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The Stockholm Syndrome Ensemble was born out of frustration. Frustration that there isn’t more time to reflect and question why we do what we do when we play and listen to music. Our hope is that exposure to a different kind of concert experience might further open our ears and minds.

‘Classical’ concerts are strange things. Most programmes are built around a performer who plays the pieces that (they feel) they play well. Often these are crafted in to a programme that combines contrasting styles and eras, but inevitably and necessarily ends up being more about the performer than the music

Contemporary and improvised forms of music have the advantage that they’re often performed by the composer themselves. There is a given context and purpose, and an integrity irrespective of content or quality. An unknown audience can at once appreciate that this music is a product of our time. It has a relevance and, one hopes, a meaning and longevity. 

Our goal is to bring music powerfully, colorfully, immediately and meaningfully in to the ear of the listener. We hope to forge a bridge between other kinds of music and art from the past and present. We might do this by playing shorter concerts, using pre-concerts and post-concerts to collect the musical inferences and influences that have been thrown up by a particular piece, and sometimes by dramatising the music.

If there is one general benefit of art of any period, it is an aesthetic one. This is more than simply cultivating an artistic sensibility, but something which inspires presence of mind and body. This is music’s vocation and supreme talent: to return us always to the present. If we are not reminded of this then when our world has grown and expanded as far as we can force it, we might not have the presence of mind to appreciate it.