Crespo Series | Waking up the ear

Few composers reshaped the sound world of the late twentieth century as radically as Luigi Nono (1924-1990). A leading figure of the post-war avant-garde, Nono brought new ways of listening, especially in the final decade of his life, when he began to explore live electronics not as an effect, but as a natural extension of human sound. “Das atmende Klarsein” (“The Breathing of Clarity”, 1980–83) is the first major work of this late period and remains one of the most significant pieces ever written for choir with electronics.

For listeners more familiar with Classical and Romantic repertoire, this music invites a different kind of attention. Instead of sweeping melodies or dramatic climaxes, Nono focuses on breath, stillness and the fragile beginnings of sound. The work is scored for small choir, bass flute, tape and live electronics, and draws on fragments of texts including the Duino Elegies of Rainer Maria Rilke. Words and tones emerge gently, hover in the air, and fade into silence. These silences are not pauses in the action; they are part of the music’s expressive core.

The electronic element is written precisely into the score. Sounds from the choir and bass flute are captured and subtly transformed in real time, then projected around the performance space. This creates an immersive, almost architectural experience of sound, as if the music were breathing around the audience. The bass flute, performed here by internationally acclaimed flautist Lina Andonovska, plays a central role. Its dark, velvety tone blends with the choir, sometimes leading, sometimes dissolving into an electronic halo, heightening the sense of intimacy and depth.

Irish composer Ian Wilson, no stranger to Bantry audiences, responds to Nono’s sound world with a new companion piece, “Adam’s Rib”, written for the same forces. Setting texts by Serbian poet Draginja Adamović, whose concentrated, dreamlike poems explore fractured realities and suspended time, Wilson’s work also explores the border between sound and silence, supported and extended by live electronics and spatialised sound.

We are delighted to welcome Lina Andonovska, Bernie Sherlock and the fantastic Dublin New Voices on their first visit to Bantry. Their programme offers not a traditional narrative journey, but a shared act of listening: music that unfolds slowly, attentively, and with extraordinary delicacy. It is an invitation to experience sound - and silence - in a new and deeply human way.

Tickets: €20/16/10