Monday 4 December 2023, 7.30pm
Now preparing to drop their sixth CD, recorded live at Prague's Punctum, KONK PACK have entered a state of permanent 25th birthday celebration bringing new levels of high spirits.
‘KONK PACK is a hardcore trio made up of world class improvisers Tim Hodgkinson, Thomas Lehn and Roger Turner. All three members of Konk Pack have been improvising for decades with musicians like Lol Coxhill, Cecil Taylor, Tom Cora, Alan Silva, Evan Parker, Marcus Schmickler, Fred Frith, Charles Gayle.... the way that they improvise together is like a swarm of bees or a school of fish (sometimes piranhas). This is not intellectual music. A heavy rocking swing echoes out of loose noise conglomerations. Their music is an exercise in extreme dynamics that range from spacious and semi-silent tonal streaks to full out onslaughts that open doors to vast tidal waves of static, set to crash straight into the audience.’ DISCOGS
‘excited looks, glowing cheeks and people banging their heads as though they're watching a death metal gig. Right now, however, my impression is foremost shaped by a palpable emotional charge flowing from the performers to the visitors and back again’ – Tobias Fischer
With compositions featured at international festivals, such as Tectonics, Huddersfield, Spectrum XXI, Nordlyd, and Ars Musica, and two sets of works for ensemble out on the Mode label, Hodgkinson also has a powerful commitment to intense and highly energised performance practice. In over forty years' work he has placed himself in a series of definitive projects, whether as cofounder of the seminal Henry Cow group, as saxophonist with influential avant metal band God, or as bass clarinet soloist in the spectral compositions of Iancu Dumitrescu. His lap steel guitar playing remains completely uncategorisable, bringing subdued and not so subdued echoes of rock musics and other ethnicities.
http://www.timhodgkinson.co.uk/
Schooled both as a concert pianist playing contemporary repertoire and as a recording technician, Thomas Lehn deploys a huge musicality through his unique chosen outlet, the analogue synthesiser. This instrument allows him extremely close and immediate contact with all aspects of sound modification - a vast gamut of living electronic sound produced with unmatched speed and fluency. Thomas Lehn simply represents a coming-of-age of electronic sound production in the domain of concert performance that sets a standard for the entire medium. He is therefore unsurprisingly an essential member of many of the most active and significant projects in this international and dynamic scene.
Over decades Roger Turner has brought the renowned volcanic power and finely-honed precision of his drum work to ensembles that have forged substantial connections with musicians both sides of the Atlantic and more recently from Japan. In addition to pioneering an acoustic percussive language that can run in tandem with approaches to contemporary electronic instruments, he has worked extensively in the microscopic laboratory of the acoustic duo situation where he acquired a highly developed sense of detail and of dynamic control. One of that select group of world-class players who have collectively redefined the language of contemporary percussion, in Turner's hands minute inflections of tension can shape the group's musical direction and galvanise a new level of audience experience.
