NPR's Tom Huizenga writes.....The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. It's the same spirit - stripped-down sets, an intimate setting - just a different space. There's a distinct dissonance between the bucolic setting of this lovely Max Richter Tiny Desk (home) concert and the reality he references after his performance. "Looking forward to the time when gigs can come back and we can do this for real," the composer says, leaving us with a yearning that is borne out in his tranquil, probing music. These half-dozen short pieces can offer two very different modes of experience. Shot in artful black and white, their simplicity and beauty invite us into a world as we once knew it, where fresh air wafts through open doors and dogs peacefully snooze (canine cameos by Evie and Haku) in the late summer sunshine in southern England. On the other hand, the chaos found in the real world we know today can find a balm in Richter's soothing, oscillating figures in "Infra 3" or the gently swaying chords of "Origins," where the music lumbers in the lower half of the keyboard. There's a mysterious potency in instrumental music, where the mind is open to wander and free-associate. Max Richter taps into that power with singular grace and humanity. LISTEN & WATCH SET LIST "Vladimir's Blues" "Origins" "Infra 3" "Horizon Variations" "Prelude 6" "Fragment"
  MUSICIANS Max Richter: piano
  CREDITS Video and Audio: Noah Richter-Mahr Editor: Mike Terry
  TINY DESK TEAM Producer: Bob Boilen Video Producer: Maia Stern Audio Mastering: Josh Rogosin Associate Producer: Bobby Carter Tiny Production Team: Kara Frame, Morgan Noelle Smith Executive Producer: Lauren Onkey Senior VP, Programming: Anya Grundmann

This week we shared NPR Music's best songs and albums of 2020, lists voted on, politely argued over and presented by our staff, station partners and contributors. Today we're featuring the good stuff from the private reserves. Below you'll find lists of top 10 albums and songs from the members of NPR Music's staff. Robin Hilton - HOST, ALL SONGS CONSIDERED writes; I chew through a staggering amount of music to prep for New Music Friday – as many as 100 or more albums in a single week. Honestly, it can all blur together at times and it's hard for any one or five or 10 albums and songs to rise to the top and stay there. My favorite music of the year was whatever I was listening to at any given moment. That said, the 10 records and tracks here, for me, will stand the test of time. For her 'Top 10 Albums Of 2020,' Robin picks; Max Richter, Voices SEE NPR PAGE

BBC Radio 3 is joining with 35 European Broadcasting Union radio stations around the world to air a message of unity through music. They'll make the first ever broadcast of Max Richter's latest work Voices on global Human Rights Day, Thursday 10 December. Including passages adapted from the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, VOICES is inspired by the document's opening statement "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights", which provides the starting point for a musical reflection on the state of the world today. A decade in the making, the piece received its world premiere in London in February. Its uplifting message of community particularly resonates as the world faces further months of uncertainty. It is here presented in a new version for 24-piece ensemble including strings, 4-member choir, electronics, solo soprano and narrator. Following a previous Richter-focused collaboration with the European Broadcasting Union in April, when the composer's eight-hour long piece Sleep was heard by audiences in 20 countries at the start of world-wide lockdowns, 35 EBU-associated radio stations around the world join this unique broadcast of VOICES, providing listeners across the globe with a renewed moment of hope and a message of peace in unprecedented times. Recorded on Friday 4 December at BBC Maida Vale studios – in strict compliance with all relevant health and safety guidelines – and presented by Elizabeth Alker, the BBC Radio 3 broadcast of VOICES features violinist Viktoria Mullova as soloist, soprano Grace Davidson, members of London-based vocal ensemble Tenebrae, the Max Richter ensemble – with Richter himself on keyboards and electronics – and British actor Sheila Atim as the narrator. VOICES is co-conceived by Max Richter and his creative partner Yulia Mahr. READ THE FULL RadioToday ARTICLE

The innovative British-German composer Max Richter recently released his ninth studio album called Voices. A decade in the making, Voices explores mental and historical landscapes as well as universal themes that seem particularly relevant today. The voices of the project come from people around the world who responded to Richter's social media invitation to be a part of the work. They, together with actor Kiki Layne and the historical voice of Eleanor Roosevelt, read the words of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights in many different languages, set to Richter's compositions-which range from quiet and meditative but also rise to Wagnerian heights. Eleanor Roosevelt reads Article 1: "All Human Beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood." The U.S. and Europe had only come out of the savagery and devastation of World War II at the time of the declaration. They were and continue to be aspirational goals for humanity, full of optimism and hope. Although they sound a little naïve given today's toxic climate, Richter believes that the declaration "is something that offers us a way forward. Although it isn't a perfect document, the declaration does represent an inspiring vision for the possibility of better and kinder world."  Photo by Mike Terry READ THE FULL 89.9KCRW: Los Angeles - Rhythm Planet ARTICLE

When thinking about putting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to music on Voices, Composer Max Richter tried to capture the essence of "the world we haven't made yet." Richter has scored soundtracks and had his music placed across film and television, including recent Hollywood movies such as Mary Queen of Scots, Hostiles and Ad Astra. But Richter's also a composer who's not afraid to take on political issues in his music. In his previous works, he's responded to the conflict in Kosovo, the Iraq War and the 2005 London terrorist attacks. On his latest album, Voices, he takes inspiration from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. NPR's Gemma Watters spoke to Max Richter about the echo between the post-World War II world and today, finding a narrator after watching If Beale Street Could Talk and the way the album fits into the present moment, even though he started work on it 10 years ago. Listen to the interview

His music sinks deep into the question not only of who we are, but who we aspire to be. His works have been streamed over a billion times and, perhaps more importantly than that, he is the composer to whom we turn as we try to find truth in this world. His new album, Voices, is just out, and it is a work almost beyond categorisation. Voices started as a small idea ten years ago when Richter composed a short piece called "Mercy" in response to events around Guantanamo Prison. Richter's aim was to write a piece to think to, a piece which would provoke us, inspire us, beguile us, something within which we could let our minds go to the most important things in our world. And he has succeeded. The original piece "Mercy" is now at the end of the album, which combines Richter's new compositions with readings, in many different languages, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Declaration was created after the horrors of the Second World War. "All human beings are born free and equal, in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience, and should act towards one another in a spirit of community." Ed Ayres interviews Max Richter  READ & LISTEN TO ABC - Australia

There are enough records in the world already, thinks the ­composer Max Richter. So when he writes music, there has to be a "good reason". So far, those have included the Kosovo War, which he tackled on his debut album Memoryhouse in 2002, the Iraq War, the subject of 2004's The Blue Notebooks, and the 7/7 bombings, on 2010's Infra. 2015's eight-and-a-half-hour concept album Sleep was intended as a break from the pressures of the digital age and became a classical phenomenon, streamed more than 450 million times. His latest, Voices, began with the contemplative violin and piano-led "Mercy", which takes its inspiration from the "Torture Memos", which revealed how prisoners were treated at Guantánamo Bay, that had left him "dumbstruck". "It felt like the world had gone wrong in a new way, and I wrote ‘Mercy' as a way to figure that out. A bigger piece of protest music was set in motion right then." The resulting album takes its theme from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the document adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948, which set the aspirational blueprint for better times after the Second World War. Music has always been a rebellion for Richter. He was born in Germany, and his family moved to Bedford when he was four. He took piano lessons, but dropped out of school at 16 because he hated it. READ THE FULL iNews ARTICLE

There's not many albums that start with a long dead First Lady reading the preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but that scratchy recording of Eleanor Roosevelt still hits a nerve. Over the last decade Max Richter has quietly pulled together this complex and moving piece using chunks of that ground breaking document created in 1948 after the horrors of the Second World War, alongside 70 crowd sourced voices from around the world set to this trademark arpeggios, drones and strings with a soprano Grace Davidson added to the mix. Not content with that epic challenge he then scored Voices for a unique ‘upside down' orchestra of 12 double basses, 24 cellos, 6 violas,8 violins and a harp, so the bass instruments lead, which really gives the whole piece depth and resonance. Actor Kiki Layne, from If Beale Street Could Talk, reads pieces of the declaration as Richter uses mini movements to create different moods around different parts of the declaration. Journey uses birdsong and drones fighting against the declaration read in different languages forcing the listener to think what does the right to freedom of movement actually mean when an orange lunatic wants to build a pointless wall. Choral adds voices from the Middle East swirling round Richter's huge strings, and stabbed notes, to make the point that if we actually adopted the declaration, we might not be in the mess we are in as children drown in the Mediterranean fleeing oppression. READ THE FULL Louder Than War ARTICLE & WATCH THE VIDEO

Max Richter's trailblazing 2015 composition Sleep is now available to download with the launch of a new app. The app enables listeners to reimagine the 8-hour Deutsche Grammophon recording in custom-made musical sessions to help with focus, meditation and sleep which many people will need in the midst of the pandemic lockdown. It brings to a wider audience some of the experience shared by those lucky enough to attend Richter's extraordinary eight-hour overnight performances of Sleep – complete with beds – including LTW's own Tim Cooper who wrote about it here when it came to London in 2017. READ THE FULL Louder Than War ARTICLE

Max Richter's eight-hour epic SLEEP, his ‘lullaby for a frenetic world', returns to BBC Radio 3's airwaves this Easter weekend in a simulcast with the European Broadcasting Union – uniting quarantined nations across the continent in moments of meditative stillness. The BBC will join with broadcasters across Europe and beyond, including USA, Canada and New Zealand, for the live simulcast of Richter's eight-hour lullaby, a re-broadcast of the world premiere from 2015. SLEEP seeks to examine the relationship between music and the subconscious mind, and to foreground the communal aspect of music performance and listening. This remarkable broadcasting moment aims to bring together listeners around the world in a collective moment of musical reflection.  The piece indeed provides an apt soundtrack for these times of lockdown – when hours seemingly stretch into the distance. Sleep offers a mindful way to forget everything going on around us. The original world premiere performance will be rebroadcast overnight on BBC Radio 3 from 11pm on Saturday (April 11) to 7am on Easter Sunday (April 12) as part of ‘Slow and Mindful' series, BBC Radio 3's offering of music for the mind in the time of lockdown.  Meanwhile, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) will bring together radio members across the globe to air the full 8-hour piece – with in Europe and beyond, including USA, Canada and New Zealand. They will all broadcast SLEEP during the Easter weekend. READ THE FULL Keep The Faith ARTICLE

We all deal with sleepless nights from time to time ― and yes, that includes experts like sleep doctors. Though having trouble falling (or staying) asleep can be distressing, it may be comforting to know that it's a common problem. According to a 2016 Consumer Reports survey, 68% of Americans struggle with sleep at least once a week. "It's perfectly normal for all of us to have poor sleep or insomnia, but it becomes more of an issue for people that begin to become anxious and fixated on their sleep," Ruchir P. Patel, medical director of the Insomnia and Sleep Institute of Arizona, told HuffPost. "Remember, if you have a bad night here or there, it's normal. The more you stress about your sleep, the less it will return back towards normal." Stressing over sleep creates more anxiety, which only exacerbates the problem. We asked sleep doctors to share the tips, tricks or other advice they follow when they personally have trouble sleeping. Some you can implement during the day as preventive measures; others you can try on a sleepless night. Sleep experts share the tips they swear by. One is that they listen to soothing music. "I will listen to Max Richter's ‘Sleep' in the background, as this is very unique classical music where he worked with neuroscientists to create music utilizing tones that can help to relax the mind and assist with sleep. My wife and I also use it for our 15-month-old baby since he was born and [it] has helped him too." -Patel READ THE FULL HUFFPOST ARTICLE

BAFTA-winning film-maker Yulia Mahr revealed her new video for ‘Vladimir's Blues', from Max Richter's album The Blue Notebooks. The global premiere was preceded by a 30-minute live chat between Yulia Mahr and Max Richter. The film is an artistic response to escalating global tension. ‘Vladimir's Blues' is about fragile beauty and the power of small things to elevate our everyday experience. Yulia Mahr's short film unlocks the positive power of a technology originally developed for surveillance and military purposes. She essentially subverts that purpose, using thermal imaging cameras – which transform infrared radiation (heat) into visible images – in a creative context to shape a narrative about a composition and the inspiration behind it. ‘Vladimir's Blues' has so far received over 105 million streams and is Max Richter's No.1 streaming track. The Blue Notebooks was not only a protest album, but meditation on violence in general, and particularly the violence that Richter experienced around him as a child. Max Richter would escape his unhappy childhood through music, literature and a love and fascination for beautiful things – especially butterflies. Mahr poignantly highlights Richter's story of a lost child escaping into music in ‘Vladimir's Blues' and also leans on her own difficult childhood. READ THE FULL udiscovermusic. ARTICLE & WATCH THE VIDEO

Half way through this performance of Max Richter's achingly beautiful On The Nature Of Daylight, I looked around our NPR Music office and saw trembling chins and tearful eyes. Rarely have I seen so many Tiny Desk audience members moved in this way. There's something about Max Richter's music that triggers deep emotions. In Daylight, which has been effectively used in movies such as Arrival and Shutter Island, a simple theme rolls out slowly in the low strings until a violin enters with a complimentary melody in a higher register. Richter, at the keyboard, adds a subterranean bass line for added gravitas, while high above another violin soars sweetly, mournfully. With all elements interlocked – and sensitively played by members of the American Contemporary Music Ensemble – the piece gently sways, building in intensity. It all adds up to a six-minute emotional journey that, if you open yourself to the sounds, can leave you wrung out. "I'm very interested in the idea of a piece of music being a place to think," Richter explained, adding that he had written Daylight as a response to the 2003 Iraq War. Richter, whose music can't be easily pigeonholed, lightened the mood with a miniature called Vladimir's Blues. Its delicately toggling chords are an homage to novelist Vladimir Nabokov who, in his spare time, was a respected lepidopterist, obsessed with a subfamily of gossamer-winged butterflies called the blues. Richter plays the piano with the practice pedal engaged for a warm, muted sound. Again in the final piece, Richter counters violence with calming, thoughtful music. His ballet Infra is a meditation on the 2005 terrorist subway bombings in London. It's music about travel, too, Richter explains, saying that he was inspired by Schubert's melancholy song cycle Winterreise (Winter Journey). In trying times, music by the soft-spoken Richter can feel like a safe haven, a place for personal reflection or a welcoming, utilitarian space to clear the mind.   SET LIST "On The Nature Of Daylight" "Vladimir's Blues" "Infra 5" MUSICIANS Max Richter: piano, keyboard American Contemporary Music Ensemble: Clarice Jensen: cello & artistic director; Ben Russell, violin; Laura Lutzke, violin; Isabel Hagen, viola; Claire Bryant, cello CREDITS Producers: Tom Huizenga, Morgan Noelle Smith, Kara Frame; Creative director: Bob Boilen; Audio engineers: Josh Rogosin, Alex Drewenskus; Editor: Kara Frame; Videographers: Maia Stern, Kara Frame, Jack Corbett; Associate Producer: Bobby Carter; Executive producer: Lauren Onkey; VP, programming: Anya Grundmann; Photo: Mhari Shaw/NPR

Sundance Institute will curate dozens of offscreen events, including behind-the-scenes panels on the art of filmmaking, musical performances and – around the theme of Imagined Futures – a public Bonfire and several extended post-screening conversations (known as IF Screenings), at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival taking place in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Sundance, Utah, January 23 through February 2, 2020. "Our offscreen programming provides a powerful cultural temperature check – it is an expression of what is preoccupying artists, bot  in terms of their own creativity, and also how that intersects with the issues of the day," said John Nein, Sundance Film Festival Senior Programmer. "This year in addition to a slate of incredible performances, there is a real focus on civic engagement, data justice, disability as a creative force,  and the role of art as an indispensable tool in the fight for truth-telling and justice-making. All of which ties perfectly into our theme of Imagined Futures." On Friday, January 31, at 8:00 p.m., The Shop will host Max Richter's 'Sleep'. Open to Festival credential holders as space allows Lift yourself out of the Festival's frenetic pace for a spellbinding evening as Max Richter performs a 90-minute concert version of his eight-hour opus, Sleep, with a string quintet from New York's American Contemporary Music Ensemble and soprano Grace Davidson. The concert will be followed by a Q&A with Richter, his creative partner and producer of Sleep Yulia Mahr, and filmmaker Natalie Johns (Max Richter's Sleep). p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d; min-height: 14.0px} SEE THE FULL But Why Tho? PAGE

It has been announced that both Max Richter and The Beach Boys will headline a huge outdoor summer show at the stunning Royal Hospital Chelsea in West London as part of the Live At Chelsea Concert Series 2020 on June 12. Richter, who will be playing his critically acclaimed Recomposed: Vivaldi's The Four Seasons & Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works, is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures on the contemporary music scene. Having been producing ground-breaking work as a composer, pianist, recording artist and collaborator since the early 2000s, Richter has been prolific in producing solo records alongside his soundtrack work for stage, ballet, cinema and TV. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL Far Out Magazine ARTICLE

Here at 25YL, we love music-so much so that we've just rolled out a music department! But what is perhaps all the more powerful than a great song is when the music in a TV show or film perfectly supplements the action, deepens the emotional stakes, or otherwise just fits so well that it becomes an indelible part of your memory of the film or show in question. Here are a few of the best uses of music in TV (in my opinion), focusing on particular scenes from some of my favorite shows. There are some spoilers in what follows, so if you haven't seen the show in question beware. At the same time, if you don't know who killed Laura Palmer, what have you been doing with your life? The Leftovers "Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now" (Perfect Strangers Theme) - The music in The Leftovers is brilliant overall, and there are any number of scenes or moments I could have picked here. In the opening scene of the Pilot, for example, the way that Max Richter's score comes in perfectly sets the mood for the Sudden Departure. But I've decided to make a somewhat odd choice here, and go with music that plays during the opening credits-not always, just once. The Leftovers changed its opening title sequence radically from Season 1 (which featured paintings and the like with religious imagery set to dramatic Max Richter music) to Season 2 (which featured candid shots of various people along with shadows of the Departed, set to Iris DeMent's "Let the Mystery Be"). I love both of those sequences, but with Season 3 we were in store for something completely different. The first episode eschewed the credits altogether, and then for the second episode we see the very same images we had become used to seeing throughout the whole of Season 2, but now instead of "Let the Mystery Be" there was…the theme song from Perfect Strangers. What was great about this was how not random it was. There are references to Perfect Strangers riddled through The Leftovers, going back to the beginning. Mark-Linn Baker appears in the show…as Mark Linn-Baker. The title of the episode in question is "Don't Be Ridiculous." And to hear this song behind the same images as those that had been in the credits throughout Season 2 imbued them with a new meaning. One looked at them in a different way. The lyrics of "Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now" in relation to this moment in the show lead one to question what precisely the characters are trying to do. They could relate to Matt and his mission, or to Nora's persistence in the face of the absurd, or to pretty much any character in a certain way. And insofar as The Leftovers is a show about the absurd, the Perfect Strangers theme calls to mind the humorous aspect of absurdity. You think the Departure was the Rapture?-Don't be ridiculous! p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL 25YL ARTICLE

Half of the Lifehacker staff can't work with music on. The other half needs it. Here's what we listened to this year while working on Lifehacker.  Composer, musician, producer, remixer and collaborator extraordinaire, Max Richter Deutsche Grammophon recording; Vivaldi Recomposed, is Richter's unique reworking of The Four Seasons for violin, chamber orchestra and moog synthesizer. The package includes remixes, and an exclusive performance film featuring the composer and violinist Daniel Hope, shot in East Berlin in late 2013. There are also five newly-composed electronic soundscapes, dubbed "shadows," by Richter, which were constructed for a live performance of the work.   The Remixes include Spring 1 – Max Richter Remix, Summer 3 – Robot Koch Remix, Autumn 3 – Fear of Tigers Remix and Winter 3 – NYPC Remix.  lifehacker staff writer Nick Douglas wrote of Richter's "recomposition" of Vivaldi's Four Seasons; "complex and a little sad, which also makes it perfect if you're reading Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell." SEE THE lifehacker PAGE

NASA's launched its Voyager program over 40 years ago, and since then, sci-fi films like James Gray's Ad Astra have been drawing inspiration from the journey that the program's twin robotic probes have made through our outer solar system. And for the film's post-minimalist soundtrack, influential composer Max Richter actually pulled plasma wave data from the Voyager probes and used it to make music that would embody the story of the long and precarious journey that an existentially fraught astronaut, Roy McBride (Brad Pitt), makes through space to find his famed father, Clifford (Tommy Lee Jones).  Though Ad Astra's music is written with an interstellar scope in mind, Richter is modest when speaking about his diminutive "notes on the page." "If you don't get the notes right on the piano, they won't sound right when they are being played by an orchestra," he says.  READ THE Q&A p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d; min-height: 14.0px}

Today Max Richter gives us another way to hear Summer from Vivaldi's Four Seasons with his "recomposed" version, featuring violinist Daniel Hope.  Composer, musician, producer, remixer and collaborator extraordinaire, Max Richter has struck a different sort of chord on his highly acclaimed Vivaldi Recomposed. A unique reworking of The Four Seasons for violin, chamber orchestra and moog synthesizer, these remixes include Spring 1 – Max Richter Remix, Summer 3 – Robot Koch Remix, Autumn 3 – Fear of Tigers Remix and Winter 3 – NYPC Remix, along with five newly-composed electronic soundscapes, dubbed "shadows," by Richter, which were constructed for a live performance of the work.  SEE WSHU: CT - E. Long Island NY PAGE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #4d4d4d; min-height: 14.0px}

Radio New Zealand's Sound Lounge brings you a lullaby of epic proportions - Max Richter's Sleep at10:00 pm on 19 January 2019.  It's the German-born British composer's "personal lullaby for a frenetic world" scored for piano, strings, electronics and vocals without words. The public premiere in Berlin was held at former East German Powerplant 'Kraftwerk' and since then Sleep has been heard by slumbering audiences all over the world, including the 2018 Auckland Arts Festival. Max Richter has loved sleeping since he was a child and to create this experience he consulted a neuroscientist to learn more about the human brain functions while sleeping. "For me," he says, "Sleep is an attempt to see how that space when your conscious mind is on holiday, can be a place for music to live." Richter performs on a range of keyboard instruments throughout the work. He plays piano, organ, synthesisers and electronics. He's also joined by the musicians of the American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME) and the lilting soprano voice of Grace Davidson.

As Hollywood's ranks of film composers become increasingly filled with talent drawn from realms of experimental and alternative music, few of these talents that claim their roots in the past have climbed to their craft's throne like Max Richter. German born and English-educated in music, Richter has prolifically conquered concert halls and scoring stages, segueing between ballets, tone poems and a marathon work designed to lull listeners to sleep – all as he's kept film and television audiences awake in an often melancholy spell. READ THE Film Music Magazine Q&A

Period films always pose a musical challenge: How authentic should a composer be?  For "Mary Queen of Scots" with Saoirse Ronan as Mary Stuart and Margot Robbie as Elizabeth I, composer Max Richter created a fairly modern score to sit alongside 16th-century music. Early-music expert William Lyons was called in to handle the historical material, leaving Richter free to tackle the dramatic score. "I wanted women's voices to be really important in the film," Richter says from London, "and I decided to try a cor anglais [English horn] for Mary's voice." Early experiments with the viol (a stringed instrument of the time) led to Richter processing the sound into "a sort of electronic cloud of viols for some of the more coloristic sequences with the voices. The instrumental music is based on a kind of geometry and a set of gestures which come from Renaissance music," Richter explains. "So it's a kind of wandering border between the contemporary and period authenticity." READ THE FULL VARIETY REVIEW

Max Richter is a busy man, most recently having composed the score to new film White Boy Rick. He's also currently on tour, playing The Blue Notebooks & Infra, on most dates, but he's got something special lined up for NYC: He'll be playing his amazing, elegiac score for The Leftovers at Town Hall on October 14 with the ACME ensemble. Fans of the HBO series may recognize October 14 as "Sudden Departure Day" (aka the day in the series when 2% of the world's population disappeared with no explanation). Tickets are on sale. Check out all dates along with streams of The Leftovers and White Boy Rick scores via Brooklyn Vegan

Composer Max Richter will release his original soundtrack to new Yann Demange-directed film White Boy Rick via StudioRichter and Deutsche Grammophon this November. The Oscar-tipped film stars Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Jason Leigh and is based on the true story of teenager Richard Wershe Jr., who became an undercover informant for the FBI and later a drug kingpin, during the crack epidemic and war on drugs in '80s Detroit. Richter's soundtrack mirrors and amplifies the murky underworld of the film, drawing on drone and industrial influences, as well as the composer's trademark ambience. White Boy Rick is available to stream now on Spotify and will be released on vinyl on 30th November. The soundtrack follows the reissue of Richter's critically-acclaimed The Blue Notebooks earlier this year. Richter also features in FACT Magazine's new film, exploring the art of scoring for film. SEE The Vinyl Factory PAGE & WATCH THE VIDEOS

From Studio to Screen is an original mini-documentary that charts the process a musician goes through to compose for film. FACT gets insights from Max Richter, Anna Meredith, Lustmord and Geoff Barrow & Ben Salisbury about their beginnings, their high points and their relationship with the intimidating global film industry. Max Richter is the mind behind the scores for a range of projects including Waltz With Bashir, Black Mirror and My Brilliant Friend, the upcoming series based on Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan novels. The influential composer, who recently released a 15th anniversary edition of his album The Blue Notebooks, visited The Store at 180 The Strand to break down the collaborative efforts of working in film. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL FACT ARTICLE & WATCH THE VIDEO

White Boy Rick-a new true crime film starring Matthew McConaughey and featuring appearances by Danny Brown and YG-has gotten its official soundtrack release. The film was scored by Max Richter, who has previously contributed music to Shutter Island, Arrival, and more. Stream it in its entirety below. A vinyl edition of the score is set to be released November 30 (via StudioRichter/Deutsche Grammophon). White Boy Rick hit U.S. theaters earlier this month on September 4. The film's story is of teenager Richard Wershe Jr., who became an undercover informant for the FBI during the 1980s and was ultimately arrested for drug-trafficking and sentenced to life in prison.  Directed by Yann Demange Early last year, Richter released his score for choreographer Wayne McGregor's narrative dance performance "Woolf Works."      PHOTO: Scott Garfield/Columbia Pictures and Studio 8 p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} SEE THE Pitchfork PAGE

UGA Presents is bringing composer, pianist and remixer Max Richter to Athens Sept. 30. The electro-acoustic artist will be joined by the American Contemporary Music Ensemble for a 7 p.m. performance in Hodgson Concert Hall. The program will include Richter's "Infra" and music from "The Blue Notebooks." Richter has composed music for over 50 film and television projects including Martin Scorsese's "Shutter Island" and Damon Lindelof 's HBO series, "The Leftovers." He was awarded the European Film Prize for his score for Ari Folman's "Waltz with Bashir." The American Contemporary Music Ensemble is dedicated to the performance of masterworks from the 20th and 21st centuries. ACME has performed at leading international venues including Carnegie Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Library of Congress in D.C. and Australia's Melbourne Recital Hall and Sydney Opera House. ACME's dedication to new music extends across genres and has earned them a reputation among both classical and rock crowds. National Public Radio calls them "contemporary music dynamos." READ THE FULL UGATODAY ARTICLE

Max Richter (The Leftovers, Taboo, Waltz with Bashir, Hostiles) has composed the original music for the upcoming HBO and RAI original series My Brilliant Friend (L'amica geniale). The show is co-written and directed by Saverio Costanzo (Private, The Solitude of Prime Numbers, Hungry Hearts) and stars Elisa Del Genio, Ludovica Nasti, Margherita Mazzucco and Gaia Girace. The drama is based on Elena Ferrante's bestselling book of the same name and tells the story of a now-elderly woman who discovers the most important friend in her life seems to have disappeared without a trace. Lorenzo Mieli & Mario Gianani and Domenico Procacci are executive producing the HBO, RAI FICTION and TIMVISION production. My Brilliant Friend will premiere in the U.S. this November on HBO. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} SEE Film Music Reporter PAGE

Catch of the Day presents tracks from new and imminent audio releases in many genres, with off-the-cuff intros plus on-the-spot evaluations. We air at 12:00 noon Hawaiian-Aleutian Standard Time under the umbrella of The Alpha and Omega Show, hosted by the redoubtable Paul Janes-Brown, actor, critic, and chorister. Officially, we compare notes for 60 minutes, but overtime is always a possibility. Please join us on Mana'o Radio 91.7 FM, Maui's leading noncommercial, 100%-listener-supported, 100%-volunteer-staff broadcaster, or live on the web at manaoradio.com. On our selections for August 5. On August 5, we opened with the Deutsche Grammophon reissue of The Blue Notebooks, an early double album from Max Richter. Obscure to the point of invisibility 15 years ago, the German-born British composer and all-around keyboardist has emerged as quite the cult icon. (My indoctrination came with the eight-hour-plus Sleep, which has been performed live as an all-nighter in ad hoc dormitories, complete with beds, pillows, and covers. You can also partake at home, in a bed of your own. Highly recommended. Digital downloads available.) Some have called Richter a minimalist, some a postminimalist, which may be labels as descriptive as any. From my limited exposure, I prefer to think of him as perhaps the Vivaldi of the Alpha State: dreamy, vague, celestially restful. We heard the opening track ("The Blue Notebooks"), with voiceover by the Circean Tilda Swinton, and a bonus track called "Cypher," about which I cannot think of a single thing to say. But please don't construe that as a put-down. SEE ALL beyondcriticism REVIEWS 

True to its name, the Mumbai-based Shapeshift Collective conjures up yet another unusual arts venture - a choral performance with a difference titled Lullaby, Stranger . Attempting to break the mould of traditional concert presentations, the setting of the show will be a dimly lit chamber with mattresses strewn over the floor. Those in the audience would select one ‘bed' each on which they would spend the roughly one-hour duration of the performance ‘lying down'. As the advisory explicitly states, ‘Sitting, standing, moving around or talking is not permitted.' All those activities will be the sole preserve of the singing ensemble who will walk around throughout, their caressing voices shifting from one pair of ears to the next, creating an aural experience of intimacy and distance that is none too typical. Wielding the baton will be Jerusalem-based conductor Salome Rebello, while Sujay Saple is the choreographer of the piece.‘Sleep and watch' performances are not entirely unknown. Since 2015, Max Richter's durational performance of more than eight hours, Sleep , in which audiences ‘sleep' along to classical music performed by a live orchestra, has become an international sensation.  Lullaby, Stranger will be performed at the G5A Foundation for Contemporary Culture, Mahalaxmi; from Aug 10 - 12, two shows daily.     READ THE FULL Hindu ARTICLE

Max Richter rarely looks back. The producer is always thirsting after fresh information, forever absorbing new ideas. That said, when the occasion arises he finds it beneficial to take backward glance. 2004's studio album 'The Blue Notebooks' was re-issued this summer, given a Super Deluxe treatment on Deutsche Grammophon. As part of this, Somesuch and Globe Productions have teamed up to produce a short film based on the album's cut 'On The Nature Of Daylight'. In the liner notes for the LP Richter describes the piece as "a meditation on violence and its repercussions, inspired both by the Iraq war – which was looming – and my own experiences." READ THE FULL CLASH ARTICLE

Max Richter, the acclaimed composer, pianist and producer, has guest-curated the Peaceful Music playlist, the first playlist brand co-created between Universal Music Group and Apple Music, in order to help people find "a useful place to rest" amid the frenzy of modern life. The West German-born Brit, whose epic 2015 record, Sleep, was praised as among the best albums of the decade, has chosen 53 superb pieces of music for the Peaceful Music playlist. Richter says of the project: "I think Peaceful Music can be a really effective tool to help us find a kind of breathing space in our always-on, 24/7, screen-based kind of a world. READ THE FULL udiscovermusic ARTICLE       Listen to the Peaceful Music playlist exclusively on Apple Music.

He just puts his head on the pillow and it's lights out.  "Sleep is probably my favorite activity," he tells The Hollywood Reporter, a statement that is not shocking, considering how easily it happens for him. On July 27–28, he's hoping that it comes just as seamlessly for hundreds of Angelenos. Richter, a composer known for his work on HBO's The Leftovers, is bringing his 8-hour-long "Sleep" concert piece to Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles in what will mark the traveling show's first-ever outdoor performance following outings in New York and Austin, Texas, during SXSW.  Presented by The Music Center, the show will begin at 10:30 p.m. and finish at 6:30 a.m., with audience members lying flat during the performance on strategically placed twin beds. THR spoke to Richter on the phone from London to find out how he adjusts his own sleeping patterns prior to the show, where "Sleep" goes from here and why sushi is so important to the production.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE Hollywood Reporter Q&A

SLEEP is an overnight performance which will take place this Friday, July 27 and Saturday, July 28 in Grand Park. Hundreds of cots will be placed in the gathering space to witness a show which spans a total of eight hours beginning at 10:30 pm and ending at 6:30 am. Guests will be treated to a relaxation-inducing score made up of pianos, string quintets, electronics and vocals so entrancing that you will likely catch some shuteye without even thinking about. "Audiences seem to find their own way to make the trip through the night," says composer Max Richter. "Some sleep the whole time, some listen all the way through, most people do a bit of both - there are no rules." During SLEEP the audience will be treated to a gigantic set of shifting vocal and instrumental elements. The performance taps into our most childlike state which allows us to return to our human fundamentals. "I have mirrored the spectrum that the unborn baby hears inside the womb - so just as the mother's body filters all the high frequencies for the child, SLEEP has a "womb-like" spectrum. To me this connects in quite a natural way the poetic dimension of sleeping," says Richter. READ THE FULL Forbes ARTICLE

Sleep is an album and performance by composer Max Richter. The album released in 2015 via Deutsche Grammophon, as an 8-CD/1-Blu-ray set serves as a concept album based around the neuroscience of sleep, hence its length of over eight hours. Accompanied by a one-hour-long album with seven additional tracks as well as remixes, According to Richter; Sleep is "an eight-hour lullaby", "a piece that is meant to be listened to at night ... structured as a large set of variations." Richter conferred with American neuroscientist David Eagleman while working on the album's piece to learn about how the brain functions during sleep. Richter stated, "Sleeping is one of the most important things we all do ... We spend a third of our lives asleep and it's always been one of my favourite things, ever since I was a child. ... For me, Sleep is an attempt to see how that space when your conscious mind is on holiday can be a place for music to live." The album has been performed in its entirety in various cities around the world such as; London, Sydney, Berlin, New York and Los Angeles breaking records including the longest live broadcast of a single piece of music in BBC Radio 3's station's history. The performance also set Guinness World Records for longest broadcast of a single piece of music and longest live broadcast of a single piece of music. Instead of chairs to sit in and watch the performance, audience members were given beds to sleep in. WATCH THE ATTACHED CLIP OF Max Richter's SLEEP at Sydney Opera House in June of 2016, performed with ACME: American Contemporary Music Ensemble. 

When The Blue Notebooks was originally released in February 2004, it did not seem to be an album which would have the afterlife it has enjoyed. It had little context. Max Richter's second album was his first for the 130701 label which, at that point, had not yet set out its stall. Over the following three to four years, Ólafur Arnalds, Nils Frahm, Hauschka, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Christian Wallumrød and more would help give The Blue Notebooks a retrospective context. It may have been a precursor but it was a stunning album in its own right. The Blue Notebooks has re-emerged on Deutsche Grammophon which, although part of the corporate and multi-national Universal Music group, is a self-determining label which exudes gravitas and kudos. Jóhann Jóhannsson had also recorded for 130701 and went on to Deutsche Grammophon, a tie-up conferring importance. This repackaging of The Blue Notebooks is branded as a 15th-anniversary edition. READ THE FULL artsdesk REVIEW

Composer Max Richter doesn't want a boisterous standing ovation or to hear loud cheers during the live performance of his album, "Sleep." He prefers the quiet sounds of breathing – or even a bit of snoring. Richter will bring "Sleep," an eight-hour classical music experience, to Grand Park in Downtown Los Angeles on Friday, July 27 and Saturday, July 28. However, this isn't a standard concert. Guests are issued cots instead of seats, are encouraged to wear loose fitting and comfortable clothing and are expected to fall sleep as the overnight performance runs from 10:30 p.m.-6:30 a.m. on both nights. "There is almost always some snoring," Richter said during a recent phone interview. "I get sort of a weird sense of validation when I hear it. That makes me really happy, actually. It's quite comforting as well, almost like having a cat purring." READ THE FULL OC Register ARTICLE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px}

Max Richter's music seems ready-made for movies – and that's not in any way a put down. The music is powerful on its own, but certain pieces take on new depth when paired with well-designed visuals. "On the Nature of Daylight," from Richter's 2004 album The Blue Notebooks, has made potent appearances in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island and Denis Villeneuve's Arrival. Now there's a new short film, made specifically for Richter's gently swaying lament, featuring an arresting performance by Elisabeth Moss (The Handmaid's Tale, The West Wing) and directed by George Belfield. Richter is reissuing The Blue Notebooks, which features readings by Tilda Swinton, on June 29. READ THE FULL NPR PIECE

Last month contemporary classical composer Max Richter re-released his acclaimed sophomore album The Blue Notebooks in celebration of its 15th anniversary, and a new Super Deluxe expanded edition is out at the end of this month via Deutsche Grammophon. In its inception, the album was a protest of the Iraq War that saw Richter, like many, using music as an externalized meditation on violence. The Blue Notebooks was and still is a delicate space for reflection. Today, Richter is debuting the George Belfield-directed video for one of the album's most well-known and compelling songs "On The Nature Of Daylight." Its slow-moving, cinematic nature has no doubt contributed to the track's extensive use in films such as Shutter Island, Stranger Than Fiction, and most prominently 2016's Arrival. The video stars The Handmaid's Tale and Mad Men actress Elisabeth Moss, who shared a statement explaining that she regularly listens to Richter's music before shoots to get herself in the zone: READ THE FULL STEREOGUM ARTICLE & WATCH THE VIDEO

Angelenos can do some unique California dreaming this summer, as acclaimed minimalist Max Richter will bring his massive eight-hour "lullaby" Sleep to Grand Park for two overnight concerts. Attendees can reserve one of 560 cots to experience this massive work under the stars on July 27th and July 28th. Though Richter and various ensembles have staged Sleep with beds in London, Berlin, Paris, Sydney, Austin and New York, these two nights – with American Contemporary Music Ensemble and soprano Grace Davidson – will be its largest stagings and first outdoor performances. "Even the biggest buildings can only accommodate a few hundred beds," Richter tells Rolling Stone. "So, this is us trying to sort of connect it into ... like a normal concert-size audience. Tickets to the Los Angeles performances of Sleep are on sale at musiccenter.org. There will also be tickets to a cot-free "listening area" available for a $6 fee online or free at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion box office.  PHOTO: Mike Terry p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL RollingStone ARTICLE

On February 15th, 2003, the world said no to war. Humanity linked up in what the New York Times called a "global daisy chain" of peaceful demonstrations against the US invasion of Iraq. It was the single largest anti-war protest in history, with up to 30 million people demonstrating worldwide. Max Richter was among those who took to the streets that day. About a week later he made his second album, The Blue Notebooks. It was recorded in only three hours, with a string quintet and the actress Tilda Swinton reading from texts by Franz Kafka and the Nobel Prize-winning poet Czesław Miłosz "for a token fee." When the LP came out a year later, in March 2004, the killing of four Blackwater contractors in Fallujah sparked a renewed period of bloody violence.  Quiet protest is the beating heart of The Blue Notebooks, which has now been reissued on its 15th anniversary with additional material. "It's an attempt for music to comment on society," Richter has said. "Specifically, it's an anti-violence record." "Shadow Journal" is the album's protest song. In the opening bars, which are padded with ambient background chatter, Swinton recites the poem "At Dawn" from Miłosz's Unattainable Earth, a hallucinatory text about a city and some unnamed catastrophe, written in a confusion of past and present tense. The haunted composition that follows emulates the writing's lucid reverie and its projections of uncertainty via ominous bass rumbles and murky loops juxtaposed with a piercing violin melody. It captures the spirit of the "politics of unreality" that Richter says was emerging in 2003 around Iraq.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL Resident Advisor REVIEW

The Barbican's Sounds & Visions weekend promised(London) "a journey into music, image and their meeting points in today's culture", with the opening event featuring co-curator Max Richter‘s 2010 Infra album played in full by The 12 Ensemble. There were also performances by Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Jlin to form an appealingly diverse line up. Richter appeared on stage earlier to explain he and fellow curator, artist Yulia Mahr, had simply chosen musicians they'd quite like to hear. Out of all names associated with modern classical music Max Richter is the one most driven by bigger projects and concepts. His 2015 piece Sleep was over eight hours long and was intended to be listened to at night while sleeping. He's also scored ballets (Woolf Works), re-envisaged the work of traditional big-name composers (Vivaldi Reimagined) and released music as a protest against war (The Blue Notebooks). It is also seen in the origins of Infra – a piece written in response to the terrorist attacks on the London Underground in July 2005 (Infra means ‘below' in Latin). It was originally composed for a dance work choreographed by Wayne McGregor, but tonight is performed by Richter on piano/electronics and 12 Ensemble (a London-based strong orchestra). In his introduction Richter describes it as "travel music" and containing "Schubert atoms."

READ THE FULL REVIEW

Little did we know when we extolled the virtues of Max Richter's Sleep-an eight-hour-plus ambient music piece meant to be listened to while one, you know, sleeps-that within mere weeks the piece would be given its New York premiere. Which is how I found myself hopping the subway on Friday night at 9:00 p.m., headed to Tribeca's Spring Studios, outfitted in my favorite pajamas and carrying a toothbrush and toothpaste in a small bag. (Ever felt like you're not getting the attention you deserve? Make your way through New York City's MTA system at night, wearing purple pantaloon pajamas, and voilà: Attention-the perhaps not the kind you were yearning for-follows you!) In keeping with Richter's other Sleep premieres around the world-including performances at the Sydney Opera House, the Philharmonie de Paris, and Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw-the venue was outfitted with a vast array of beds, 160 in this case, courtesy of Beautyrest (the beds will be donated to local homeless shelters when the performances are complete), on which concertgoers where encouraged to lounge, to rest, and, yes, to sleep. I caught up with Richter-who, understandably, given that he was about to spend almost nine hours in front of various keyboard accompanied by the American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME), was spending some time getting his head together in a small, quiet room-for a few minutes before the work's 10:30 p.m. start. Mostly, I wanted to know where this crazy idea to create this piece came from. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL VOGUE ARTICLE

Max Richter is bringing something much needed to the city that never sleeps: his eight-hour masterpiece, SLEEP. After a successful North American debut at SXSW in March, Richter will perform SLEEP for the first time in New York City this weekend. Attendees will come together for an immersive, overnight performance where they'll fall asleep to the ultimate nighttime soundtrack. To ensure a comfortable evening, Beautyrest mattresses will replace traditional concert seating so guests can fall into a peaceful slumber. Guests will then have the opportunity to explore the restorative powers at work while asleep. Following the event, the mattresses and bed accessories will be donated to communities in need. Tickets are available for both May 4 and May 5 for $250. Doors will open at 9pm with the concert beginning at 10:30pm and ending at 7am. Event Location is 'Spring,' 50 Varick Street, New York, NY. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} SEE THE Haute Living PAGE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px}

SLEEP is eight hours long – and is actually and genuinely intended to send the listener to sleep. "It's an eight-hour lullaby," says its composer, Max Richter. The landmark work is scored for piano, strings, electronics and vocals – but no words. "It's my personal lullaby for a frenetic world," he says. "A manifesto for a slower pace of existence." After receiving its world premiere in Berlin lasting from 12 midnight to 8am at which the audience will be given beds instead of seats and programmes, SLEEP was performed at this past SXSW 2018. Austin Underground's Executive Producer Chris Peck is back with a concert review unlike any other. Watch the attached video. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060}

Max Richter has announced a new reissue of his masterpiece The Blue Notebooks in honor of the album's 15th anniversary via Deutsche Grammophon. The reissue is available in a standard 2xCD or 2xLP edition with the full album and a second disk including live recordings, remixes by Jlin and Konx-Om-Pax, as well as an unreleased recording titled ‘A Catalogue Of Afternoons'. A "super deluxe" 2xCD hardcover edition includes a real notebook and a brand new track titled ‘Cypher'. Released in 2004, the album was written and recorded in 2003 in response to the US invasion of Iraq. It's become one of the most iconic pieces of classical and protest music of the 21st century and appeared in films such as Arrival, Shutter Island and Waltz With Bashir. SEE THE FACT PAGE

Moms and composers have calmed listeners for centuries. Singing, lilting melodies…even inducing sleep – on purpose! Most composers write a lullaby, and may or may not believe you might fall asleep while listening. We'll hear from a composer who wrote a work with the express intention for the audience to sleep! Ahead Max Richter's Sleep, plus more of his music for the stage and screen on this episode of What's New. "Inspired equally by The Beatles and Bach, punk rock and ambient electronica", composer Max Richter mixes "baroque beauty with minimalist methodology, classical orchestration with modern technology." His body of work encompassing concert music, operas, ballets, art and video installations, multiple film, theater and television scores plus solo albums incorporating poetry and literature! LISTEN TO THE SEGMENT What's New is a production of WBAA, a listener supported broadcast service of Purdue University.

In a career that spans almost three decades, the classically trained British composer Max Richter has been part of a minimalist piano collective; he's worked with the British electronic group The Future Sound of London and Mercury Prize winner Roni Size; he's composed ambient and contemporary classical pieces that incorporate field recordings, archived sound, Tilda Swinton reading Kafka and Czeslaw Milosz and Robert Wyatt reading Murakami; he's scored ballets and films and plays and operas and television shows and released an album of 24 short compositions meant to be used as ringtones; he's recomposed Vivaldi's Four Seasons. It's the sort of focused creative frenzy that might explain his recent epic, Sleep-an eight-plus-hour ambient work, consisting mainly of soothing strings, honey-toned piano, and a warm and resonant electronic bass effect, meant to accompany somnolence. Richter premiered the work, which he describes as "an eight-hour personal lullaby for a frenetic world and a manifesto for a slower pace of existence," in Berlin for a pajama-clad audience of 400, which drifted off to sleep in the beds moved into a performance space for the occasion. READ THE FULL Vogue ARTICLE

"Are you joking??" asked a woman in line after a staff member told her about the night's coming performance. She clearly hadn't read or heard about Sleep and if you come unprepared, it would be a bit of a shock to find out what's in store. But it's no joke. Sleep is eight hours of non-stop music, performed live overnight, and, yes, there are beds. To call it a concert does not seem accurate. Sleep is an experience. It isn't surprising that the woman in line was unfamiliar with Max Richter's enormous work. Prior to this event, Sleep had only been performed in Sydney, Paris, London, and Berlin. This performance at South by Southwest (SXSW) marked the North American debut of the monumental Sleep. With Richter himself on piano, keyboards, and electronics, soprano Grace Davidson lending wordless vocals, and members of the American Contemporary Music Ensemble on violin, viola, and cello, those brave (or un-informed) enough to venture out for this marathon concert were in for an unforgettable night. Read THE FULL MOODMEDIA ARTICLE by Music Design Erin Yousef

KMFA Rideshare Host - Chris Johnson attended the or the North American premiere of Max Richter's Sleep, presented by SXSW at Texas Performing Arts at UT Bass Concert Hall on March 13. Badge-holders lined up for over an hour in advance, trying to get a spot on one of 150 mattresses set out on the stage. In addition to the slumbering audience on stage, there was an observation gallery in the hall, where about a hundred audience members were allowed to voyeuristically observe the concert for a couple of hours. The full version of Sleep became available for streaming on March 16.  KMFA's Chris Johnson was lucky enough to be among the latter group. Below are his notes from the sidelines. Take a read

From Westworld craze to Elon Musk to dozens of branded activations, it's been a busy week for marketers at South by Southwest. For this week's recap of digital stats, we're looking at the standout numbers behind the festival that got people talking.

HBO's recreation of Sweetwater, the world within Westworld, was one of this year's buzziest activations and one of the hardest activation tickets to score. Working with agency Giant Spoon, the team wrote 444 pages of script and hired 60 actors to pull off the activation. Read our story and watch our video coverage of the event here. HP's Digital artistry house - While there were arguably less brand activations than in past years, they were interesting and gave attendees a unique experience that they couldn't get elsewhere. Knowing that it's hard to stand out at the festival, HP opened its house for only one day to show creatives how its products work. All told, the house got 5,237 people (and eyeballs) to play around with its ZBook laptop. BeautyRest focused on luxurious relaxation during its SXSW activation, inviting 150 people to sleep on its beds in Bass Concert Hall while listening to British-German composer Max Richter play for eight hours. (Read staff writer Katie Richards' first-hand account of spending a night sleeping next to 149 strangers.) Pandora's been pitching the powers of its algorithm for a while, so it decided to bring a data visualization of it to SXSW. The company's activation crunched genomes from 10,000 songs, using facial recognition to create personal audio clips. Dating app Grindr teamed up with WNYC's Nancy podcast this week to allow Austin residents to edit and add LGTBQ information to Wikipedia pages. Over the course of five hours with 50 attendees, the team edited 500 Wikipedia pages. "The impact on a young queer person going to Wikipedia and seeing proper pronouns used or finding substantive information about important figures in queer history is immeasurable," said Tobin Low, cohost of Nancy. "The greatest hope for something like this hack-a-thon is that you help someone feel affirmed in their existence." Podcast media company Gimlet Media wants to move into voice assistants, and Anna Sullivan, vp of brand partnerships, talked to Adweek about shifting from smartphone shows to its first Amazon Alexa skill for P&G's Oral-B and Crest Kids. The skill educates kids on brushing their teeth, entertaining them with music and games as they brush. Since rolling out a week ago, 45 percent of people who have downloaded the skill use it every day, indicating a possibility for marketers to build voice experiences that tap into everyday routines. Ride-sharing app Lyft was everywhere at SXSW this year, which takes significant planning and orchestrating to pull off. The festival is Lyft's biggest time of year, when requests for rides triple in Austin compared to the average number of requests. From programs with the Austin community to a branded pit stop for drivers, here's our look at Lyft's SXSW plan. SEE THE ADWEEK PAGE

This might very well be the ultimate lullaby. Right at the start of the 2018 SXSW Music Festival, Max Richter's eight-hour composition Sleep was performed overnight to an audience tucked into 150 beds. They - the audience, not the tireless group of musicians who performed the piece - slept, dreamed and sometimes snored through this trance-inducing experience. "Sleeping and being asleep is one of my favorite activities," Richter told NPR in 2015, just before Sleep premiered. "Really, what I wanted to do is provide a landscape or a musical place where people could fall asleep." Richter has performed Sleep live a few times now, and brought the experience to Bass Hall in Austin, Texas. In the video here, you'll see Richter himself on keyboards and electronics, along with the ACME string ensemble and soprano vocalist Grace Davidson, surrounded by those snoozing listeners. This is just an excerpt of the eight-hour concert, but should induce a moment's calm whenever you should need it. WATCH THE NPR VIDEO

At 12:25am Tuesday morning, Max Richter had only been on the stage at Bass Concert Hall for 15 minutes and someone was already snoring. During a typical concert this would be a horrible insult. For Sleep, it proved a high compliment. Best known for lush film and TV scores (The Leftovers), Richter's latest project is an 8-hour composition designed to be played overnight by seven musicians. Last night's SXSW performance was the North American premiere. The piece debuted in 2015 and had been played 11 times previously. The Austin audience lay onstage in 150 twin-sized BeautyRest beds, which were donated to charity afterward. More witnesses sat in 200 overflow seats out front. Non-badge holders had to leave at 2am, but were allowed back at dawn to experience the end of the piece. Although nobody likes a snorer, there's no wrong way to experience Sleep. The only instructions were a polite request not to make much noise and the crowd acted respectfully. A full moon projected on the wall gave just enough light to find your way to the bathroom (or scribble a concert review), but as soon as the music started, the rest of the beds seemed to disappear to create a concert for one. Around 8:30am, the wake-up lights rimming the stage brightened and the piano shifted to bass notes, a subtle but unmistakable alarm. For the first time in hours, the crowd stood up and filled the auditorium with a refreshing sound: applause. 
Photo by David Brendan Hall p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL Austin Chronicle REVIEW

Ahead of World Sleep Day on March 16, Royal Philips, a global leader in health technology, has released the findings from its annual global survey in the report, "Better Sleep, Better Health. A Global Look at Why We're Still Falling Short on Sleep," which looked at what keeps people in 13 countries from getting their optimal night's rest. As a leading innovator in sleep and respiratory care, Philips aims to use these findings to further enhance conversation about an important yet often forgotten pillar of health and wellbeing: sleep health.

In support of this effort, Philips will co-sponsor the immersive, overnight sleep experience performed by critically acclaimed, international composer Max Richter at SXSW in Austin, Texas on March 12. The concert, beginning at midnight and running until 8:30 a.m. on March 13, sees Richter and a string ensemble perform the entire eight-hour lullaby that was composed to aid relaxation, meditation and sleep. Having previously performed Sleep in Australia, the U.K., Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Spain, the concert at SXSW will be Richter's North American debut.

In his debut SXSW performance, classical polymath Max Richter loads into UT's Bass Concert Hall on Monday, March 12, to perform Sleep, an eight-hour orchestral composition played overnight to an audience laying in actual beds. The 51-year-old Englishman detailed his own sleeping habits and more. READ THE Q&A w/Austin Chronicle p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060}

The full eight-hour version of contemporary British composer Max Richter's highly-acclaimed Sleep is to be made available for streaming through all digital platforms for the first time on 16 March. The release ties in with Richter's two overnight performance of Sleep. The first is at the legendary SXSW Festival in Texas on 16 March - which is also World Sleep Day around the world – and the second is at New Zealand's Auckland Festival on 18 March. First released in its entirety as a digital album through Deutsche Grammophon in 2015, Sleep has also spawned a truncated 60-minute version album – known as From Sleep – which also been available on physical formats and has been acclaimed on the international stage. Now, to tie in with the eight-hour album streaming, North America's Vinyl Me Please will be releasing a very special, exclusive limited version of the 1 hour From Sleep on marbled vinyl on 30 March. Fashioned as "an eight-hour lullaby" by its composer, Sleep is scored for piano, strings, electronics and vocals – but no words.  SEE uDiscover Music PAGE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px}

IN his contributions to the National Theatre of Scotland's international smash Black Watch and Charlie Brooker's Black Mirror, post-classical composer Max Richter evokes profound tragedy and unease. However, even in such darkness his work can radiate a beauty so shimmering it blanks out despair. So it is with Three Worlds, Richter's take on Mrs Dalloway, Orlando and The Waves, three novels by Virginia Woolf, born 136 years ago this week Richter has long played with that idea, and this, an exclusive Celtic Connections pairing of his ensemble with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, conducted by the globally-acclaimed Robert Ziegler, is a transcendent triumph. Introduced with the only known recording of Woolf's voice, the flowing Mrs Dalloway shares the elegant, existential dread of the novel, while the surging, Baroque-inspired Orlando – here teamed with dazzling lighting theatrics – emphasises that book's sci-fi elements. Woolf's death hangs over final movement The Waves, which features a moving solo from SCO cellist Su-a Lee and the author's last words to her beloved Leonard, read here by actress Gillian Anderson. READ THE FULL National ARTICLE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px}

Max Richter's Blue Notebooks album was deservedly described as a "modern compositional tour de force of almost overwhelming emotional power", as "deceptively tranquil, borderline supernatural music", and as "languorously transcendent". Cerys Matthews, the BBC 6 Music presenter, has chosen his most recent CD, Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works, as her album of 2017, singling it out for its freshness, distinctiveness, and emotional power. And when American actress Amy Brenneman tweeted a scene from her TV show, The Leftovers, the music for which had been written by Richter, she told him simply: "You slay me."   The Blue Notebooks included On The Nature Of Daylight, a quite beautiful piece of work, which has been heard on such films as Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island and Denis Villeneuve's alien-contact hit, Arrival.   Richter has composed scores or soundtracks for film, theatre, TV, opera and conceptual art works. His theatre works include Alan Cumming's solo Broadway version of Macbeth. His CDs ranged from Songs From Before, with the songwriter Robert Wyatt reading texts by Haruki Murakami, to Recomposed by Max Richter: Vivaldi, The Four Seasons; and Sleep, "an eight-hour lullaby", which has been performed overnight in Paris, Madrid, London and Sydney, with beds provided for the audience.   Max Richter and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, will perform Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works is at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall on January 23 as part of Celtic Connections.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #606060; min-height: 14.0px} READ THE FULL Sunday Herald ARTICLE

p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #263e0f} p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #263e0f} Entertainment Studios is making a last minute dash to the Oscar finish line with "Hostiles." Scott Cooper‘s western stars Christian Bale as a legendary Army captain in 1892 who reluctantly agrees to escort a Cheyenne chief (Wes Studi) and his family through dangerous territory. Gold Derby recently spoke with star Rosamund Pike, film editor Tom Cross, and composer Max Richter about their work on the film. "It's not your typical western," yet, "in common with some other westerns of a previous age… it offers amazing opportunities for music because of the amount of space in the film." Richter explains, "The landscape is a huge part of this film. It offers this sort of medium for the characters to find their story in, but it's all held in this extraordinary landscape, which can be populated also by music." The composer "ended up using kind of an abstract orchestral language, all based on resonating drones and various string textures." Richter chats via webcam. WATCH THE Max Richter - GOLDDERBY INTERVIEW

Busy people with no time to see shows will be delighted to know that at the 2018 Auckland Arts Festival in March there's one event they can go to in their sleep. From audacious British composer Max Richter, Sleep is an eight-hour concert designed to be heard overnight, with the audience lying down. Richter has created an exquisite hybrid of classical and electronic music – 31 uninterrupted pieces – to be experienced while in and out of consciousness and lucid dream states. READ THE FULL SCOOP ARTICLE p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial; min-height: 11.0px} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}

The good folks over at Freshly Popped Culture have been having some fun with the soundtrack to HBO's drama "The Leftovers."  They've taken composer Max Richter's wonderfully haunting score - particularly the track "The Quality of Mercy," which plays during the show's most devastating moments - and added it to other, less dramatic scenes from the world of cinema. Unsurprisingly, it makes even comedic moments like the "Anchorman" scene seem like intense dramatic scenes. WATCH But they didn't stop there. They also added the music to scenes that are already pretty depressing, like Mufasa's death in "The Lion King." The result is a horrifically emotional animated scene that baffles the brain and leaves the viewer in a fragile state of mind. You're going to need a hug after watching this one. WATCH p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial; min-height: 11.0px}

Find yourself struggling to drift off and stay asleep at night, or get your butt out of bed in the mornings? If your hectic life is interrupting with Mother Nature's best immune boosting, hormone replenishing, muscle building, fat burning, energy generating slice of magic, you need to read this! Our fitness experts, the BUF Girls shared their top 5 tips for better sleep and more get-up-and-GO when your alarm goes off. Improve your sleep with these 5 practical steps Turn off all your screens at least an hour before bed. That includes your computer, TV, iPad and yep, your phone too! This might be a good time to head out on a night walk, meditate, or cuddle up for a chat over a cup of herbal tea with a loved one
  Try using a magnesium supplement or even better, a magnesium oil before bed – we love Salt Lab magnesium oil rubbed on the tummy and under the feet for incredible, deep sleeps!
  Listen to some soothing music or read a (non-work) book. If you have Spotify, hit up Max Richter's album "From Sleep"
  Sip on drowsiness-inducing herbal teas after dinner, rather than sugary treats that wind you up. We love chamomile, oat flower, or valerian tea varieties
  Invest in a "Lumie" alarm clock to wake up fresh! These magical clocks wake you up with a half-hour artificial sunrise, so for those of you waking up in the middle of the night for shift work, or hitting the gym super early when it's still dark, you won't believe how much fresher you feel with this over a more traditional alarm clock – it's pure magic! SEE THE Hit 109 PAGE

Drifting into Old Billingsgate Market late on a Saturday night immediately felt like entering a dream. Hundreds of camp beds were positioned around the cavernous venue floor, before a small but prominent stage; the audience arriving with sleeping bags were here for German-born British composer and musician Max Richter's "eight-hour lullaby" Sleep, performed live in its entirety from 11pm to 7am. Sleep originally premiered in a BBC Radio 3 overnight broadcast in 2015. Tonight's sold-out London all-nighter followed concerts in Berlin and Sydney, but it still had an experimental air: a City of London landmark transformed into a kind of arthouse dosshouse, with masses of strangers brought into somnolent intimacy (and the weird distraction of fellow spectator Jarvis Cocker changing into his pyjamas on a nearby bed). Somehow, the experience never felt forced; everyone seemed to succumb easily to Sleep's spell.    PHOTO:  © Mark Allan p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial; min-height: 11.0px} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre} READ THE FULL Financial Times ARTICLE READ The Independant

Max Richter is a restless musician, composer and something of an alchemist in sound who doesn't seem to fit into any tidy genres. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music in the U.K., but he's worked with electronic music bands like Future Sound of London. He writes exquisite electro-acoustic miniatures, but also full-length ballets and even an eight-hour piece called Sleep. He's scored movies (Waltz With Bashir, The Sense of an Ending) and even re-scored Vivaldi's classic Four Seasons. We asked Richter to stop by our New York studio with a playlist of some of his favorite music. The result was a relaxed session of spinning tunes and talking music. Hear the complete conversation via the listening link above and read an edited version of it below.  LISTEN TO THE SEGMENT p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

It's quiet here. Outside, in the frigid darkness, nothing moves. No birds sing, no deer wander, no headlights cut through the clear air. Even the wind seems to be hushed. Somewhere over the trees the moon silently hangs suspended above the wisps of cloud. In the apartment around me, each of its inhabitants respire in steady, relaxed tempos. The world is sleeping. It's 5:19 a.m. and everything is still. For the past several hours, essentially all night, I have been immersed in Max Richter's composition "Sleep." Listening to this piece is like a sort of trance - once you enter into it, you stop noticing it's there. The music gradually melds into the scenery, fades into the background of whatever you are doing and enters into you. It isn't so much doing anything as it is simply being: being present, being absent, being everywhere and nowhere at once. Its principal characteristic is its inexplicable, elusive feeling of grounded placelessness. It invites you into its care and envelops your tired mind in a soft embrace. It hovers at the periphery of your senses. "Sleep" doesn't ask for anything from you. It doesn't demand your attention or your love or your hate, or even your recognition. It goes on whether you're listening or not. To try to analyze it would be beside the point. READ THE FULL The Michigan Daily ARTICLE by Dayton Hare  p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

For the week of 19th February: The top three albums in the Classic FM Chart has remained the same for three weeks now, plus to add the the resilience, no. 4 is also a non-mover this week. Two weeks ago, Max Richter's new album Three Worlds entered the chart at no. 1. For the third week running it is still holding the top spot, while both Einaudi's Islands and The Classical Album are also non-movers at no. 2 and no. 3 for the third week in a row. The 50 Greatest Pieces of Classical Music by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, which climbed to no. 4 last week, is also a non-mover this week.  The rest of the chart it is a game of two extremes - pieces either moved one or two places, or jumped around dramatically. This is reflected in the rest of the top 10, which includes eight albums the same as last week, as well as our top four non-movers. One of the new additions to the top 10 is Classic FM: A Night at the Movies, which jumped a staggering 19 places last week and climbs a further 5 places this week to no. 6.  Jonathan Antoine's Believe is on a rollercoaster ride in the Classic FM Chart. It is the second new addition to the top 10 as well as being this week's highest climber, rising 15 places from no. 24 to no. 9. Strangely enough, this album was last week's biggest faller, dropping from no. 4 to no. 24, and the week before that it was a new entry. It is encouraging to see albums are constantly regaining popularity, yet nothing is guaranteed.  p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px} span.s1 {text-decoration: underline} Elsewhere in the chart, this week's largest faller is Bach: Cantatas with Iestyn Davies, which drops 12 places from the middle of the chart to just inside the top 30. All new entries and re-entries feature in the lower half of the chart this week, including new albums from Henning Kraggerud with the Malmö Symphony Orchestra and Virgin & Child: Music from the Baldwin Partbooks II, and five re-entries from Max Richter, Alfie Boe, John Williams: Greatest Hits 1969-1999, London Symphony Orchestra and 100 Hits: Relaxing Classics.  

There are 8 strong new entries in this weeks chart, but the stand out performance is without a doubt by Max Richter with his latest album Three Worlds: Music from Woolf Works which enters the chart straight at no. 1.  This is Max Richter's second album in the top 10 of the Classic FM Chart - his other current album Sleep is this week's highest climber, jumping a staggering 18 places to no. 6.  Ludovico Einaudi's Islands and The Classical Album remain in the top 3, while other two other new entries make it in to the top 10 - Amy Dickson's new album Glass is at no. 5 this week and the London Haydn Quartet enter the chart at no. 8.  Other new entries include the latest albums from cellist Natalie Clein at no. 20, Westminster Abbey Choir at no. 21, Dustin O'Halloran's soundtrack for the new award-winning film Lion at 25, the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain playing Holst at 26 and finally Iestyn Davies re-enters the chart at no. 6. SEE THIS WEEK's FULL CLASSIC fM CHART

Max Richter doesn't fit neatly into genre categories. He doesn't follow the line of Sigur Rós and Godspeed! You Black Emperor into the postmodern icicle of long tracks and self-seriousness. He doesn't write scores exclusively, although his non-score records sound like they are score records and vice-versa, and he isn't a conservative classicist. He is something different altogether. In his most iconic moments, Richter is an instantly satisfying composer, soundtracking to our dreams and memories. His textures are thick and evoke the moments we forgot or are too afraid to remember and the memories we treasure. But his discography isn't that simple. He has records like Sleep that challenge the very fabric of what music is for and in what it is. Richter's new work, Three Worlds, doesn't neatly fit into any of those categories. It has moments of Memoryhouse radiance, and is orchestral enough to recall The Four Seasons but doesn't necessarily remind me of either of those. Three Worlds is based on the legendary works of Virginia Woolf.  READ THE FULL popmatters REVIEW p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

With the release of Memoryhouse in 2002, the world was introduced to Max Richter's unique talent for combining sounds that seemed to both satisfy and defy the label of "modern classical." It's a label that's all too easily applied to any music that seems as if it could soundtrack dramatic moments in independent films, and while this certainly applies to much of Richter's music, he has consistently produced albums that manage to surprise with their creativity even as they subtly overwhelm with their emotional impact.  

After the impressive feat of composing an 8-hour album, and a very good one at that, Richter now takes a respite from his frequent excursions into music for film and television and returns to Deutsche Grammaphon with a concept album. This time the inspiration is English author Virginia Woolf, and Richter's compositions provide the score for a ballet now being performed at London's Royal Opera House. Readers may be happy to know that my lack of familiairity with Woolf's oeuvre (sadly, my experience is limited to picturing Nicole Kidman's prosthetic nose in The Hours) did nothing to dampen my enjoyment of the album. READ THE FULL Soundblab ARTICLE

Composer Max Richter will perform his own works with a 22-piece orchestra at an open-air concert at Blenheim Palace this summer. The June 16th show, is part of the 2017 Nocturne Festival, which turns Blenheim Palance into an open-air concert venue every year. Richter will perform his own compositions, including Vivaldi Recomposed, which reimagines Vivaldi's iconic series of concertos, The Four Seasons, alongside ‘On The Nature Of Delight', which featured heavily in the 2016 sci-fi blockbuster Arrival. Concert-goers will also hear the premiere performance of a new Richter piece, ‘Three Worlds: Music From Woolf', which collects together his compositions for Wayne MacGregor's Royal Ballet production Woolf Works.  SEE THE FULL CLASSIC fM ARTICLE READ Banbury Guardian   p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

Max Richter has detailed a new "three-part" record featuring music by the works of Virginia Woolf to be released next month. The record puts to disc part of Richter's longer score for Woolf Works, an acclaimed ballet based around the life and works of the influential English writer. The ballet, which premiered in 2015 to rapturous applause, is choreographed by Wayne McGregor, who Richter has collaborated with on a few previous occasions. Woolf Works is constructed around the themes of three of Woolf's books - Mrs. Dalloway, Orlando, and The Waves - and includes "fragments from her letters, diaries, and other writings... woven into the work, with spoken words from Gillian Anderson, Sarah Sutcliffe, and even Virginia Woolf's own voice, reading the essay Craftsmanship from a 1937 BBC recording." READ FULL The Line of Best Fit ARTICLE p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

Whether he's composing the score for HBO's The Leftovers or creating a new concept album, Max Richter's music is spellbinding. His attraction to projects that have political dimensions is well known, so it's no surprise that he was quick to get on board with John Madden and compose the score for the scorching thriller, Miss Sloane. The film stars Jessica Chastain as a Washington lobbyist who takes on a formidable opponent, the gun lobby. Miss Sloane is tense and utterly thrilling from start to finish. Richter and I recently spoke about how he used both electronic music and an orchestra to voice various elements and help propel the film. In Ricter's hands, the blend of electronica and traditional orchestra feel uniquely suited to help the audience unravel the fierce Miss Sloane. Read the Awards Daily conversation with Max Richter about scoring Miss Sloane 

Den of Geek speaks with composer Max Richter to talk about his work on Black Mirror, The Leftovers and Vivaldi's Four Seasons…because why not. "There's a tyranny of happiness," Richter says describing his score for this season's Black Mirror episode "Nosedive. Richter is a seemingly ever-present modern cultural force with his music appearing in the theater, film and television. Very little of his output, however, could be described as "happy." He created the score for HBO's The Leftovers, one of TV's most brilliant but also most relentlessly bleak shows. Richter's score fits it perfectly - a haunting piano dirge that flirts with becoming inspirational without ever quite getting there. Den of Geek - Alec Bojalad spoke with Richter about his work in each of these mediums…and as a TV partisan silently hoped he'd admit that he liked us the most.   READ THE Q&A         p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}  

During our recent webcam chat (watch above), "Miss Sloane" composer Max Richter reveals that his work on the film stemmed firstly from, "the subject matter itself, which is a sort of high-powered, political, twisty narrative, full of energy and a lot of information," and secondly from, "this lead character, Miss Sloane, and her trajectory through this landscape." Directed by John Madden, this EuropaCorp release stars Jessica Chastain as Elizabeth Sloane, a brilliant and ruthless lobbyist taking on the most powerful opponent of her career: the gun industry. SEE THE PAGE WATCH THE VIDEO

German-born British composer Max Richter is launching his own record label, which kicks off with a 12″ of music from the soundtrack of Denis Villeneuve's sci-fi thriller Arrival. Released on December 16, the 180g vinyl features two versions of Richter's ‘On The Nature Of Daylight'. The tracks feature as string quartet and full orchestra versions, and form the opening and closing theme from the movie, which hits cinemas this month. The track originally featured on Richter's 2004 album, The Blue Notebooks, and was a response to both the events of the Iraq War and Richter's own childhood. He was initially reluctant to let Villeneuve use it on the film. "When I was contacted by the makers of Arrival, I was initially cautious. Having allowed the work to be used in two outstandingly powerful films, Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island, and Henry Alex Rubin's Disconnect, I was doubtful about granting another use," Richter says. While Richter has provided the opening and closing theme for the movie, which stars Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner and Forrest Whittaker, the rest of the score has been written by Jóhann Jóhannsson. READ THE FULL FACT ARTICLE p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

Music, Alfred Hitchcock once said, "makes it possible to express the unspoken" in film-to hint at underlying turmoil or approaching darkness. No contemporary composer expresses the same complexity of emotion onscreen as Max Richter, whose work pervades modern culture, from film to television to dance to theater. On The Leftovers, the HBO show about the sudden and incomprehensible disappearance of 2 percent of the world's population, it's Richter's theme that expresses the world's subsequent state of nihilism and despair. "On the Nature of Daylight," a composition from his 2004 album The Blue Notebooks, pops up in countless scenes and soundtracks, notably in a pivotal moment in Denis Villeneuve's upcoming sci-fi film Arrival. Richter also wrote the score for the 2016 film Morgan, a sci-fi horror film about a human hybrid gone wrong. His newest work accompanies the first episode of the new season of Black Mirror, Charlie Brooker's speculative series about a world transformed by technology. In "Nosedive," directed by Joe Wright (Atonement) and starring Bryce Dallas Howard (Jurassic World), a woman lives in a reality where every interaction, no matter how tiny, is rated, and people gain status in society based on their scores as human beings. Throughout the episode, the score creates a sense of gorgeous disconnect: a signal for viewers that beneath the sunny perfection of the world of "Nosedive" is something deeply troubling. p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px} Although Richter's work rewards focused attention, his most recent album was intended for subconscious rather than conscious listening. 2015's Sleep is an eight-hour record created with the help of a neuroscientist to accompany a full night of rest-a comment both on the scattered nature of modern attention spans and the power of slow art. Some of his upcoming projects include the Jessica Chastain movie Miss Sloane, season three of The Leftovers, a show called Taboo for the BBC starring Tom Hardy, and a new ballet for the Netherlands Dance Theater. He spoke with me by phone; the interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length. READ The Atlantic Q&A

Max Richter is no stranger to soundtracks, having previously lent his minimalist, classically informed approach to films including The Leftovers, Waltz With Bashir, Miss Sloane and Disconnect. The Berlin-based composer brought his A-game for Black Mirror S3's opening episode (and surely one of the most talked about) – ‘Nosedive', a teeth-clenchingly uncomfortable portrayal of superficial status in the digital age, helmed by Atonement director Joe Wright. Bryce Dallas Howard plays Lacie in a not-so-distant future where Facebook and Instagram likes have evolved into a terrifyingly central part of our lives. Number of likes on an unnamed, ubiqutuous social platform are used to determine a rating out of five that has drastic consequences for those lower on the register. p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px} With the orchestral score already released on Deutsche Grammophon, we asked Richter how he went about soundtracking the episode, and own take on Brooker's vision of a depressingly believable tomorrow.   READ THE FACT Q&A p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Helvetica; min-height: 12.0px}

Classical was dead. Long operating on the bourgeoisie corners of society. Lauded only in the mythic concert halls, derided by the rock loving youth. In recent years, something finally changed, the introduction of more varied instrumentation into indie rock rekindled a long smoldering fire, and the post classical movement was born. Over the past fifteen years the 130701 imprint by FatCat Records has played a pivotal role in the burgeoning post classical scene, housing artists like Set Fire to Flames and Hauschka, creating an open space for innovative artists to explore their creativity. In honor of their fifteen year anniversary 130701 has released Eleven Into Fifteen, a satisfying hors d'ouevre and engaging collection of unnoticed unreleased oddities from iconic artists. One of the last big standouts from the album is "Bach Study" by Max Richter. On this track, Richter takes a slow moving orchestra and turns it into something of an event, each note lingers on endlessly and deeply, reaching into the depths of the soul. About halfway through the piece a deep shaking rumble buzzes through the listeners headphones, punctuating the piece with a full and aching texture that adds so much more to the song than it has any right to and leaving a profound impact on the structure of the entire album. READ THE FULL mxdwn.com ARTICLE

10.15pm would usually be a wrap at the Sydey Opera House, but not tonight. Two hundred classical music fans, panoramic harbour views and eight hours of dreams performed by the composer during a wild winter storm. I'm aware our sensible consumption choices and aura of calm may seem slightly cultish. And I suppose it is. Just 200 of us have come to a sleepover at the Sydey Opera House, to see composer Max Richter's eight-hour composition, Sleep, performed overnight.   Released last year, the classical work was created with help from neuroscientist David Eagleman with the aim of nurturing the sleeping brain. Richter did not pioneer sleeping music, but the beauty and scale of Sleep, as well as its timing ("a lullaby for a frenetic world"), has taken the genre to new levels of sophistication. READ THE FULL guardian ARTICLE

Imagine composing an epic eight-hour piece of music, only to have people fall asleep while listening to it. Composer Max Richter doesn't mind at all. In fact, he's bringing his band all the way to Australia to do just that! The Sydney Opera House will turn into one big slumber party on Friday 3rd and Saturday 4th of June 2016, as Vivid LIVE presents SLEEP - Richter's "eight-hour lullaby for a frenetic world" - and we'll be there to broadcast it live to the nation on ABC Radio, ABC TV and ABC iView. We start at 11.30pm June 3rd until 7.30am June 4th (AEST) 2016. How to Listen
Online via ABC Classic 2: radio.abc.net.au/stations/classic2/live
On your mobile device via ABC Radio app: https://radio.abc.net.au/help/apps
On digital radio via ABC Extra: http://www.abc.net.au/radio/digital/extra/ How to Watch
On your tele via ABC1
Online via iView: iview.abc.net.au/ SEE Herald Sun PAGE

Influential neo-classical composer Max Richter has long operated between the folds of contemporary classical music and the electro-acoustic world. His prodigious output is strewn across opera, ballet and film and regularly bleeds into alternative popular culture, through his own work and numerous challenging collaborations. With a back catalogue that has produced a rich stream of post-classical and ambient electronic music, Richter is a master at seamlessly entwining orchestral and electronic sounds – from his landmark debut album Memoryhouse in 2002 to his most recent release ‘from SLEEP', an eight-hour experiment in ambient drone for people to, quite literally, sleep to. READ & SEE THE musicradar PAGE

Classical and minimalist composer Max Richter has given the world a remarkable work of art. Described by Richter as a  "personal lullaby for a frenetic world" and "a manifesto for a slower pace of existence," Sleep is an eight-hour classical piece, which features piano, strings, and vocals fused with gentle electronics. It's Philip Glass on Xanax. Sleep is also a reminder of the deaths and rebirths that are part of our lives. Richter's work was composed in consultation with the American neurologist David Eagleman as a way for him to explore the effect music has on subconscious minds. Richter: "For me, sleeping and music are both altered states; they are different ways of perceiving the world and relating to the world... I feel like they are intuitively connected in some way-the lullaby tradition is globally universal, so this idea of sleeping to music is obviously something as a species we like doing." Sleep has song titles like "Dream 19," "Cassiopeia" and "Patterns." The notes repeat over and over, with subtle touches of violin and electronica. It could be viewed as a total lack of imagination, but I think it's pure genius. READ THE FULL Splice Today PIECE

Max Richter is a German-born, British composer releasing some six albums. But to understand his standing now, you have to go back to a band he fronted, called Piano Circus, that commissioned works from Arvo Part, Brian Eno and Philip Glass – and his grasp of  "less is more". Now after two successful releases in New Zealand (the unmissable Recomposed-Vivaldi's Four Seasons and Sleep), Universal Music have re-issued his 2006 disc Songs From Before. Once again it's a sparse work; its nearest counterpart seems to be the minimalists' from Iceland: Johann Johannsson, Olarfur Arnalds and Sigor Ros, or The Bridge television soundtrack. The recently retired Robert Wyatt (ex-Soft Machine and Pink Floyd/Bjork collaborator) gives us five readings of Lit-god Haruki Murakami, with only two violins, two cellos and a viola, plus Richter's keyboard electronics mirroring the sound of glass harmonica and xylophone, which remarkably sounds like a full symphonic orchestra. We now have another wonderful album to add to his small body of work.  SEE THE Stuff.co.nz - The Dominion Post PAGE

Composer Max Richter performed the public world premiere of his eight-hour lullaby - Sleep as the 400-strong pyjama-clad audience settled into camp beds for the night at 'Kraftwerk' the dimly lit Berlin venue for the performance. Richter and his musicians are performing for three nights as part of the Berliner Festspiele's Maerz Musik Festival. In September 2015, Richter performed Sleep to an invited audience of just 20 at the Wellcome Collection, London. Radio 3 broadcast the piece, thereby earning the world record for the longest piece of music ever broadcast live. Richter composed his piece, which features piano, strings and vocals fused with electronics, in consultation with US neurologist David Eagleman as a way to explore the effect music has on subconscious minds. SEE THE FULL guardian ARTICLE SEE Electronic Beats PAGE

Max Richter's somnolent opus Sleep is mostly premised on this overlooked question: falling asleep during a presentation, a funeral, a comedy routine, or a conversation is bad, sure, but should being lulled to sleep by music be such a bad thing? Could it be a good thing to fall asleep to music, both for the composer and the dozer? I'm a musical sleeper myself, maybe under the spell of both the city (where I grew up and where noise at night is its own kind of lullaby) and the pseudo-science and the science that says that babies should listen to Bach while they're sleeping and that old people should too. One 2005 study found that for seniors with sleep problems, listening to relaxing classical music for 45 minutes before going to bed helped improve their subjective sleep quality. In a 2008 study, twenty-something students listened to classical music, audiobooks, and nothing as they fell asleep; only the students who listened to music showed marked improvement in their sleep.  READ THE FULL Motherboard ARTICLE

If you're a fan of HBO programming, you've probably heard the work of composer Max Richter - he's responsible for scoring one of its dark dramas, The Leftovers. But recently, Richter released something a little more subdued: an eight-hour album called Sleep, which he calls a "lullaby for a frenetic world". Ambitious though it may be, Richter is hardly the first composer to send people nodding off, or to try and score a dreamscape. READ THE FULL NHPR ARTICLE

Post-minimalist composer Max Richter's latest work, Sleep, is an eight-hour song cycle created - with the help of input from sleep therapists and scientists - to mimic and aid sleep patterns; you're to fall asleep somewhere among the 25 minutes of opener "Return 16 (time capsule)" and awaken near the end of "Dream 17 (Alpha)." It's a gorgeous listen, all sparse piano, voice, strings and drones; for those who want to enjoy it awake, there's From Sleep, a 50-minute, condensed version of similar thematic compositions. Max Richter - Sleep / exclaim.ca: Top 10 Improv & Avant-Garde Albums, Best of 2015

It might be taken for granted but sleep is as essential to human life as food. Some claim it is more so and that the human body can survive longer without food than it can without sleep. Max Richter, a German-born British classically trained composer, values the necessity of sleep which he classes as one of his favourite activities, so much so that he devoted his new composition to sleep, eight hours of what he calls a lullaby that premiered in Berlin in September when participants brought beds and blankets to experience Richter's mesmerising minimalist creation. It is scaled-down to a one-hour set of highlights for this From Sleep CD featuring Richter on piano, organ, synthesisers and electronics, with the American Contemporary Music Ensemble quintet of string players plus vocal sounds in the final track. Richter skilfully shapes two imaginative "Path" movements (5 and 19), Space 21 (petrichor), Dream 3 (in the midst of my life)and Dream 8 (late and soon) into a compelling program of composed and improvised soothers for insomniacs. SEE ALL REVIEWS ON news.com.au PAGE

Somewhere in the world, right now, a mother (or father) is singing a lullaby to a baby. The ancient folk art form is common to all cultures, not just in essence but in form. The songs are often in 6/8 time with lyrics warning of danger. Almost all are very short. Max Richter's Sleep is eight hours long. It is designed to send listeners to sleep, and to play while they slumber. In the age of the soundbite and the 140-character tweet, unleashing such a lengthy work seems almost perverse. "Sleep is one of my favourite activities," Richter told Time magazine, and this is not his first lullaby although the others, which clocked in at about two minutes, were considerably shorter. The British-German composer, based in Berlin, has a habit of initiating ambitious projects. He has released an album of instrumentals designed to be used as ringtones (24 Postcards in Full Colour), and three years ago, as part of Deutsche Grammophon's Recomposed series, he reworked Vivaldi's classic The Four Seasons, replacing 75 per cent of the original score with his own work and adding Moog synthesiser.   READ THE FULL Sydney Morning Herald REVIEW

More than half the audience was asleep and at least one was snoring during the world premiere of Max Richter's latest composition at the Wellcome Library in London. And the 49-year-old British composer couldn't have been more pleased. The piece, called Sleep lasts eight hours, and it is designed to do exactly that: encourage people to fall asleep. And stay asleep. Richter had the idea one morning. "You could say I woke up with it," he tells the South China Morning Post in a recent interview in Oxford. "I wanted to explore the boundary  between sleeping and waking: it's a fertile space and I wanted to see whether music could really send people into that space." READ THE South China Morning Post ARTICLE

Max Richter, now signed to the prestigious classical label Deutsche Gramophone, explores the post minimalist sound associated with Brian Eno, Arvo Part and Philip Glass in that he uses sonics, alongside violin and cello, plus the ethereal voice of soprano Grace Davidson, to create sound patterns, many which I perceive to be church influenced. Certainly the use of organ reinforces that view. Giving the album the title from Sleep might just be too soporific for some and may cause problems in the fast dwindling music stores as to where to place this disc. Does it legitimately belong in classical or is it New Age? It's rather beautiful in its construction and deeply soothing, which means it has succeeded in its goal. READ THE FULL Stuff.nz ARTICLE

Composer Max Richter wants you to close your eyes and fall asleep to his latest album, that why he called it Sleep. Honestly it's no insult if you nod off during the middle of it… that's the point. Eight Hours long, the work was created by the British musician to encourage listeners to dream, before waking up again, still listening to his music (though there's also a one hour version entitled From Sleep you can listen to while awake if you prefer). So are you feeling sleepy? Good, Q has the premiere of the a new video from the record, Dream 3, which Richter himself has written us an introduction for… Richter says: "This film, made by my wife Yulia, feels like a stream of consciousness riff on the ideas in the music. It's a night time journey through our hometown, Berlin, as well as New York where I recorded some of the material. I've always been fascinated by that magical space when most of the world is sleeping, and for many years that is when I did all my work. Yulia and I have often talked about this, and one of her earlier films (for my piece Fragment) is another exploration of this space, shot in beautiful time-lapse on Super 8mm. So you could say this film is the the next instalment of an ongoing conversation over our kitchen table. Isn't that where the most interesting things happen anyway?" WATCH 'Slumber'

During the past few weeks I've been listening to "Sleep," by the contemporary British composer and musician Max Richter. The wordless composition, which is scored for piano, strings, voice, and electronics, is a little more than eight hours long. The full-length "Sleep" is available only as a digital download; a one-hour version, "From Sleep," is available on vinyl and CD format also. The eight-hour version, Richter said in a recent interview, is a lullaby, and the one-hour version, a daydream. "From Sleep" is beguiling, "Sleep" is more tranquil and, by design, more elusive. It is "meant to be slept through," Richter says. I can't describe what happens in at least six hours' worth of "Sleep," because I've been sleeping. On September 27th, a live performance of "Sleep," involving Richter and a half-dozen other musicians, was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 from midnight to 8 A.M. It was the longest live broadcast of a single piece of music in the station's history. The piece was performed in the reading room of the Wellcome Library, a London institution dedicated to the study of medical history, to an audience of around twenty people, accommodated in camp beds. Afterward, when they were interviewed by the BBC, few could claim to have slept for the duration of the performance. "I didn't want to sleep," one audience member said, while another described experiencing hallucinations. Radio listeners tweeted their reactions throughout the night, and, as for the musicians, one suspects that by the end they were in need of a good sleep themselves. READ THE FULL New Yorker PIECE

Radio 3 established two Guinness world records on Sunday 27 September with a live broadcast of Max Richter's Sleep. The eight-hour, one-minute and 23-second  performance was the ‘longest live broadcast' and the ‘longest single continuous broadcast of a piece' to have ever featured on radio. Sleep was composed in collaboration with the neuroscientist David Eagleman as an exploration of the interaction of music and the sleeping mind. Richter calls it his ‘lullaby for a frenetic world.'Sleep is scored for a chamber ensemble of strings, keyboard, electronics, and solo soprano, who performed in shifts throughout the night, taking breaks to sleep. READ THE FULL Classical-Music.com PIECE

The EIGHT-HOUR lullaby for adults promising a perfect night's sleep: Four insomniacs put new £25 classical record to the test... so does it really work? BBC Radio 3 will broadcast eight-hour 'lullaby' this weekend in full Titled 'Sleep', record is designed to promote good quality slumber Composer Max Richter consulted neuroscientist when making the record Anyone who's grappled with insomnia will tell you that they'd do almost anything to be able to get a good night's sleep. It's a malaise that almost all of us have suffered from at some point in our lives.   The clock ticks, you toss and turn, the darkness turns to a half-light, the birdsong begins...and then slumber takes you, ten minutes before you're supposed to get up for work. Sleeping like a baby? Four FEMAIL writers played the music while sleeping overnight. Bianca London said she felt fresher in the morning but didn't like sleeping in headphones. When Radio 3 sends it out over the airways live and in its entirety on Saturday, it will be the longest single piece of music ever to be broadcast by the corporation. More than a few insomniacs are expected to tune in.  Richter's album, titled Sleep, is eight hours long; an unbroken piece of music that the composer has described as 'my personal lullaby for a frenetic world'.  'I had to do something more than offer sympathetic words':...That's the headline story; but for anyone who's ever battled a sleep problem, it may also offer a glimmer of hope to those whose heads hit the pillow every night but find they can't switch off. The condensed album version of the works, priced at a princely £25, is already top of the music charts. Discussing the work, Richter says he became fascinated by what goes on 'under the hood' while we're asleep and worked with a neuroscientist to make music that might actually enhance the sleeping experience.  READ THE FULL Daily Mail ARTICLE     Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3243434/Four-insomniacs-eight-hour-adult-lullaby-promising-perfect-night-s-sleep-test.html#ixzz3mkQT0VOU  Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

This weekend, across London, in the reading room of the Wellcome Collection, an ensemble orchestra and soprano will perform Max Richter's Sleep from midnight on Saturday until 8am on Sunday. The concert will be heard live on Radio 3, thereby becoming the longest single continuous piece of music broadcast live on the BBC  (a recorded version is already available on Deutsche Grammophon). Those of us who nodded off during side two of Bowie's Low or the more plangent sections of Messiaen's Catalogue d'Oiseaux were unwittingly in training for our roles as comatose listeners to Max Richter's musical experiment. But if Lost in Thought is aimed at encouraging mindfulness, what's the point of Richter's Sleep? Can audiences be said to be listening if they aren't awake? "I think of Sleepas an experiment into how music and the mind can interact in this other state of consciousness," says Richter, "one we all spend decades of our lives completely immersed in, but which is so far rather poorly understood." Richter wrote the piece in consultation with American neuroscientist David Eagleman, and the concert is aimed at helping to understand the nature of sleep. Listeners will be invited to report on whether Richter's lullaby helped them to drift off and what kind of dreams they had. Sleep is being played as part of Why Music?, a weekend of public events and one-off broadcasts that includes debates and performances exploring the relationship between music and the mind. READ THE FULL guardian PIECE

From Sleep is an offshoot of Richter's durational album Sleep, which clocks in at 8 hours – about the amount of sleeping time scientists recommend for adults.  While Sleep is intended as "a personal lullaby for a frenetic world" and meant to be listened while one is counting sheep and through the duration of the sleep cycle, From Sleep is a more modest 60-minute ambient daydream.  It's a warm blanket of hazy, cozy sound.  Richter calls it his "manifesto for a slower pace of existence."  The two albums share a common landscape, but with a much shorter run-time From Sleep is less of a political statement. The album contains seven selections that sound different enough to be their own pieces but flow seamlessly together, enough so that it's difficult to tell when one piece has ended and the next begins.  Richter has composed a delicate musical cocoon with no sharp edges.   From Sleep opens with "Dream 3 (In the Midst of My Life)."  The gentle, pulsing piano feels like a lone boat bobbing up and down in a vast ocean.  The vaguely aqueous feel continues into the next selection, "Path 5 (Delta)," which offers up synthesized vocals from soprano Grace Davidson that sound like they could have been recorded underwater.  As the song goes on her voice even begins to sound less human and more like a beautiful, sorrowful, looping whale song. "Space 11 (Invisible Pages Over)" is a simple drone that serves as a bridge to "Dream 13 (Minus Even)," where we are again treated to Richter's tranquil piano.  This time the piano is less pulsing and more like a lullaby with the cello taking its time to join in like a tranquil foghorn.  The fog begins to lift at about the halfway mark and you can almost feel the warm sun dappling the aural scenery. The looping structure of the album mirrors the looping within the songs as we move from "Dream 13 (Minus Even)" to another bridging drone ("Space 21 (Petrichor)"), to more slow, precious, circular piano in "Path 19 (Yet Frailest)", and finally return in "Dream 8 (Late & Soon)" to silky strings, moody organ, and Davidson's lamenting vocals floating in and out like a zephyr. Given its graceful serenity, From Sleep could be used as ambient background music for students, a meditative companion for yogis, or the soundtrack to a relaxing evening walk.  And yes, you can also use it as a sleep aid.  Hit play on this dulcet album in any situation where the end goal is to relax, open up the mind, and disengage from the busy whirring of everyday life. LISTEN TO THE ALBUM

Can an eight-hour 'adult lullaby' soothe our frazzled brains? Thomas H. Green talks to its composer. It is almost midnight and I'm lying in bed, lights out, awaiting sleep. However, all is not quiet. Very gently, a stereo is playing. A slow, mantric piano motif floats from the speakers. "It sounds like the music they play when I have my foot massage," my girlfriend yawns drowsily. I am not finding it quite as easy to drift off. Lying in the stillness, the revolving notes seem intrusively loud, simply because my consciousness is focusing on them. I turn the music down. Then I turn it down again. Riding the verge of inaudibility, but still a clear presence, it works much better, massaging my brain into dreamland. The music is Anglo-German composer Max Richter's new project, unambiguously titled Sleep. It is eight hours long and designed to help soothe the brain during the sleeping hours. Its appearance is timely, given recent surveys of Britons' sleeping habits. According to the Sleep Council, we now get only six and a half hours' sleep a night on average, up to two hours less than 60 years ago. And, according to the Economic and Social Research Council, a third of us suffer from insomnia and another quarter have some other form of sleeping problem, all of which have a serious impact on our wellbeing - from poor mood and cognitive function to increasing levels of obesity. Richter's music - which will be performed live for the first time on BBC Radio 3 on the night of September 26 in front of an audience lying in camp beds - is being billed as a "lullaby" for an always-connected, frenetic world. "In our daytime environment, we expend a lot of energy curating all that stuff coming out of our screens," Richter says. "I wanted to make a piece that was so big, listening to it would be like a pause button on that information flow, going on holiday from it."   READ THE FULL stuff.nz ARTICLE

BBC Radio 3 and Wellcome Collection have announced the world premiere live broadcast of Max Richter's ground-breaking and experimental new composition "SLEEP", to be performed live from Wellcome Collection into the early hours of the morning as part of the Why Music? weekend. BBC Radio 3 will air the world premiere live broadcast of Max Richter's SLEEP live from Wellcome Collection on from midnight on 26 September to 8am on 27 September. Composed in consultation with renowned American neuroscientist David Eagleman, the 'lullaby for a frenetic world' is meant to be heard whilst sleeping. Audiences across the UK are invited to hear the broadcast as they sleep whilst the composer experiments to find out what effect hearing music has on our subconscious mind. Max Richter, pictured, says: "The BBC Radio 3 Why Music? broadcasts from Wellcome Collection neatly sum up what my piece is about. I think of SLEEP as an experiment into how music and the mind can interact in this other state of consciousness, one we all spend decades of our lives completely immersed in, but which is so far rather poorly understood. I consulted with the neuroscientist David Eagleman on how music can relate to the sleep state and have incorporated our conversations in the compositional process of the work."  READ THE FULL NewsonNews STORY SEE THE BBC POST READ Classical Music POST

One of Britain's leading contemporary composers has written what is thought to be one of the longest single piece of classical music ever to be recorded. SLEEP is eight hours long – and is actually and genuinely intended to send the listener to sleep. "It's an eight-hour lullaby," says its composer, Max Richter. The landmark work is scored for piano, strings, electronics and vocals – but no words. "It's my personal lullaby for a frenetic world," he says. "A manifesto for a slower pace of existence." SLEEP will receive its world premiere this September in Berlin, in a concert performance lasting from 12 midnight to 8am at which the audience will be given beds instead of seats and programmes. The eight-hour version will be available as a digital album, and for those who prefer it, a one-hour adaptation of the work – from SLEEP – will be released on CD, vinyl, download, and streaming formats, all through Deutsche Grammophon, on 4 September.   READ THE FULL MoneyTalksNews ARTICLE

British composer Max Richter hopes you are snoring before you finish his latest release. Sleep, an 8-hour classical piece released Friday, features gentle strings and peaceful piano. He has called it a "personal lullaby for a frenetic world. A manifesto for a slower pace of existence." Richter says sleep is an integral part of his creative process. "Sleeping has always been one of my favorite activities," Richter told TIME. He's also aware that most of us aren't getting enough of it. Recent research shows that high school students, air traffic controllers and even surgeons are suffering from dangerous levels of sleep deprivation. Meanwhile, sales have skyrocketed for children's book The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep, written by a Swedish behavioral psychologist who uses reinforcement techniques in the book to calm children into drifting off.  READ THE FULL Time ARTICLE

British composer Max Richter spent about two years writing and recording a piece of music which, if it's successful, few people will hear in full. It's a composition called Sleep and it runs eight hours long - the perfect length for a good night's rest. The full version of the piece will be released as a digital album Friday. "Sleeping and being asleep is one of my favorite activities," Richter says. "Really, what I wanted to do is provide a landscape or a musical place where people could fall asleep." That's right: This music is designed to put you to sleep. Richter and his ensemble will premiere the piece in Berlin this fall, playing from midnight until 8 a.m. in a venue customized for the occasion. "We basically will play in the round, so the band is in the middle, and ringed around it are four or five hundred beds," Richter says. And if all goes well, there will be as much snoring as applause. LISTEN TO THE WCLV: Cleveland Feature     Also, Listen to the attached Interview

For most performers, nothing is more disrespectful than a snoozing audience member. But Max Richter takes a different view. "If the audience stays awake during my performance I will consider it the greatest insult," says Max Richter, the classical composer who hopes his latest work will send the nation to sleep. BBC Radio 3 is to air the world live broadcast premiere of Sleep, an epic eight-hour "lullaby for a frenetic world," which Richter has designed to transport listeners gently into slumberland. The longest single continuous piece of music ever broadcast live on the BBC, the British composer will begin the performance of his trance-inducing experimental work, accompanied by a small ensemble, at midnight on 26 September. The premiere will be staged at the Wellcome Collection in London in front of an invited audience of around 20 people. Instead of seats, the venue will provide beds and the lights dimmed to encourage an appropriately somnolent atmosphere in the Reading Room. One of the longest pieces of music ever recorded, the gently pulsing Sleep is released on 5 September as an extended stream and download through Deutsche Grammophon – listeners are advised to place their devices on sleep mode to avoid distractions.   READ THE FULL Independant ARTICLE READ THIS Independant ARTICLE

leep. It's both an oasis where our physical and mental batteries get recharged and a playground for the subconscious. It's also the subject of Max Richter's latest project, SLEEP, which inspired this video by Yulia Mahr. A composer, pianist, remixer and musical tinkerer, Richter has written a soundtrack for slumber, eight hours in all, which will receive its premiere this fall in Berlin. Instead of seats, audience members will stretch out on beds, encouraged to actually drift off to the music. It helps that the event is slated for midnight to 8 a.m.The benefits from a sound night of sleep are becoming more apparent - as many a Fitbit fanatic will attest. A recent study in the journal Sleep suggests the more shuteye we get the less likely we are to get sick. But Richter points out other advantages. He believes the pace of our 21st-century lives is too hectic. Slowing down, even with your music, can be a good thing. He thinks of the project as "personal lullaby for a frenetic world."What Richter's proposing isn't exactly new. He acknowledges his forebearers like John Cage, La Monte Young and Morton Feldman, each of whom experimented in long-form, slowly paced compositions.In the video, gently swaying, angelic voices offer a soothing contrast to shots of bustling New York and Berlin crosscut with sleepers. It's all sped up in time-lapse black and white with an inverted visual effect. The piece, Path 5 (delta), is from an hour-long offshoot from SLEEP, music Richter wrote in the same spirit but intended to be heard with eyes wide open.The full, eight-hour version of SLEEP will be released Sept. 4 as a digital album, while the separate one-hour suite, called from SLEEP, will be released on CD and vinyl the same day.  WATCH THE VIDEO

In the lead-up to the release of his eight-hour lullaby album, Sleep, composer Max Richter creates a playlist of some his favourite music, from noise-rockers Girl Band to Aphex Twin. Here are a few words from Max Music exists beyond genre labels. I generally follow my enthusiasm when listening, so this selection is a typically mixed bag. A few things in this list, such as Dinu Lipatti playing Bach, have visited my turntable for years; others, such as Girl Band, are recent additions to my home vinyl collection. I've just finished a project concerned with sleep, perception and dreams, and many of the picks here feel like reveries: the abstract melancholy love song by Aphex Twin, or the cavernous spaces of Grouper's music both seem disembodied in their own way. One of the images that music calls to mind for me is that of the daydream. I think many of these tracks are like daydreams, though not all of them are the kind of dreams we might want to have. CHECK OUT Max's List

Contemporary minimalist composer Max Richter has written a new piece entitled Sleep which is eight hours in length and designed to soundtrack a night of slumber. Richter describes the piece as "an eight-hour personal lullaby for a frenetic world and a manifesto for a slower pace of existence". The piece is scored for piano, strings, electronics and vocals. It is warm yet haunting and melancholic, while moving at a glacial pace. The German-born British composer said something during our conversation that stuck with me: "I think time is a preoccupation right now." This brought a documentary about Marina Abramovic - The Artist Is Present - to mind. The film, released in 2012 chronicles a retrospective at MOMA and features a 736-hour static, silent performance piece, which sees Abramovic sitting immobile in the museum's atrium during opening hours while spectators were invited to take turns sitting opposite her. As people stared back at her, some for a few minute, some for hours, many began to cry or describe a feeling of transcendence afterwards. Richter has previously described his music in the terms of story telling but this time, with Sleep, his most ambitious piece to date, it's like he's deliberately left pages of the story book blank. It's as if a projector with no film is beaming a hazy light onto a blank cinema screen for you to project your dreams onto.  READ THE FULL Quietus REVIEW

Lke many European composers before him who have made the pilgrimage across the Atlantic to offer their talents on the altar of Hollywood, Max Richter has learned to become proficient in the rituals of studio networking. "Today is a meeting day. I'll sort of have the same conversation 11 times," said the Berlin-based English composer on a recent visit to Los Angeles. It was early morning and Richter, 49, was seated in the dining room of his posh West Hollywood hotel, finishing a plate of scrambled eggs. Tall and pale in complexion, he seemed completely relaxed despite the demanding day ahead of him. "The one-to-one connections with the creative people, that's easy," he said. "It's actually all the people in the suits - you have to get past them somehow. That's the challenging part." READ THE FULL Los Angeles Times ARTICLE

On one level, Max Richter's latest album is straight-up ambient postminimalism, all hushed and precious moodiness, but there's concept behind the mellow loops and drones and wordless floaty vocals. A decent night's sleep lasts for eight hours; Richter's epic durational work Sleep clocks in at the same. The German-British composer calls it both a "personal lullaby for a frenetic world" and a "very deliberate political statement" on the way we engage with our sonic environment. He wants to know how our brains deal with music while we dream: it is neurological research by incredibly low-key stealth. The full version, Sleep, is intended to actually send us to sleep, but From Sleep is a one-hour offshoot during which we're supposed to stay awake. Richter plays piano, organ, synths and low-thrumming electronics; the American Contemporary Music Ensemble adds soft-hewn vocals and strings. It's a warm, slow-moving daydream with no sharp edges and a self-consciously hazy sound, as if recorded next door or underwater.  SEE theguardian PAGE

It TELLS you something about Max Richter, that despite being surrounded by 22 musicians at the Edinburgh International Festival, the first "instrument" he plays is his Apple Mac. The electronic opening notes of his Recomposed – Vivaldi: The Four Seasons climb out of the computer, before handing over to the string section of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, and incredible solo violinist Daniel Hope. Forty-five minutes later, an enormous Playhouse crowd is on its feet, and with good reason. Richter's extraordinary, and genuinely exciting, re-working of the famous concertos gets your adrenalin pumping one minute, fills you with tender sadness the next. While Hope's dynamic playing compels our gaze with his fast and furious bowing.   READ THE FULL WOW ARTICLE

Composer Max Richter wants people to doze off during his latest composition, SLEEP, which he calls an "8-hour lullaby." SLEEP has its world-premiere performance this September in Berlin, Germany, coinciding with the release of a full recording of the piece (as well as a condensed, one-hour version) by Deutsche Grammophon. I spoke with Max from London to learn about this curious new project. He explained some of his inspiration for SLEEP. He also dispelled some of the myths being circulated by the media that he's attempting to break records with the "longest ever piece of classical music," as the Telegraph UK claimed in a recent feature.  

READ THE Q&A with Richter and WFMT: Chicago - Stephen Raskauskas

There is prolific and then there is Max Richter. The 49-year-old German-born British composer has composed and recorded his own music, in addition to writing for theater, ballet, opera, cinema and television. He has collaborated with numerous artists, both those in music and those in other mediums. Later this year, he will be debuting an eight-hour composition called SLEEP, which Richter has described as "an eight-hour lullaby." So suffice to say, that it should astound most to know that throughout this prodigious output, Richter has almost never stumbled. In fact, his 2004 solo release, The Blue Notebooks, has proven to be one of the most affecting of the past 15 years. Richter's masterful ability to explore the human mind through his haunting post-minimalist compositions and selected readings from Kafka and Miłosz showcased him at the top of his game. But even on his numerous other releases, including 2002's Memoryhouse and his haunting score for the 2010 documentary How To Die In Oregon, Richter has always proven himself to more than capable of capturing a mood or a feeling better than practically any other artist in any medium. And so, when tasked with providing a score for the HBO program The Leftovers, Richter was given the opportunity to prove this point.  READ THE FULL 405 ARTICLE

Max Richter's SLEEP will receive its world premiere this September in Berlin, in a concert performance lasting from 12 midnight to 8am at which the audience will be given beds instead of seats and programmes. The eight-hour version will be available as a digital album, and for those who prefer it, a one-hour adaptation of the work – from SLEEP – will be released on CD, vinyl, download, and streaming formats, all through Deutsche Grammophon, on 4 September. "You could say that the short one is meant to be listened to and the long one is meant to be heard while sleeping," says Richter, who describes the one-hour version as "a series of windows opening into the big piece". Richter will be interviewed by several Classical Radio Stations today including: WFMT: Chicago, WCLV: Cleveland, KUHA: Houston, KING: Seattle, KMFA: Austin and WGTE: Toledo

Composer Max Richter continues to reinvent classical music for the 21st century in his latest effort titled simply Sleep, which he describes as an eight hour lullaby in which the composer says will debut to an audience in beds rather than seats, a description that has Pitchfork Media describing the world premier as a "classical music slumber party." Hear highlights from the forthcoming project on Tuesday's program. Meanwhile catch the trailer right here. SEE THE KUAF: Fayetteville AR - Of Note PAGE

For those who have ever worried about drifting off during a classical music concert, composer Max Richter has created a piece specifically for that purpose. Sleep, an eight-hour piece which the the German-born British composer calls a "lullaby for a frenetic world," will premier in Berlin this September. The overnight performance will go on from midnight to 8am, with audience members in beds rather than seats. It is set to be the longest single piece of classical yet written, and is scored for piano, strings, vocals and electronics. Richter, 49, intends the work to be heard "while sleeping". The composer consulted American neuroscientist David Eagleman, whose book Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives Richer made into a chamber opera in 2011, to learn about human brain function. "It's really an experiment to try and understand how we experience music in different states of consciousness," says Richter. From Sleep – a shorter, hour-long adaptation intended for more engaged listening – will also be released. Both versions will be available as a digital album through the label Deutsche Grammophon.   READ THE FULL Telegraph ARTICLE READ THE Metro ARTICLE READ THE Reuters ARTICLE READ The Nation ARTICLE READ THE Tiny Mix Tapes ARTICLE

He has been hailed as one of the most influential composers of his generation. The Grammy nominated Max Richter has joined forces with the Royal Opera House for a new ballet, Woolf Works, based on the life of Virginia Woolf. Known for his merging of classical music with modern technology, Richter is not only a composer but a pianist, producer and collaborator. He has worked with choreographer Wayne McGregor on this latest collaboration, and he explained how the idea came about.  WATCH THE BBC VIDEO

It topped the iTunes classical charts and now Max Richter's radical remix of Vivaldi's Four Seasons gets its premiere on baroque instruments in Sydney. "I was really looking forward to a period ensemble picking it up," says Richter of his 2012 work Recomposed, phoning in from Berlin. Woolf Works, his new ballet inspired by Virginia Woolf and choreographed by Wayne McGregor, is about to open in London, but the composer's mind is currently with the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra and their landmark performance. Playing 18th-century instruments with gut strings, the ABO is "hardcore", says Richter, whose own work is Vivaldi for the 21st century, with long looping rhythms, minimal shimmering passages stretching time. For the first time in 26 years, ABO's artistic director Paul Dyer will swap his harpsichord for a laptop and Moog synthesiser, while a modern harp replaces the baroque harp. Aside from these substitutions, the instruments all date from Vivaldi's time. Vivaldi Unwired opens at City Recital Hall, Sydney on 6 May, travelling to Melbourne and Brisbane  READ THE FULL guardian ARTICLE READ THE Sydney Morning Herald REVIEW READ THE Australian REVIEW

Composer Max Richter has taken apart Vivaldi's original set of violin concertos, "The Four Seasons," and reconfigured the components while reclaiming the work as a beautiful object.  Richter opened up some of the repeating patterns already present in the work and as he says, "literally wrote myself into Vivaldi's score."  For this New Sounds, Max Richter joins us to present some of his "Recomposed: Vivaldi, The Four Seasons."  Listen to part of "Summer," which Richter "hijacked," in his effort to make "heavy music for the orchestra." He further admits that  "perhaps I was also thinking about John Bonham's drumming."  Then, sample a bit of what Max Richter has done to "Winter," where he focuses on the "stunning melody" of the slow movement, (which features violinist Daniel Hope), and enriches its accompaniment with a nod to modern Icelandic music in the glacial Sigur Rós or Jóhann Jóhannson vein.  And more.   SEE THE WNYC: New York - New Sounds PAGE

If Mozart could have popped into a few cafés, circa 1789, to perform some of his hits, it would be a little like what composer Max Richter is up to this month. Mr. Richter is heading to Los Angeles, New York and Knoxville, Tenn., to perform compositions that have established him as a force on the contemporary orchestral music scene, including his soundtrack for Damon Lindelof's HBO series "The Leftovers,"  his popular 2004 album "The Blue Notebooks" and "Memoryhouse," his first album. Not keen to be "sitting in the studio 24-7," Mr. Richter is renewed by being onstage. "The thing about performing is that you learn so much more about the music," he said. "Putting it in front of people, you're experiencing the world at real time." Based in Berlin, he's in New York for a recording session prior to performances at L.A's El Rey Theatre on March 22nd, New York's Le Poisson Rouge on March 25th and 26th, then to Knoxville's Big Ears Music Festival on March 28th and 29th. Mr. Richter has played Le Poisson Rouge previously: In 2012, he released a radically recomposed version of Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" in which he reworked the instrumentation and tempos to make the overplayed piece of Baroque music sound entirely new. The recording called for fiendishly fast playing from violin soloist Daniel Hope. READ THE FULL Wall Street Journal ARTICLE

Max Richter has been composing inventive orchestral music for years, but naturally, American audiences really began noticing him en masse only when his compositions began appearing in movies and television. His music was featured prominently in Martin Scorsese's "Shutter Island," and he wrote the score for the animated movie "Waltz With Bashir." More recently, the German-born composer has worked on HBO's metaphysical drama series "The Leftovers," which debuted last year. Richter's reimagining of Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" is one of his most popular recent works - it was performed at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara last year with violinist Daniel Hope. The composer will embark on a U.S. tour this spring, with a stop in Los Angeles at the El Rey Theatre scheduled for March 22. The program will feature his music from "The Leftovers" as well as pieces from his popular 2004 album "The Blue Notebooks."   READ THE FULL Los Angeles Times ARTICLE

For anyone who has been lucky enough to watch live music at the Royal Albert Hall - or even be inside it for that matter - you will know exactly what I mean when I say that its beauty and grandeur is hard to encapsulate using mere language. Arguably the pièce de résistance in its namesake's Albertopolis - on Saturday night it acted as the perfect host for the wonderful Max Richter. The night began in a joyous melee of tracks from Richter's fantastic recomposition of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons. Whilst Richter kept a watchful eye over the proceedings, the real star of the half was the ever-impressive violinist and fellow Berlin-based Englishman Daniel Hope - whose command of his instrument was more impressive than any I've ever seen. The second half took a more somber tone, which one would only expect as it served as a 10-year anniversary of Richter's highly celebrated The Blue Notebooks. As moving a musical event as I've ever seen, the night was perfectly encapsulated by the final encore which saw much of the hall rise to their feet in appreciation of a true master of contemporary classical music. Before all this though - 405 photographer Alexandra Cameron was granted full access to Richter and his team as they rehearsed, soundchecked, and prepared for the evening ahead. See her breathtaking photos below.  SEE THE 405 PAGE

Max Richter gives the title Recomposed to his take on Vivaldi's four violin concertos The Four Seasons. However, to the extent that this implies revisiting the same set of musical challenges that Vivaldi faced, the word doesn't quite capture what he has done. Richter has used some (but not all) of Vivaldi's themes, rhythms, virtuosic violin passages and concerto layout, but created something out of them that is entirely new and of its own time, just as Stravinsky did with the music of Pergolesi in Pulcinella or with Tchaikovsky in The Fairy's Kiss. Although Richter's harmonies would have been familiar to Vivaldi, the musical language is totally different in that the gravitational pull to the home chord at the cadence is broken, leaving the music free to finish mid phrase if it wishes. READ THE FULL Sydney Morning Hearald REVIEW

 

Max Richter recently interviewed with Classic FM and discussed several subjects, including his DG album - Vivaldi Recomposed, which features an extensive reworking of Vivaldi's Four Seasons. Richter fell in love with the classic piece as a child, but after hearing it repeatedly in stores, advertisements, and similar settings, he found it overdone and eventually grew tired of it. This new compositional reworking of The Four Seasons was his way of rediscovering and re-engaging with the work. Though three-quarters of the notes in this version are Richter's, Vivaldi's original piece can be heard clearly throughout.  READ THE FULL Classic FM INTERVIEW HERE

It's been a busy time for Max Richter on the back of his entry into the Recomposed series and some early career reissues, recent soundtrack work and now a brand new score, this one for the live action/animated interpretation of Stenislaw Lem's 1971 novel The Futurological Congress. I've yet to see the film but it's so easy, as so often seems to be the way with Richter's soundtrack work, to be swallowed up in the score – the beautiful Winterreise a standout here, that majestic sweep of strings signalling heartbreak and hope, that beautiful collision of mourning and head held high stoicism – but we also have some Kraftwerk-esque pulsing, strobing electronica here, an interesting departure from what you might usually expect.   READ THE FULL Off The Tracks REVIEW

In the world of modern classical-cum-film composers, few musicians are doing more to stretch sonic boundaries than the German-born, London-located musician named Max Richter. Making his way from stage to ballet and concert hall ensembles, Richter's early work impressed as it often combining beautifully solemn string melodies with an alt. electronic attitude. Concept albums like "Memoryhouse" and "The Blue Notebooks" sung with Richter's unique admiration for such composers as Philip Glass and John Adams, not to recently mention his wittily hip deconstruction of Vivaldi for "The Four Seasons." It was this mesmerizing sound that mixed aching melodies with a hip beat that no doubt attracted Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman, who was looking for a similarly unique dance partner to accompany his groundbreaking animated 2008 film "Waltz with Bashir," a war movie unlike any other that used animation to play the wracked conscience of an IDF soldier involved in his country's invasion of Lebanon. Nominated for a Foreign Language Film Oscar, "Waltz" propelled Richter into a film scoring career that's continued to impress as it hauntingly opened the door to The Holocaust in "Sarah's Key," detailed an apocalyptic loss of feeling in "Perfect Sense," rhythmically tied together the screwed-up L.A. residents of "Disconnect," and even got to play a red planet zombie plague ravaging "The Last Days on Mars."      However, none of the often-metaphysical worlds that Max Richter's music has trod upon breaks into a whole other plain of existential existence like "The Congress," which also marks Ari Folman's featuring return after too long an absence. For if movies like "Being John Malkovich" or the Paul Giamatti-starrer "Cold Souls" have taken real life actors into smartly-played "meta" situations, then Folman goes many steps further by having a purposefully blank Robin Wright sell her acting imagine in eternal perpetuity to pay for her son's medical care. Folman's questions of art versus commerce, and humanity itself are hotly debated at a "Congress" called Abrahama, a bizarre animated thinktank retreat that would give Roger Rabbit pause. Stuffing his movie with a veritable "Where's Waldo" of pop star imagery, Folman's very slow, yet transfixing pace is somewhere between Ralph Bakshi's "Cool World," Hayao Miyazak's "My Friend Totoro" and Andre Tartovsy's "Solaris," whose author Stanislaw Lem also provides mind-bending story inspiration here. Richter's musical palette of ethereal percussion, majestic orchestral themes, electronically berserk alt. cartoon music and poignant piano and violin solos powerfully expresses Folman's meditation on identity with equal hypnotic power, linking live action and animated worlds with a lush melodic tapestry and beatific attitude. It's Richter's most impressively intellectual, yet accessible score yet, a work of astonishingly controlled power that sooths as much as It entices the listener's own thoughts of self. If any "Congress" should be celebrated, it's this impressive re-connection between one of two of international cinema's most thought-provoking artists, with Folman once again inspiring his experimental muse to break into a new, transfixing musical territory that truly finds Toontown Zen.  READ THE Film Music Magazine INTERVIEW

Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" as an app? The original work is presented alongside a "recomposed" version by British musician Max Richter with commentary and various features. DW's Conny Paul gives it a try. READ THE FULL Deutsche Welle ARTICLE

If there is one defining characteristic about composer Max Richter, is that he refuses to stay within any preconceived boundaries. Classically trained at Edinburgh University and finishing his studies under the tutelage of avant-garde composer Luciano Berio in Florence, from there Richter's career went in a variety of directions. He did traditional compositional work, collaborated with acts as varied as The Future Sound Of London, Roni Size and Vashti Bunyan, and issued his own complex and acclaimed solo work. So it was only a matter of time until the movies came calling for Richter's unique, soulful and avant work, and the last decade has seen him contribute to films such as the animated "Waltz With Bashir," the WWI drama "Lore," the sci-fi "Last Days On Mars," the intimate "Wadjda" and many more. But always looking for a further challenge, Richter has now tackled his first TV gig with HBO's highly anticipated "The Leftovers," which premiered over the weekend. Once again, Richter has delivered some haunting, evocative music which promises a full season of his immediately identifiable sound helping to shape the strange, surreal and emotional world of Damon Lindelof's show. Last week, we chatted with Richter over the phone from Germany about working on "The Leftovers," and his approach to the layered series about loss and what we do to move on.  READ THE FULL IndieWire INTERVIEW

Ominous music in a television thriller usually means something bad is about to happen. But in HBO's series "The Leftovers," which starts Sunday, good and bad are far from clear. Amplifying that ambiguity is the soundtrack, written by British neoclassical composer Max Richter. READ THE FULL Wall Street Journal ARTCLE

Each month, WCLV - Cleveland Program Director Bill O'Connell selects a series of special CDs to be featured on the air throughout the month. For the June CD list one of Bill's standouts is 'Recomposed' by Max Richter: 'Vivaldi - The Four Seasons' - Daniel Hope, violin; Max Richter, Moog synthesizer; Berlin Concert House Chamber Orchestra/André de Ridder on DG. Blair Sanderson, allmusic.com: "Antonio Vivaldi's Le Quattro Stagioni is one of the most beloved works in Baroque music, and even the most casual listener can recognize certain passages of "Spring" or "Winter" from frequent use in television commercials and films. Yet if these concertos have grown a little too familiar to experienced classical fans, Max Richter has disassembled them and fashioned a new composition from the deconstructed pieces. Using post-minimalist procedures to extract fertile fragments and reshape the materials into new music, Richter has created an album that speaks to a generation familiar with remixes, sampling, and sound collages, though his method transcends the manipulation of prerecorded music. Richter has actually rescored the Four Seasons and given the movements of Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter thorough makeovers that vary substantially from the originals. The new material is suggestive of a dream state, where drifting phrases and recombined textures blur into walls of sound, only to re-emerge with stark clarity and poignant immediacy. Violinist Daniel Hope is the brilliant soloist in these freshly elaborated pieces, and the Berlin Concert House Chamber Orchestra is conducted with control and assurance by André de Ridder, so Richter's carefully calculated effects are handled with precision and subtlety."  Featured Wed 6/4, Fri 6/13, Tue 6/24.

In 2012, composer Max Richter took one of the most overplayed pieces of classical music, Vivaldi's The Four Seasons, and radically rewrote it, reworking elements of the original composition in strings and electronics, but keeping the essence (and plenty of the melodies) of the original. Now Vivaldi Recomposed has been turned into an app by the makers of the wildly successful Beethoven Symphony No.9 app (one million downloads ain't bad). The app allows you to watch and compare performances of Vivaldi's original played by Anne-Sophie Mutter and Richter's Recomposed version, played by Daniel Hope, and then explore the music with graphic scores, commentaries, historical background and interviews with the composer and performers. Max Richter tells Lyndsey Winship why his Recomposed version of Vivaldi's Four Seasons will make such a great app and Daniel Hope, who plays the violin solos on Recomposed, welcomes the chance to reach a new audience. READ THE FULL Sinfini Music INTERVIEW.

On Thursday, Dec. 20, Q2 Music - New York presented a live webcast of violinist Daniel Hope and Ensemble LPR performing Max Richter's acclaimed deconstruction of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons. Watch the attached Video A modern take of the legendary concertos, Vivaldi Recomposedtakes its cue from the practices of electronic music, sampling melodic fragments of the Vivaldi masterpiece, and reworking them via phrase elongations, reductions and loops to be interspersed within Richter's original music. The resulting album functions powerfully both as a highly personal work and a homage to the Baroque composer. The second half of the evening features Max Richter on piano accompanied by string quartet and electronics performing selections from INFRA – a darkly atmospheric album from 2010 based on an earlier collaboration with choreographer Wayne McGregor and artist Julian Opie and inspired by T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. Vivaldi Recomposed features British violinist Daniel Hope (the soloist on the recorded work) with (Le) Poisson Rouge's own Ensemble LPR, under the direction of newly-appointed conductor Tito Muñoz. Daniel Hope appears courtesy of Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft. The December 19 and 20 performances of Vivaldi Recomposed: The Four Seasons mark the U.S. debutof the composition.

I love Vivaldi's music.  His lesser-known sacred works had a big influence on Bach, too.  What I hate, however, is calling somebody up and getting the v/m greeting, "Please enjoy the music while your party is being reached".  Then it's "Spring" from the Four Seasons.  I won't enjoy the music, I'll hate it!     It's already irritating enough that your call is being screened and maybe its recipient will decide it's not important enough to answer, but having to listen to this well-worn classic on hold just brings on Clockwork Orange moments for me.  (for those who don't remember, it's the 1971 Kubrick film where the lead character–Malcolm McDowell– is brainwashed to the point where his beloved Ode to Joy, the great choral passage from Beethoven's 9th, makes him retch and vomit. Which brings me to my subject:  Here is a version of Vivaldi's war horse, but it's "recomposed" by Max Richter.   It's a new Deutsche Grammophon cd, and the results are really good, even for people like me who suffer from the aforementioned Clockwork Orange syndrome.  I suggest you check it out. READ THE FULL KCRW: Los Angeles - Rhythm Planet Story