As many of you likely know, I also play violin for the contemporary music group Ensemble Dal Niente. Starting last weekend, and continuing through this week, I am in Darmstadt, Germany with the ensemble for the (in)famous Summer Course for New Music. You can expect more thoughts from me once I'm not in the midst of rehearsal on some of the most challenging music I've ever tackled - especially on the amazing chamber performances by the Arditti Quartet and Ensemble Recherche in works by Brian Ferneyhough.
For now, I hope you enjoy my photo-blog...since my phone is mostly useful as an mp3 player and camera here. Clicking a photo makes it bigger!
The opening concert of the festival, with Ensemble Modern playing Cage.
The amazing Arditti Quartet with Brian Ferneyhough after performing his String Quartet No. 6. More on this later.
A side-street in Darmstadt, that I discovered en-route to my and Jesse Langen's Shangri-La of espresso drinks.
Daniel Vezza plays the hero as well as the composer at Dal Niente's composer workshop by killing a Godzilla-sized spider.
Dal Niente's workshop concert got a bit crowded when extensive piano preparations moved us into a small chamber hall.
The view from my hotel room balcony. I'll see you and the quartet soon enough.