Thursday 1 October 2026, 7.30pm
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Cellist Charles Curtis and bassoonist Dafne Vicente-Sandoval present a shared evening of works for cello and bassoon. The programme includes a new work by Tashi Wada, performed by the duo in the US earlier this year, alongside Éliane Radigue’s OCCAM duo composed for Curtis and Vicente-Sandoval, premiered in Glasgow in 2015 and performed here in London for the first time. Curtis will also perform a selection of solo works, with music by Alvin Lucier. Full programme to follow.
Born in Laguna Beach, California in 1960, cellist Charles Curtis has followed a singular path through the worlds of concert performance and musical experimentation. A graduate of the Juilliard School and the recipient of the Piatigorsky Prize, Curtis taught at Princeton and performed internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. His long creative relationships with experimentalists La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela, Alvin Lucier, Tashi Wada and Éliane Radigue have brought into being a body of distinctive works modeled on his cello-playing and performing persona. His own creative work has spanned sound-based and installatory work in galleries and alternative spaces, as well as experimental rock merging sustained sine waves and spoken word. He has made original music for experimental films by artists such as Raha Raissnia, Luke Fowler and Jeff Perkins. Very recent performances have taken Curtis to Empty Gallery in Hong Kong, the Biennale Son in Valais, Switzerland, London’s Café Oto for a series of four solo concerts, the Big Ears festival in Knoxville, EMPAC in Troy, New York, the Fondation Cartier in Paris, and Blank Forms in New York. Since 2000 Curtis has taught contemporary music performance at the University of California, San Diego, where he is now Distinguished Professor of Music.
Dafne Vicente-Sandoval is a bassoonist who explores sound through contemporary music interpretation and electroacoustic performance. Her research has translated into an intuitive investigation of the bassoon’s complex acoustic properties, embracing the elusive behavior of overtones as well as the countless possibilities in timbral shadings and idiosyncratic tunings. Her instrumental practice has led to the creation of a significant body of solo pieces in close collaboration with a handful of composers (Éliane Radigue, Jakob Ullmann, Alvin Lucier, Peter Ablinger, Phill Niblock, Catherine Lamb, Tashi Wada). A graduate of the Paris Conservatory and the Musik-Akademie Basel, Vicente-Sandoval currently lives in Paris. She has published essays in Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik, Revue et Corrigée, Blank Forms and Sound American magazines. Recent releases include Ullmann's Müntzers stern/Solo II on Edition RZ, Niblock's NuDaf on XI Records and Minos Circuit on Portraits GRM.
