Quarry by Rakhi Singh

Rakhi Singh is a violinist, music director, curator and composer based between Manchester and London, England. In 2016 she co- founded Manchester Collective whose upcoming 21/22 season features residencies at the Southbank, St George’s Bristol, The White Hotel, Salford and their debut proms performance.

Alongside her work leading the Collective, Singh has firmly established herself as a violinist and leader of high repute, working for and alongside the likes of Steve Reich, Phillip Glass, Oliver Coates, Clark and Björk, Olivia Chaney, Clod Ensemble and Abel Selaocoe and guest leading ensembles like London Contemporary Orchestra, RLPO, CBSO, Hebrides Ensemble, Sinfonia Cymru.

She is a recording artist for Bedroom Community, with whom she has released two albums as curator/director of Manchester Collective and her debut compositions EP will be coming out in August 2021.

As a composer she has written two large-scale pieces with long-time collaborator, electronic producer Vessel, the first of which Written in Fire was premiered at Aldeburgh Festival and the second Paradise Lost commissioned by Manchester Collective. Most recently she produced a film ‘FFAALL’ for the Royal Opera House 8bit digital commissions, working closely with Director Joe Morgan, movement artist Blackhaine and opera singer Mimi Doulton.

Born to an English mother and Indian father in rural Wales, Rakhi’s upbringing was influenced by many different cultures and traditions.

Synopsis:

Quarry is the debut EP of violinist Rakhi Singh, developed and recorded between her home and Greenhouse Studios, Reykjavik across the latter half of ‘20 and the start of ‘21. Spurred on by recent collaborations with the likes of Vessel, Clark and Blackhaine, Quarry is Singh’s first trio of solo works, for violin, electronics and voice. Quarry was developed between Singh’s home and an inspirational trip to Bedroom Community founder Valgier’s studio ‘Greenhouse Studios’ in Reykjavik.

Quarry is the first step of many more to come, perfectly befitting of Bedroom Community’s approach of uplifting instrumentalists at the top of their craft to find their own voice.

“Greenhouse is a special place to forge friendships through music that you know will last a lifetime. It was my first time working closely with Valgeir and it was like we’d known each other for an age, When you’re involved in collaborations you are learning by osmosis. You experience different approaches and observe different thinking patterns that can then be absorbed into your own explorations”

These first recordings represent a marker in the sand for Singh, the first steps of a journey of discovery; untethered from a score to see what emerges - the triptych Is inspired by the dialogue between hope and regret, loss and discovery and her ever evolving love for her partner Sebastian Gainsborough.

“Quarry has a few different meanings for me, firstly as a physical space I find them powerful and captivating places and there are many near my family home in Wales that I always visit when home. The man-made craters in the landscape can be austere yet strong with all the striking shapes in the rocks that are a result of human and mechanical graft. They are places where I experience time in a different way as I see hundreds of thousands of years layered through the rock . The process of creation feels like I delve into an internal quarry to see what will be revealed in the layers of rock formation within myself.”

First single Khuda’i (taken from the Punjabi for excavation) feels like an apt jumping off point for Singh’s work, eschewing sheer virtuosics in favour of a marriage of violin, subtly skewed by electronics to create an uncanny soundscape drifting between the lines of dark & light, teetering on the brink before drawing us back at the last moment.

For fans of; Hildur Guðnadóttir, Julia Kent, Mica Levi, Daniel Pioro

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Rakhi Singh is violinist, collaborator, composer & music director based between Manchester and London, England.

rakhisinghmusic.co.uk