Scott Walker - And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball?

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4...according to our Mingus on Thu 27 Sep, 2007.

Scott Walker: 'and who shall go to the ball? and what shall go to the ball' (4AD) Heavens we are being arty today, first up we have the Records records and Tyyfpus free-improv, then the Cardew avant-garde popular front. Now we have the barely perceptible, almost invisible sounds written for the dance piece of the same name. Was this made by chance or written using chance techniques and/or methodologies? Micro-macro rubbings, scrapings, judderings and thudderings, droning and floating. Sounds like the score to an underwater ballet or a football match played on ice on the moon. A very interesting week for releases, shame you'll ignore the more challenging stuff in favour of the populist, but...hey!

Scott Walker was commissioned by London’s South Bank Centre to write the music for a contemporary dance piece, released here as a limited edition in exquisite deluxe packaging.Entitled ‘And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball?’, the entirely instrumental composition is made up of four movements with a total running time of 25 minutes.·Scott has this to say about the music: “Apart from a slow movement given over to solitude, the music is full of edgy and staccato shapes or cuts, reflecting how we cut up the world around us as a consequence of the shape of our bodies. How much of a body does an intelligence need to be potentially socialised in an age of ever-developing AI ? This is but one of many questions that informed the approach to the project”.·When the music was completed, it was given to choreographer Rafael Bonachela and a dance company called Candoco, whose ranks include both able-bodied and disabled dancers. With production and lighting design also influenced by Scott’s approach to the project, the first public performance took place at the Contact Theatre in Manchester on April 26th. ·Since then, the company have toured the piece around Europe to much acclaim, and in September they return to the UK to perform at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. To coincide, 4AD will make the music for ‘And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball?’ available as a limited edition release in deluxe packaging. It will never be repressed.

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