Nieuw Ensemble, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival @ St Paul's Hall

In a complete overhaul of the planned order the orchestra lead with Erçin Kaya's Brackets, the piece is initially driven by the stringed mandolin and guitar, but they fall back to give prominence to a recording of a deranged sounding 20th century poet named Raoul Hausmann. The sound of Hausmann echoing around over the sparse pulses of strings is deeply unnerving. The minimalism plays well but the middle sections did seem to drag a little as nothing more than filler, completely lacking emotion, style or inventiveness.

Half the ensemble leave for the second part, Gerard Pesson's Recreations Fracaises, leaving the violin, the flute, the oboe, the clarinet and a pianist. The programme notes describe it as "a tribute to French music", written in 1995 it has taken 14 years to make its debut in Blighty but it was a worthwhile wait. Divided in 9 sections it is a 15 minute master class of instruments playing off each others sounds complimenting each other wonderfully. Highlights include section 2 where the three wind instruments are played together before gradually being joined by the rest of the instruments and a game of call and repeat between a flute and a violin.

The rest of the ensemble return from hiding for Luca Francesconi's A Fuoco, a piece written about memory. I didn't really get the connection personally, it is possibly I forgot it (get it? Memory? forgot?), but I did get a quarter hour of nicely flowing music. The centre instrument here is an acoustic guitar which spends most of the time being picked quickly with an almost mariachi sound to it. The other instruments provided supplement without stealing the focus, the sections featuring the wind instruments are particularly ethereal.

After a brief interval we are treated to a composition by Seung-Ah Oh, named after a traditional Korean singing technique. JungGa represents Korean heritage coming to the fore of her compositions. With the Oboe acting like a vocal line for the piece the eighteen minutes whizz past. Certainly the most interesting and entertaining piece performed today.

The shortest piece tonight is Natalia Dominguez Rangel's minimalist piece Speech Perception; which heavily uses long periods of silence with very occasional bursts of sound. At only 5 minutes it's still too long, rarely threatening to interrupt your boredom.

Rounding off the night is Stefano Bellon's En Roscas de Cristal de Serpiente Breve, a compact driven piece of music fueled by the strength and complexity of the violin work aptly provided by Emi Ohi Resnick who plays out of her skin. The violin twists and wriggles over the other instruments like a snake on sand. This piece of virtuosity rounds off the night perfectly prompting a huge and deserved audience reaction.

Overall the night provided beautiful music in a beautiful setting, there were only a couple of duds but the proficiency and intrigue of the pieces prove entertaining, showing not all contemporary music is men hitting tape recorders and off kilter time signatures. ( http://www.nieuw-ensemble.nl/en/fs/1_1.html)