julia Adolphe, Ed Nesbit, Olivier Messiaen, Gyorgy Ligeti and Paul Max Edlin.

Tickets must be booked for each individual session you would like to attend. Attend as many as you can!

Venue and accessibility information:

The Octagon, Queens’ Building, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, E1 4NS

Disabled Access – please refer to: https://www.disabledgo.com/access-guide/queen-mary-university-of-london/octagon

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