The Non-Piano Ensemble is a Hamburg-based ensemble with 4 pianists at its core. It was founded by pianist Jennifer Hymer with the Hamburg festival Non-Piano/Toy Piano Weekend in 2014, its purpose being to have a group of outstanding solo pianists who could also play works for toy and other small instruments such as toy pianos, melodicas, kalimbas, toy & percussion instruments, balloons, typewriters, etc. Their numerous collaborations have included such performances as ensemble pieces up to 8 toy pianos, a Beatles-inspired program in the historic Indra, where the Beatles made their first Hamburg appearance, a balloon quartet by Francesco Filidei, an electric typewriter trio by Manuel Rodriquez Valenzuela, a kalimba trio by Steven Tanoto, Simon Steen-Andersen’s paper and voice duo ‘Difficulties Putting it into Practice’, a piece for juggler and toy piano with juggler/composer Denis Fargeton and two projects with puppet theater: ‘Monkey King’ with renowned Taiwanese puppeteer master Jean-Luc Penso and a Queen Elizabeth 1.-inspired puppet production with Lucie Cunningham.

Their appearance at the Non-Piano/Toy Piano Weekend has become a favorite yearly event in Hamburg with a wide array of toy pianos, unique musical guests, virtuosic performance feats and a diverse mixture of musical styles from pop, classics, remakes of classical music, theatrical performances to the most recent compositions in contemporary music and current trends in music technology.

With an imaginative use of toy and ‘real’ instruments in combination with carefully thought-out programs, the ensemble offers programs that are equally entertaining as also thought-provoking.

Since 2014 the ensemble has commissioned pieces from composers such as Sergio Vasquez Carrillo, Chris Corcoran, Hector Docx, Denis Fargeton, Mauro Lanza, Sascha Lino Lemke, Benjamin Helmer, Laura Livers, Linda Marcel, Julia Mihaly, Daniel Moreira, Ewelina Nowicka, Mats O Hansson, Ruta Paidere, Catalina Rueda, Benjamin Scheuer, Sebastian Sprenger, Steven Tanoto, Steffen Wolf and Dong Zhou.

They’ve had the pleasure of working with such special guests as Dorrit Bauerecker, Hui Hui Cheng, Lin Chen, Lucie Cunningham, Jan Gerdes, Karlheinz Essl, Taleja Großmann, Isabel Etteanuer, Lisa Lammel, Marcia Lemke-Kern, Benjamin Lyko, Lin-Ni Liao, Cornelia Monske, Meredith Nicoll, Lili Pätzhold, Jean-Luc Penso, Pawel Romanczuk, Jacob Sello, Manuel Rodriguez Valenzuela, Frederic Verrieres, Fanny Vicens, Anna Vishnevska and Ying-Chieh Wang.

In Kalv we will hear the musicians: Bernhard Fograscher, Jennifer Hymer, Daria-Karmina Iossifova, Steven Tanoto and with them is also composer and sound engineer Sascha Lino Lemke.

With support from Goethe Institut

About the concert 

Non-Piano Ensemble participates in several concerts during this year’s festival. Two of these, this one and tomorrow’s, form a larger unit, which goes by the motto ‘Out of this world’. This is how they themselves describe what the two concerts consist of:

”Out of this World’ presents an all-encompassing musical journey to different times, states and places with extraordinary compositions that are simply one of a kind.

Toy pianos are in the focus in such pieces as a rollicking toy piano duo by Thomas Kotcheff, Julia Wolfe’s street-music driven ‘East Broadway’ and the hearty welcome of ‘We hope you will enjoy the show’ in Daniel Moreira’s Beatles transcription (which includes a looped introduction of audience noises during the public’s entry).

The program also features unique compositional and performance practices in Sascha Lino Lemke’s ‘Albumblätterer’ in which two pianists use their very own score  and its pages as a crucial part of the composition,  Francesco Filidei’s colorful balloon quartet and a premiere by Benjamin Scheuer which in which a musical “cabinet of curiosities” with impossible sound objects and calls of rare creatures are presented to a sensation-seeking audience.

A visit to prehistoric times is also included with the piece ‘Fuoco’ commissioned from Mats O Hansson for a specially theme ‘Homosapiens’ program in 2021 where the toy pianist is surrounded by a huge screen of warm flickering flames and light accompanied by the cackling sounds of fire.

Additional humorous and unusual displays of instruments are included in Moritz Eggert’s ‘Melodie 1.0’ with the virtuostic clacking of a typewriter and two short trios by Francesco Filidei where the pianists need to perform some piano parts with their bottoms…

Program

John Cage – Living room music, movement 1 & 2 [1940] – for 4 performers

Erik Grizwold – Down the rabbit hole [2015] – for toy piano

Francesco Filidei – Due Sigle per Riccardo [2017] – for piano 6 hands and 3 bottoms

Moritz Eggert – Melodie 1.0 [1998] – for melodica, piano and type-writer

Gustav Holst/Steven Tanato – Venus: The Bringer of Peace – f0r melodicas and toy pianos

Francesco Filidei – Due Sigle per Riccardo [2017] – for piano 6 hands and 3 bottoms

Mats O Hansson – Fuoco [2021] – for toy piano, electronics and video

Steven Tanoto – The Justice from As She Likes It [2021] – for 4 melodicas and toy piano

About the concert 

Non-Piano Ensemble participates in several concerts during this year’s festival. Two of these, this one and yesterday’s, form a larger unit, which goes by the motto ‘Out of this world’. This is how they themselves describe what the two concerts consist of:

”Out of this World’ presents an all-encompassing musical journey to different times, states and places with extraordinary compositions that are simply one of a kind.

Toy pianos are in the focus in such pieces as a rollicking toy piano duo by Thomas Kotcheff, Julia Wolfe’s street-music driven ‘East Broadway’ and the hearty welcome of ‘We hope you will enjoy the show’ in Daniel Moreira’s Beatles transcription (which includes a looped introduction of audience noises during the public’s entry).

The program also features unique compositional and performance practices in Sascha Lino Lemke’s ‘Albumblätterer’ in which two pianists use their very own score  and its pages as a crucial part of the composition,  Francesco Filidei’s colorful balloon quartet and a premiere by Benjamin Scheuer which in which a musical “cabinet of curiosities” with impossible sound objects and calls of rare creatures are presented to a sensation-seeking audience.

A visit to prehistoric times is also included with the piece ‘Fuoco’ commissioned from Mats O Hansson for a specially theme ‘Homosapiens’ program in 2021 where the toy pianist is surrounded by a huge screen of warm flickering flames and light accompanied by the cackling sounds of fire.

Additional humorous and unusual displays of instruments are included in Moritz Eggert’s ‘Melodie 1.0’ with the virtuostic clacking of a typewriter and two short trios by Francesco Filidei where the pianists need to perform some piano parts with their bottoms…

Program

Daniel Moreira – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band [2015] – for three toy pianos

Sascha Lino Lemke – Albumblätter(er), first movement “…leider nicht von mir…” Valse élégiaque [2018] – for piano four-hands

Julia Wolfe – East Broadway [1996] – for toy piano and electronics

Moritz Eggert – Melodie 1.0 [1998] – for melodica, piano and type-writer

Fabian Svensson – Toccata  [2009] – for toy piano

Benjamin Scheuer​​ – Merkwürdige Metamorphosen (World Premiere) –  for toy instrument quartet and samples

Mats O Hansson – Papyeon [2022] – for toy piano and piano

Sascha Lino Lemke – Arnautz tramet sa chanson – Tornada con frammenti di una Sestina [2017] – for piano and electronics

Francesco Filidei – Esercizio di Pazzia 1 [2012] – for 4 performers and balloons

About the sound walk 

According to tradition, we gather at the parish home and then head into Kalv’s forests. We walk in stillness and silence. At various places on our journey, we listen to nature’s own sounds, at others our festival ensembles 40F and Non-Piano Ensemble will articulate the sound.

John Cage – The Beatles 1962-1970 [1990] – version for 5 toy pianos

Thomas Kotcheff – Death, Hocket and Roll [2014] – for two toy pianos