chris burn musician

[2000]

 

In 1999 - 2000 he transcribed and arranged a number of early solo improvisations by Derek Bailey for the string trio 'cranc' - Rhodri Davies, Angharad Davies and Nikos Veliotis. He later arranged these transcriptions, in a number of versions for solo Piano. In addition to including them in his own concerts, both Phil Thomas and Pat Thomas performed and recorded these pieces. Another set of arrangements, this time for 'inside piano' was made with transcriptions of Alan Lamb's 'Wire Music'. Excerpts were played at a solo concert given by Chris Burn at the Ulrichsberg Kaleidophon in 2007. As part of this performance, and at other solo concerts around this time, Burn was now including electro acoustic and amplified treatments of the piano.

 

A series of compositions; Piano pieces and some pieces for Brass and for Percussion were written from 2000 onward; 'Hall of Mirrors' was played by Tubulate in the UK, Europe, Russia and America. 'alles vergangliches' was first performed in Freiburg in 2004 by Steve Altoft and Lee Ferguson. Phil Thomas played his piano pieces at the BMIC, Cage and 21st century Britain festival, the 2002 Acousmental festival and the Comprovisation festival 2005. Further CD releases at this time were on both EMANEM and other labels; as soloist, group and Ensemble member. A more flexible approach to personnel was adopted by Ensemble. 'Horizontals White' (2001) and 'Ensemble at Musica Genera' (2002)were recorded with different sextets. Concerts were given in Vienna ('95)and Berlin ('97) with larger groups drawn mainly from musicians from those two cities. A later group performed at Densites 2008 with just five musicians; Burn, John Butcher, Christof Kurzmann, Simon Fell and Le Quan Ninh. This can be heard at; www.lequanninh.net

 

Other festival appearances included Musica Genera, Phil Thomas's 'Comprovisation' Festival, Ad Hoc 2007- Munich (as both soloist and where the Burn/Doerner/Frangenheim trio also perfomed), Ausland 2007, Densites 2008, and - as trumpeter - at the Freedom of the City 2002 festival with Matt Hutchinson and in two of John Russell's 'Fete Quaqua' festivals at the Vortex.

 

In 2008, Burn worked in the John Butcher Group, performing 'somethingtobesaid' a composition by John Butcher, for eight musicians. This piece, commissioned from John Butcher by the Huddersfield Festival was performed at HCMF 2008, Den Bosch 2008, Maerz Music Berlin - 2010 and recorded for BBC Radio 3 broadcast and CD(WOW2.) At this time Burn participated in two recordings for Another Timbre. The first, a trio of two Pianos and Double Bass with Phil Thomas and Simon Fell - the middle distance (AT24) - and the second a recording of Cage's four4 (AT34) with Simon Allen, Lee Patterson, Chris Burn and Mark Wastell.In Summer 2010, he wrote a piece for trumpet player Matt Davis; 'loe music' was premiered in Falmouth, Cornwall in November 2010 during Matt Davis's solo trumpet recital alongside Cage, Wolff and others.

More recently he has been a regular performer at the annual Quaqua festival and in 2013 played solo and in duo with Magda Mayas at the Concepts of Doing festival, Belin. He returns to Berlin at the end of 2013 to record and play concerts with Alexander Frangenheim and Axel Doerner. In the 2015 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival he played in Simon Fell's group and has in 2016 taken part in the Confront Recordings celebrations at Cafe Oto, London.