Playlist: Shiva Feshareki

This month on M Magazine, we’re celebrating the long-awaited return of the BBC Proms to the Royal Albert Hall. 

On Thursday 19 August, award-winning experimental composer and turntablist Shiva Feshareki will join Sofi Jeannin and the BBC Singers for a choral playlist colliding the Renaissance with the present day. Works by Hildegard of Bingen, Byrd and Josquin will be woven into a continuous musical sequence with pieces by Stravinsky, Feshareki, Nico Muhly and Roderick Williams. 

Over the last decade, previously PRS Foundation-funded Feshareki has been a pioneer at the cutting edge of both contemporary classical and electronic music scenes. In 2017, she was honoured with a British Composer Award for Innovation, adding to accolades including the Royal Philharmonic Society Composition Award, the Elgar Memorial Prize and the London Music Masters Award.

Ahead of her Proms performance, we asked Shiva to make us a playlist. Tune in. 

James Tenney - (beast)

James Tenney is probably my favourite composer of all time. A hypnotic composition focussing on the essential nature of sound, and the vibrations within the body and strings of the double bass.

James Tenney - For Ann (rising)

And now for my favourite electronic work by Tenney. The inventor of the Shepard Tone, first displayed in this composition.

Ralph Lundsten - Cosmic Phantazy

A bit of essential scandavian new-age good vibes from electronics pioneer Ralph Lundsten.

Pauline Oliveros - Deep Listening

An icon who always makes it onto my playlists, over and over again, for this piece composed in-the-moment in duet with the acoustics of an underground water cistern alongside Stuart Dempster and Panaiotis. Oliveros’ Deep Listening philosophies, if applied to all areas of life, would mean we lived in a world of more empathy, understanding, and openness to each other, but also to the environment we exist in.

Rrose - Mine 

Dark, trippy, uniquely Rrose. To be listened to in a darkened room.

Mohammad Reza Mortazavi - Derwish in a Club

A kaleidoscope of colour and rhythm on a single drum by the Iranian tombak virtuoso.

Eliane Radigue - Occam Ocean II 

A 20th Century electronic music pioneer, who phased into the 21st century shifting her focus to creating some of the most unique, otherworldly acoustic music, as displayed here in the spellbinding Occam Ocean II. 

Eliane Radigue - Kailasha 

And one of my favourite electronic compositions by Radigue, for the Arp 2500 synthesizer, making this instrument uniquely and intricately her sound, so far removed from any other aesthetic usually associated with this synth.

Ellen Fullman - In the Sea

Using a string instrument created by the composer that interconnects so deeply with space and sound. 

Googoosh - Gole Bae Goldoon

The original diva of the Middle East! One of my faves from the Iranian singing legend.