The Blue Shroud

Barry Guy, bass and director  
Savina Yannatou, voice
Jordina Millà, piano 
Maya Homburger, violin 
Fanny Paccoud, viola  
Ben Dwyer, guitar 
Torben Snekkestad, soprano sax / tenor / reed trumpet 
Michael Niesemann, alto sax  /  oboe   
Per Texas Johansson, tenor sax / clarinet 
Julius Gabriel, baritone sax / soprano 
Percy Pursglove, trumpet
Marc Unternährer, tuba
Lucas Niggli, percussion
Ramón López, percussion 

 

Barry Guy The Blue Shroud (Irish Premiere)

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Barry Guy performs and directs his remarkable new work, The Blue Shroud, a piece that brings together superb musicians in a creative scenario that reflects his belief that compassion is still a currency open to all, with the ultimate hope that humanity will learn from history.

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Three strands  inform The Blue Shroud: the bombing in 1937 of the Basque city of Guernica; the painting by Pablo Picasso that arose following the event; and in more recent times (2003) a blue drape that was hung over a tapestry reproduction of the Guernica painting in the United Nations building before U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell delivered his case for invading Iraq. It was historian Simon Schama’s analysis of Picasso’s painting that drew Guy into the world of Guernica and the resonances that have accompanied its history. The result is  a piece of music that reflects the realities of the subject matter, while indicating the power of the human spirit to withstand oppression.

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Barry Guy has assembled an international team of musicians adept atco-existing in the worlds of improvisation as well as Baroque music, and. fragments of Biber and J.S. Bach included in the score are performed on Baroque violin, viola, oboe and serpent. These fragments of early music sit side by side with contemporary modes of expression, the rhetoric of each bridging the gap between the centuries.

 

The project is further enriched by the words of Irish poet Kerry Hardie, who created Symbols of Guernica as the text for Guy’s composition, as well as two further verses for the end of the work. Hardie’s contribution became the backbone of the piece, which reflects on the human condition and the continued suffering and violence in the world, seen through the lens of Picasso’s iconic painting.