Colin Currie is 'masterful' in tour with Asko|Schönberg

© Juri Hiensch

Last month, Colin joined the Asko|Schönberg ensemble for a six-date tour across the Netherlands, kicking off at Amare in The Hague. Performing an all–Steve Reich programme, the tour took him to Amsterdam, Tilburg, Utrecht, and Heerlen.

Colin performed Reich’s Clapping Music and Four Organs, before closing the concerts by conducting Reich/Richter.

“The music of Steve Reich performed by one of his greatest proponents, British percussionist Colin Currie, joined by Dutch contemporary music ensemble, Asko|Schönberg… The first half was all about the music and the intense effort exerted by the musicians to perform with such precision. Now, with musicians out of view, Reich’s largely consonant and highly accessible musical language in the masterful hands of Currie and Asko|Schöberg, was about the listener.”
Bachtrack, April 2025

Reich/Richter is a collaborative cinematic exploration of Gerhard Richter’s intense, abstract painting 946-3, which was stretched and manipulated on a screen in the halls, to new music by Reich. “A stream of images, its rhythmic flow interpreted by music and, at the same time, a musical composition visualized by film images” is how Richter describes the collaboration.

Colin previously conducted the European premiere of the work in 2019, at the special request of Steve Reich himself, who invited him having seen Colin conduct his music in both Tokyo and Paris with the Colin Currie Group.

© Juri Hiensch

Watch the trailer for Reich/Richter with the Asko|Schönberg below:

Colin Currie is 'mesmerising' in performance of Tan Dun’s Water Concerto with the LPO

On Saturday 29 March, Colin reunited with the London Philharmonic Orchestra to perform Tan Dun’s Water Concerto at Queen Elizabeth Hall, London. Conducted by Hannu Lintu, Colin’s performance of the extraordinary, culture-crossing Water Concerto has been met with critical acclaim:

"The London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by the last-minute replacement Hannu Lintu, matched adventure with brilliant playing. Virtuoso percussionist Colin Currie made the Water Concerto as much about theatre as music... highly entertaining."
★★★★★ - The Times

“Colin Currie’s mesmerising display in Tan Dun’s Water Concerto with the LPO. The surface of the water became the skin of a drum as Currie attacked it... it is quite an experience, and no praise can be too high for Currie.” 
Seen and Heard International

“Currie’s measured, deliberate movements gave the whole thing a curious gravity. It needed to be seen, as well as heard.”
The Spectator

© London Philharmonic Orchestra

© London Philharmonic Orchestra

Colin Currie conducts the Hallé in festival of Philip Glass

This week, Colin travels to Manchester to conduct the Hallé Orchestra in their three-day festival celebrating the music of pioneering minimalist composer Philip Glass. One of the most influential composers alive today and among the first proponents of the minimalist movement, Glass’s music was described as “a viscous bath of pure, thick energy” by electronica pioneer Brian Eno.

This afternoon (14 February), Colin conducted the orchestra in Glass’ 1981 piece Glassworks at the Royal Northern College of Music. Written to exploit cutting-edge technology at the time, the piece was released both on LP and also on cassette tape in a special stereo mix intended for listening with headphones and Walkman.

Colin conducts the Hallé

Tomorrow (15 February), Colin leads the Hallé in Glass’ multimedia piece LIFE: A Journey Through Time. The visuals that accompany Glass’ shimmering music comes from the culmination of National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting’s six-year journey of photographic discovery that parallels new scientific insights about the evolution of life on Earth. The result is a lyrical interpretation of life on our planet, from its earliest beginnings to its present diversity. From prehistoric trilobites to giant tortoises, delicate jellies to spiny octopus trees, and from erupting volcanoes to shimmering coral reefs.

This is Colin’s second time conducting the Hallé in their annual composer festivals, leading them in music by Steve Reich last year to critical acclaim. The Guardian described Colin as “a conductor with a percussionist’s instinct for meter” and praised his performances as “masterful”.

 

Colin Currie performs two UK premieres with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra

This week, Colin returns to the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra to take on the UK premieres of two captivating concertos.

On Thursday 6 February, Colin will take the stage at Glasgow City Halls to perform Olga Neuwirth’s sci-fi inspired percussion concerto, Trurliade - Zone Zero, conducted by Mihhail Gerts (who replaces Ilan Volkov).

At 35 minutes long, Olga states that the concerto is inspired by both the ‘typewriter scene’ from the movie Who’s Minding the Store? (1963), and the algorithmic systems, which eliminate trader input, in stock market trading.

The “brazenly modernistic” work, as Colin describes it, requires him to perform at an extremely large percussion station, together with a full orchestra. Thera are also three additional percussion stations that are each manned by an orchestral player, positioned at the rear of the orchestra.

The concert will be broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 at 7.30pm GMT, and will be available to listen back to on BBC Sounds.

Colin’s percussion set up for Trurliade - Zone Zero

Then on Friday 7 February, Colin will once again join the BBC SSO, this time to perform the UK premiere of Andy Akiho's Percussion Concerto at Aberdeen Music Hall. Colin recently performed the work last month in a five-date tour of Belgium with the Brussels Philharmonic.

The work, originally written for Colin in 2019, uses a battery of instruments, including a toy piano, vibraphone, glockenspiel, kick drum, snare drum, car-brake drum, and even tuned rice bowls hit with chopsticks.

Colin recently sat down with Intermusica to discuss the two works, as well as his other upcoming concerto engagements this Spring. Watch below:

Colin Currie performs Akiho's Percussion Concerto with Brussels Philharmonic

Colin performing the premiere of Andy Akiho’s Percussion Concerto in 2019

This weekend, Colin kicks off a five-date tour of Belgium with the Brussels Philharmonic. The programme consists of swirling dance music to traditionally usher in the new year, with a virtuosic surprise at its centre: Andy Akiho’s Percussion Concerto. Written specially for Colin in 2019, the piece uses a battery of instruments, including a toy piano, vibraphone, glockenspiel, kick drum, snare drum, car-brake drum, and even tuned rice bowls hit with chopsticks.

Classical Voice America said of the piece’s premiere: “Currie, who was the orchestra’s artist-in-residence from 2015-2018, performed each instrument with precision and panache, always impressively in sync with the orchestra… An exciting cadenza was both inventive and playful. Intensely complex rhythmic passages became faster and faster, with Currie blitzing the bowls with dazzling speed.” Colin himself remarked: “The new Andy Akiho concerto has completely blown me away, with its verve, joy, depth of emotion and vibrancy of colours. The superb orchestration and fabulous harnessing of symphonic power made a huge impression at the premiere, not just with myself but the audience, who went wild for the piece, and also the orchestral musicians who rallied enthusiastically around this work. In four movements, the percussion set-ups are clear and distinct, and very well-designed.”

You can catch the concert at Concertgebouw Brugge on 4 and 5 January, Schouwburg Leuven on 7 January, Flagey Brussel on 8 January, and CC De Spil Roeselare on 11 January.

Colin with Andy Akiho

Colin Currie Quartet performs two world premieres at Kings Place

Colin performs a programme rife with personal connections at Kings Place this weekend. The Colin Currie Quartet celebrates his native Scotland in the venue’s year-long ‘Scotland Unwrapped’ series, which pays tribute to music and musicians from the region and draws to a close this month. Colin has had a long association with Kings Place, having performed many times at the venue.

The programme features three Scottish composers: David Horne, Aileen Sweeney, and Anna Meredith. David Horne’s Pulse for solo marimba, which opens the concert, uses the human heartbeat as rhythmic inspiration and alternates unpredictably between extremes of energy and tranquility. This is Colin’s first time performing the work. Aileen Sweeney’s Starburst, performed here in its London premiere, infuses edgy, dancy, contrapuntal music with the composer’s traditional Scottish folk background. As suggested by the title, the piece takes inspiration from both astrophysics and childhood visits to the sweet shop, and was commissioned by Chamber Music Scotland, where Colin is an Ambassador.

You can listen to the Colin Currie Quartet rehearsing the piece here:

The third and final Scottish composer, Anna Meredith, has a double connection with Colin, as they played in the same wind band at their Edinburgh high school, and have kept in touch ever since. Anna has found success and was even nominated for the Mercury Prize for her high-octane and thrilling electronic music, and her piece Bumps Per Minute: 18 Studies for Dodgems is a typically full-throttle reinvention of the traditional fairground ride. The Quartet will play the piece in an arrangement by George Barton, a member of the Colin Currie Group.

A second world premiere from Ben Nobuto was commissioned by Colin specially for this concert. Daily Affirmation builds upon the mantra-like repetition of small and simple ideas to develop the four percussionists into “affirmation machines, dispensing joy in little packaged doses like those mechanical Pez sweets”.

The programme is completed by Steve Reich’s Mallet Quartet, a piece which among other Reich works has become a signature of the quartet. Written for two vibraphones and two five-octave marimbas, Reich’s typical canonic harmony creates a hypnotic groove.

The concert will be recorded for future broadcast on Radio 3.

Colin Currie joins the Hallé for MacMillan's Veni, Veni Emmanuel

Tomorrow evening, Colin plays the first of two dates with the Manchester-based Hallé orchestra, performing as the soloist in James MacMillan’s percussion concerto Veni, veni Emmanuel. Based on the Advent plainchant of the same name, the piece draws its inspiration from MacMillan’s Catholic faith, and has become one of Colin’s most-performed works. It uses an impressive battery of percussion instruments, producing tuned, untuned, skin, metal and wood sounds.

In a 2014 interview, MacMillan described how he “always loved the sonorities of percussion and continue to be impressed with the range of possible colours. I’ve learnt a lot from the players I’ve worked with… I’ve had the privilege to conduct a range of different percussionists and have observed how each brings different qualities to the same music. If I had to characterise Colin’s approach it would be a combination of accuracy and sensitivity that generates real emotion.”

In February, Colin will appear with the Hallé again for a three-day celebration of the music of living legend, Philip Glass. Colin will conduct musicians from the orchestra and from the nearby Royal Northern College of Music in Glassworks, and the following day in Frans Lanting’s LIFE: A Journey Through Time. Colin previously conducted the Hallé in their Reich festival earlier this year, which received a five-star review in the Daily Telegraph, with the Guardian describing how Colin “tightly corralled” the orchestra “with a percussionist’s instinct for meter”.

Colin Currie joins Royal Liverpool Philharmonic for Elfman's Percussion Concerto

Colin Currie heads to Liverpool tomorrow to join the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra for their concert ‘An American in Paris’. Conducted by JoAnn Falletta, Colin will perform Danny Elfman’s Percussion Concerto. The pair previously joined forces to record the piece for Sony Classical, which was released earlier this year, and will be signing their CDs following the performance.

Elfman wrote the Concerto specifically for Colin, praising him as “an extraordinary musician who would be great to collaborate with”, and the piece exploits his typically lush and cinematic style. “The audience were captivated by Colin Currie’s every move as he performed the piece. Darting across the stage between instruments, Currie is a true showman,” wrote Amy Melling (Abundant Art) of the US premiere.

The exuberant piece uses an impressive arsenal of percussion instruments (the soloist alone plays 12 instruments in total, including pots and pans, and a metal ‘gizmo’), and showcases Elfman’s classic sound so familiar from his many award-winning film scores.