Echo Vocal Ensemble has Already Gone on tour

I remember wondering in Spring 2020 whether 2021 would feel like an endless festival: where everything originally scheduled for 2020 would happen at last, but alongside everything also originally planned for 2021, making a months-long concert series with back-to-back events.

It’s not quite ended up that way, but there have been moments haven’t there?

One particular highlight was finally hearing Echo Vocal Ensemble perform my piece already gone, written for their inaugural composers’ competition in 2019 and selected as their joint-winning entry. Echo are a brilliant group of highly-talented singers who have such a confident and assured quality together, particularly so coming from their director Sarah Latto.

Never one to miss an opportunity to stretch themselves, Sarah and the Echo team developed the project into something really special and perhaps even more so than had the original plan gone ahead un-pandemic-ified. They scheduled a workshop in central London where they performed excerpts of both winning pieces and three shortlisted pieces, with composers able to explain their approaches and give feedback either in person or virtually. It was fascinating to hear some of the others - by now it’s almost a cliché but they really were all so different, despite responding to the same source text!

This was followed by a tour of concerts, starting at King’s Place in London where the two joint-winning pieces were given their world premieres. This high-profile event was brilliant, in a great room for appreciating the delicacy and vulnerability of a cappella voices.

Here are some reviews of the concerts -

• Jon Jacob’s review of the King’s Place, London concert for his Thoroughly Good blog

• Miranda Heggie’s review of the Midlands Arts Centre, Birmingham concert for The Arts Desk

Thank you Sarah and Echo for everything you did to make the Already Gone tour happen! And to the other composers whose pieces were premiered for sharing their music.