Virtuoso keyboardist James McVinnie plays from J S Bach’s extraordinary works for keyboards, as part of Back to Bach. Continuing Bold Tendencies’ cross season celebration of Baroque polymath J S Bach, we focus here on the Italian Concerto and French Overture - written by Bach as a pair, set in F major and B minor (the most distant keys to one another); showing his chameleon-like approach to the assimilation of different national styles of composition into his own inimitable writing. In the Italian Concerto the keyboard is the whole orchestra. Intricate passages are passed between imagined soloists and tutti-a tour-de-force riot for the fingers. The French Overture is a collection of dances book-ended with a grand Overture and unique Echo movement. Bach moulds and remoulds the same musical material again and again into each different dance movement, which make up the work as a whole. The Concerto and Overture are interspersed by pieces from one of the most important works in music history - The Well-Tempered Clavier. Composed in the early 1720s, this 48 piece collection spanning all 24 major and minor keys was written by Bach “For the profit and use of the studious musical youth”; they are at once delightfully imaginative, and triumphs of musical geometry. This event is supported by Scops Art Trust. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Bold Tendencies platforms the “super-producer” J Dilla, uplifting his prolific, distinctive sound and impact. In his brief but brilliant life, Dilla accumulated kudos as one of the most influential artists in hip hop and popular music. Described by friend and music producer Madlib as the “Coltrane of Hip-Hop”, Dilla’s raw and imperfect style is characterised by its loose, human feel - his creation of a uniquely “Dilla Time”, possessed of a complex, and soulful swing and groove. Join us as we play selected tracks from his second and final studio album Donuts - released on his 32nd birthday, just three days before his untimely death in 2006. Widely acclaimed for its wrangling with impermanence, the album is largely considered Dilla’s swansong and magnus opus, playing with the boundaries of the known and unknown, past, present and future; a tapestry of liberal layering and eclectic sampling. Dilla’s relentlessly fresh wordplay, pun and lyrical wit will be interspersed with creative responses from guest artists including Fraser T Smith and Yomi Sode, sidestepping the terrains of more traditional listening parties, sound stories, and audio essays. Presented by Bold Tendencies. This is a 12+ event.

How do we love? Let us count the ways. Multi-Story Orchestra’s new orchestral and choral piece Love in Many Forms explores the varied kinds of love that shape our lives - from the thrill of first love to the warmth of family love, from love that challenges societal expectations to the love we learn to show ourselves. Love in Many Forms invites you to reflect on how love defines us. Love in Many Forms has been created by the Orchestra’s South London based Young Creatives, with songwriter Dupri McKoy and composer Lewis Daniel. In true Multi-Story style, the performance will begin with musicians spread all around the space before coming together for the full orchestral performance, led by Music Director Yshani Perinpayagam and Choir Leader Dupri McKoy. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Bold Tendencies pays homage to Thomas Mann’s wartime radio broadcasts Deutsches Hörer (Listen, Germany!), with new messages on the issues of our time contrasted with readings from the originals. An unlikely hero of democracy, Thomas Mann has shocked and captivated audiences since the turn of the 20th century. Mann’s output - spanning novels, short stories, poetry, essays, lectures, letters and diaries - charts the evolution of both his own, and collective political thought and cultural mores; the changing tides of Europe in an era of technological shifts and World Wars. From October 1940 Mann delivered 55 monthly short broadcasts via the BBC under the title Deutsches Hörer! (Listen, Germany!), condemning the brute violence and crude philistinism of the time. Advocating for ongoing resistance and collective action, their exploration of human injustice, inequity and global atrocity is enduring. On the occasion of what would have been his 150th birthday, Listen, World! draws upon the spirit of Mann’s radio speeches. Alongside readings of the originals, we welcome contributions from artists and thinkers of our time including Nikolaj Schultz, Charlie Fox and Mohsen Mohamed; their messages honouring and staking claim in the legacy of resistance and hope propelled by Mann and so many brave others. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Artist and choreographer Eve Stainton makes their Bold Tendencies debut with The Joystick and The Reins (World Premiere), accompanied by Ennio Morricone’s seminal score for The Thing (1982). The Joystick and The Reins explores who is deemed to be, and those who decide what constitutes a ‘threat’ within society; exploring how marginalised groups have been instrumentalised through systems of oppression and authoritarianism. Cycling through hyper-emotional states of intensity, the scene and solo figure become a site for the audience’s own projections. This becomes a choreographic practice of distortion, referencing ideas of power, dominance, perpetrator, victim, threat and interpretation. Influences for The Joystick and The Reins include historical reenactments, police and riot arrest imagery, and 1980s Crime Watch episodes; examining what it means to reconstruct a theatrical scene that draws on truth, and how societal constructs keep people ‘at risk’ of incarceration in a place of vulnerability. Morricone’s music finds resonance with Stainton’s mutual exploration of societal suspicion, psychological horror, and the devastating potential of individual isolation. Co-commissioned by Bold Tendencies, Dansehallerne (DK), Transform, Possession Performance + Automation and The Place. Supported by Queen Mary University of London, Old Diorama Arts Centre, Den Frie Udstilling (DK), SLUG (DE) and L'Ecart Biennial (CA). This event is supported by the Wavendon Foundation. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

The London Symphony Orchestra, one of the world’s top orchestras, makes its Bold Tendencies debut performance with a special evening of works for strings. The LSO’s first programme for the concrete concert hall - devised by Benjamin Marquise Gilmore, violinist and Leader of this great orchestra - begins with the so-called “ninth symphony” by pioneering Polish composer and violin virtuoso Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969). The Concerto for String Orchestra (1946) is amongst her most important works and won a Polish State Prize in 1950, going on to be performed worldwide. The sensibility of traditional music is enfolded via Sally Beamish’s The Day Dawn (for string orchestra), based on an old Shetland fiddle tune of the same name. Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings follows; composed in the late summer of 1880 it layers beauty, joy and sweetness with solemnity, melancholy and devastation. The programme ends with Entr’acte by multi-award-winning composer Caroline Shaw. An alternately illusive, spiky, playful and soporific string instrument sound experience, she says of it: “I love the way some music suddenly takes you to the other side of Alice’s looking glass, in a kind of absurd, subtle, technicolor transition.” Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Sheku Kanneh-Mason and Sæunn Thorsteindottír play the Complete Cello Suites as part of Back to Bach. Speaking profoundly to our age, Bach’s supremely human music transcends any sense of current genre and fashion; encapsulating the range of emotional, intellectual and physical experience. Largely unknown for some 200 years after their composition, Bach’s six works for unaccompanied cello are amongst the composer’s greatest musical achievements. We are joined by exceptional musicians of the new generation - acclaimed Icelandic cellist Sæunn Thorsteindottír joining us specially, and friend of Bold Tendencies Sheku Kanneh-Mason (from whom the idea came to play the Cello Suites in our raw concrete spaces) - for a special concert, offering this unrivalled music of intimacy and meditation a most extreme setting. This event is supported by Scops Art Trust. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

James McVinnie Ensemble animate the Concrete Concert Hall with the virtuoso electronic realisations of Wendy Carlos, as part of Back to Bach. In 1962, American composer and musician Wendy Carlos recorded various electronic pieces at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Centre in New York City - including a rendition of Bach’s Two-Part Invention in F Major, and the Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major. In 1967 Carlos would play these recordings to producer Rachel Elkind, laying the groundwork for a collaboration that would evolve into the 1978 album Switched-On Bach. Recorded in Carlos’ studio apartment using the then-recently invented Moog synthesiser, Switched-On Bach featured 10 electronic interpretations of Bach’s music; an unexpected success that reached No.1 on the Billboard Classical Albums chart. Join us as the James McVinnie Ensemble (James McVinnie, Eliza McCarthy, Siwan Rhys and Hugh Rowlands) pay homage to Wendy Carlos with a sequence of Bach’s works arranged for the Moog SoundLab UK, a portable studio centred around one of the rarest electronic instruments - the limited edition reissue of the legendary 1960s System 55 Moog Synthesizer. Specially designed by Moog Music Inc in 2014, the Lab is based in the Institute of Sound Recording at the University of Surrey, UK. This event is supported by Scops Art Trust. The Moog SoundLab UK is supplied with the support of Paul Smith. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Jean Rondeau, celebrated contemporary ambassador for his instrument, plays the Goldberg Variations on harpsichord. Composed (according to the title page) “for the soul’s delight of music lovers”, Bach’s Goldberg Variations fascinate every generation of musicians. This music reflects the world it finds itself in: past, present and future. The Goldberg Variations are 75 minutes of wildly virtuosic keyboard music: demanding, exacting, filled with glittering, intricate ornaments, but equally liberating for player and listener both. As Bach himself wrote, they were “composed for music-lovers to refresh their spirits” (reportedly in particular for warding off insomnia). Each of the 30 successive variations grows out of the previous one yet unfolds its own individual magic and drama, offering reassurance as well as exhilaration. We are thrilled to welcome outstanding musician Jean Rondeau to Bold Tendencies for the first time, to play the Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord - as they would have been when first played in 1741 by Bach’s student, 14-year-old harpsichordist Johann Gottlieb Goldberg. This event is supported by Scops Art Trust and the Continuo Foundation. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

We welcome acclaimed Rachmaninoff interpreters from around the world and spanning multiple generations, for back-to-back iterations of the composer’s four Piano Concertos. Ryan Wang, Jeneba Kanneh-Mason, Boris Giltburg and Junyan Chen join us as soloists and the Philharmonia Orchestra, returning for a fifth consecutive year of performances, is conducted by Charlotte Corderoy. Spanning 50 years of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s 69 year life, each of his four masterworks were written and subsequently much revisited, revised and reworked. They are some of the most extreme, technically challenging pieces in the piano repertoire, and some of the most famous and best-loved music in popular culture. The four Concertos arrived in a period of seismic change across socio-political and cultural life, and their sound worlds represent this in shimmering technicolour and contrasting emotional moods of melancholy, grotesquerie, nostalgia and exultation. Join us to hear these colossal pieces - rarely performed in this complete form, and never before in the UK - each requiring the stamina of an athlete, the dexterity of a surgeon, and the soul of an artist. This event is supported by the Rachmaninoff Commissioning Circle: Sam & Alexandra Morgan and those who wish to remain anonymous. The concert grand piano is supplied and maintained by Steinway & Sons, London. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Our season ends with the world premiere of Garland, a large-scale new work for orchestra and chorus of 118 performers by Oliver Leith, visionary British composer of the new generation. Garland is a spectacular procession of sound, music and singing. Leith’s most ambitious work to date is performed by the amassed forces of 12 Ensemble, GBSR Duo, EXAUDI, soprano Patricia Auchterlonie and a mixed amateur chorus; conducted by Naomi Woo and Jack Sheen with choral refrains written by Charlie Fox. The choir is augmented by a horse, bicycles, car and other pedestrian detritus ‘played’ to create noise and rhythm. 32 string and 16 brass players unite with a large battery of percussion and sampler keyboards to form an atypical orchestra, enveloping the audience in sound as the performers circulate our Concrete Concert Hall. Garland continues the relationship between Leith and Bold Tendencies, begun in 2023 with a presentation of his work good day good day bad day bad day (2018); continuing in 2024 with a programme of his three large-scale works for orchestra: Honey Siren (2019), Cartoon Sun (2023) and Pearly, goldy, woody, bloody, or, Abundance (2022). This event is supported by the Oliver Leith Commissioning Circle: Brian Boylan, John & Emma Donnelly, Bob Shaw, Lukas Zueger-Knecht and those who wish to remain anonymous. The concert grand piano is supplied and maintained by Steinway & Sons, London. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Artist and choreographer Eve Stainton makes their Bold Tendencies debut with The Joystick and The Reins (World Premiere), accompanied by Ennio Morricone’s seminal score for The Thing (1982). The Joystick and The Reins explores who is deemed to be, and those who decide what constitutes a ‘threat’ within society; exploring how marginalised groups have been instrumentalised through systems of oppression and authoritarianism. Cycling through hyper-emotional states of intensity, the scene and solo figure become a site for the audience’s own projections. This becomes a choreographic practice of distortion, referencing ideas of power, dominance, perpetrator, victim, threat and interpretation. Influences for The Joystick and The Reins include historical reenactments, police and riot arrest imagery, and 1980s Crime Watch episodes; examining what it means to reconstruct a theatrical scene that draws on truth, and how societal constructs keep people ‘at risk’ of incarceration in a place of vulnerability. Morricone’s music finds resonance with Stainton’s mutual exploration of societal suspicion, psychological horror, and the devastating potential of individual isolation. Co-commissioned by Bold Tendencies, Dansehallerne (DK), Transform, Possession Performance + Automation and The Place. Supported by Queen Mary University of London, Old Diorama Arts Centre, Den Frie Udstilling (DK), SLUG (DE) and L'Ecart Biennial (CA). This event is supported by the Wavendon Foundation. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages.

Jean Rondeau, celebrated contemporary ambassador for his instrument, plays the Goldberg Variations on harpsichord. Composed (according to the title page) “for the soul’s delight of music lovers”, Bach’s Goldberg Variations fascinate every generation of musicians. This music reflects the world it finds itself in: past, present and future. Public Rehearsals are open invitations to see performers in action. The relaxed atmosphere allows space for those who may prefer or require an informal performance setting. Breaking down the barrier between audience and artist, community members are invited to witness the rehearsal process of world-renowned artists in a relaxed setting. During rehearsals, audience members are free to move around as they need, allowing those with access requirements or those who may feel less at ease in traditional performance settings to experience and enjoy the arts in a comfortable space. Tickets are free however £5 donations are welcome, to support us to continue offering free, accesible cultural and creative activities for Southwark and Peckham residents. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages

We welcome acclaimed Rachmaninoff interpreters from around the world and spanning multiple generations, for back-to-back iterations of the composer’s four Piano Concertos. Ryan Wang, Jeneba Kanneh-Mason, Boris Giltburg and Junyan Chen join us as soloists and the Philharmonia Orchestra, returning for a fifth consecutive year of performances, is conducted by Charlotte Corderoy. Public Rehearsals are open invitations to see performers in action. The relaxed atmosphere allows space for those who may prefer or require an informal performance setting. Breaking down the barrier between audience and artist, community members are invited to witness the rehearsal process of world-renowned artists in a relaxed setting. During rehearsals, audience members are free to move around as they need, allowing those with access requirements or those who may feel less at ease in traditional performance settings to experience and enjoy the arts in a comfortable space. Tickets are free however £5 donations are welcome, to support us to continue offering free, accesible cultural and creative activities for Southwark and Peckham residents. Presented by Bold Tendencies. All ages