Page 14 - Fyne Times Spring 2014

Alan Turing
Codebreaker
A life in music by James McCarthy
Image © Andy Potts
Saturday 26 April
2014
7:30pm
world premiere
Barbican Hall, Silk Street,
London EC2Y 8DS
£25 £19 £15 £12.50 £9
concessions available
hertfordshire chorus
Naomi Harvey soprano
London Orchestra da Camera
David Temple conducting
www.hertfordshirechorus.org.uk
14
SPRING 2014
Alan Turing - CODEBREAKER
A life in music
by James McCarthy
World premiere, Saturday 26 April 2014
Barbican Hall, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
Hertfordshire Chorus
Naomi Harvey
London Orchestra da Camera
David Temple
JAMES McCARTHY’S ‘CODEBREAKER’
is a major new choral work based on the
life and tragic death of ALAN TURING -
mathematician, wartime code breaker and
pioneer of computer science. McCarthy sets
existing text to music - speeches and texts
from well-known poets (Wilfred Owen, Sara
Teasdale, Walt Whitman, Oscar Wilde, Robert
Burns) that reflect aspects of Turing’s life
experiences. Soprano soloist Naomi Harvey
provides the voice of Turing’s mother - a hugely
important figure in his life.
Codebreaker is by one of the UK’s most
talented young composers. James McCarthy
received rave critical
reviews for his
previous major work,
17 Days, about
the Chilean mining
accident, premiered
in 2012. The piece
was commissioned by
Hertfordshire Chorus.
To listen to an extract
from Codebreaker and
watch a short film about the piece, go to
Hertfordshire Chorus YouTube channel. Visit
the Codebreaker Facebook page for the most
up-to-date information.
“I am advised to try to forget it all.
That would be fatal…
To regret one’s own experiences
is to arrest one’s own development.
To deny one’s own experiences
is to put a lie into the lips of one’s own life.
It is no less than a denial of the soul…”
Adapted from Oscar Wilde’s ‘De Profundis’