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Jonny Greenwood plays five new pieces in a London power station
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Photo: not credited by Faber Music · press photo, Faber MusicJonny Greenwood played five new pieces for guitar and ensemble for the first time on Sunday 23 February, by Faber Music's account, at the Wapping Hydraulic Power Station in east London. Soloists of the London Contemporary Orchestra played with him, conducted by Hugh Brunt. In an interview The Quietus published five days earlier, he talked to Chris Woolfrey about the concert and about Radiohead.
'The National Anthem' arrangement was sung by Thom - I just wrote it down.
Jonny Greenwood1
About 500 people filled the power station, a brick building that still holds its old machinery and was until recently home to the Wapping Project arts centre. In the reports of the night, “Loop” is built on an electric guitar figure that is looped and built up. For “Self-Portrait With Seven Fingers” the audience joined in on their phones. Greenwood also played the ondes Martenot, an early electronic instrument, and the tanpura, and the programme took in extracts from his film scores and works by Bach, Purcell, Messiaen, Xenakis and Edmund Finnis.
First performances, 23 February 2014
| # | Work | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Miniature | piano-based |
| 2 | Fight With Cudgels | – |
| 3 | Microtonal Sketches | intervals smaller than a semitone |
| 4 | Loop | electric guitar, looped |
| 5 | Self-Portrait With Seven Fingers | audience on their phones |
He wrote the music for this one concert, and told Woolfrey he would choose on the day what suited the room. With only seven players he suspected it would be too reverberant for microtonal pieces and better for the slower sextets from Norwegian Wood. Radiohead pick songs for a hall the same way, he says.
The film work he keeps from the band. It is solitary, a lot of preparation on paper and then a few anxious hours recording against the clock, and he tries to keep the instruments true to the film's period. For Norwegian Wood he found a 1960s Japanese nylon-string guitar and period home recording gear. He is due to score Paul Thomas Anderson's next film, Inherent Vice. In Radiohead he enjoys the glockenspiel as much as the guitar. I enjoy struggling with instruments I can't really play.
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“Harry Patch (In Memory Of)”, just Thom Yorke and a string orchestra, is his favourite of his string arrangements, and he says he would not have written it without the orchestral music he has made away from the band.
I'm still keen to approach a Radiohead song by going to orchestra first instead of orchestra last, as is traditional.
Jonny Greenwood1
Jonny Greenwood and LCO soloists, Wapping Hydraulic Power Station, London, 23 February 2014· London Contemporary Orchestrawatch on youtube →