At 8pm on Friday 2^nd July 2010, Neil Campbell and Perri Alleyne-Hughes will be performing an intimate concert of their new music at the beautiful new Hope Theatre (part of Liverpool Hope University’s new Creative Campus) on Shaw Street, Liverpool. As part of the programme Neil will also be playing a set of some of his original music for solo guitar.

Neil says: ‘The concert on 2^nd July will be an intimate experience in a brand new state of the art theatre space at Liverpool Hope University’s Creative Campus. Aside from playing a set of my music for solo guitar (which is always great fun) what is personally so very special to me is that, in collaboration with composer and vocalist Perri Alleyne-Hughes, we will be presenting some of the new music we have written together. These new songs are emotional, impressionistic, jazz tinged compositions with expressive vocals and instrumental excursions for guitar. The new music has also given me the opportunity to explore technology such as loops and digital effects to allow one guitarist (i.e. me) to create the impression of an entire ensemble.’

Perri Alleyne-Hughes is a vocalist, composer, choral music director and arranger. Her role as arranger and choir director with Sense of Sound Choir has helped to lead them to prestigious performances in collaboration with an ever impressive series of artists including Seal, Paco Pena, Damon Albarn, David Coulter and Brian Eno. In 2006 the choir were runners up in BBC Radio 3’s Choir of the Year competition. They were also significantly involved in performance projects related to Liverpool’s 2008 Capital of Culture and in the same year came in the top six of the BBC’s choral competition ‘Last Choir Standing’. Perri herself is an incredibly gifted vocalist and song writer in her own right.

Supporting the concert will be a short performance from the ensemble of the newly formed Liverpool Guitar Society, which promotes classical guitar music to enthusiasts on Merseyside.

Tickets are £8 (£6 concessions) and are available at the venue on the door …. please click here for a map

At 7pm on Saturday 26th June a performance of Neil Campbell’s Frankenstein recorded at BBC Radio Merseyside on Thursday 17th June will be broadcast on BBC Radio Merseyside.

Neil Campbell’s Frankenstein is a musical realisation based on the Mary Shelley novel composed by Neil Campbell and scored for choir, ensemble and narrator. The performance features actor Gary Mavers (Peak Practice), Sense of Sound Choir (led by Perri Alleyne-Hughes) and The Neil Campbell Collective (featuring Neil Campbell (guitar), Anne Taft (soprano), Vicky Mutch (cello), Chris Bradshaw (keys), Andy Maslivec (bass) and Mark Brocklesby (drums)).

Listeners on Merseyside can tune in to the station at 95.8FM. Those listening around the world can listen to the show at the BBC web site which you can access at: the BBC Radio Merseyside web site. It will be possible to listen again to the performance after the broadcast using the Listen Again facility at this site.

Before the broadcast of Frankenstein, from 6-7pm, Neil will be appearing on BBC Radio Merseyside as a guest on Spencer Leigh’s ‘On the Beat’. This will give the opportunity to talk further about the Frankenstein project and its realisation as a piece for radio.

Programme notes accompanying the performance can be downloaded here.

(Many Thanks to David Munn for these photographs of the performance)

Three movements (2, 5 and 4) from Neil’s composition ‘Rotations’ for six pianos will be performed at Liverpool Hope University’s Capstone Building on the evening of Monday 21st June in a Midsummer Concert, a special invitation-only event to mark the opening of the spectacular Gardens (Angel Field) and the opening of the Capstone Building as a Steinway Centre. The music will be performed on six Steinway upright pianos in a programme which includes music by Debussy, Brahms, Grainger and Steve Reich (Six Pianos). This will be the first ever live performance of music from ‘Rotations’, which was written and recorded by Neil in 2003.

At 7.30pm on Saturday 19th June 2010, Perri Alleyne-Hughes and Neil Campbell will join the bill of a charity musical evening playing a short set in aid of the Women for Women charity, an organisation that funds better health for women and babies across the country. The event will take place at the new Hope Theatre, in the new Capstone Building on Hope’s Creative Campus on Shaw Street. All money raised from the concert will go to this worthwhile charity supporting research into problems affecting women and their babies such as miscarriages, still births, genetic disorders and cancer.

Other performers that evening will include Harmony Belles (a capella group), Caroline Smith and Helen Milne Duet (piano duet), pianists Lewis Coenen Rowe and Leo Casimo and sopranos Mary Black and Rachel Harland, Sophie Fraiser (from ‘Our Day Out’ at the Royal Court), HNC Music (Jazz Band) and Kikosi (Soul Band). Tickets are £7 (£5 concessions). For more information or ticket requests call Katie on 07779 298 025 or email katiespall@hotmail.com.

On Thursday 17th June 2010 a special musical performance of FRANKENSTEIN will be recorded live for BBC Radio Merseyside (98.5FM or www.bbc.co.uk/liverpool/ ) to an audience of invited guests.  This recording will then be broadcast on BBC Radio Merseyside for a special programme at 6pm on Sat 26^th June as part of the Spencer Leigh Show ‘On the Beat’.

Neil Campbell’s FRANKENSTEIN is an electrifying classical rock composition inspired by the famous novel by Mary Shelley and will feature Liverpool actor Gary Mavers as the voice of Doctor Frankenstein.  The composition has been scored to be performed by an expanded version of the Neil Campbell Collective, an ensemble which combines the energy and intensity of a rock band with classical instrumentation such as classical guitar, cello and operatic soprano Anne Taft.  It also features members of the Sense of Sound Choir.

The original version of Neil Campbell’s FRANKENSTEIN was performed at St. George’s Concert Room in November 2009. This will be an exclusive opportunity to hear the completed version prior to public performances, which are being programmed for late 2010 and into 2011.

One of the new and exciting developments to Neil’s site, courtesy of web developer David Churchill, is that visitors to www.neilcampbell.org.uk can now select and listen to almost 100 tracks of Neil’s back catalogue as streaming audio from the player at this site. Also included in the play-list are some previously unreleased selections. What’s more, If you choose to open the player in a popup window (link just under the player) the player will continue even when you have navigated away from the site, so you can listen to the music as you browse other sites or check your e-mail. We hope you enjoy this new feature.

A new remixed, remastered and expanded version of Neil’s 2003 solo guitar CD ‘Through the Looking Glass’ has just freshly returned from the pressing plant and is available for purchase via his myspace sites. The new CD sounds much brighter, punchier and warmer than the original version and contains 20+ minutes of new tracks. These extra eight tracks include new recordings of ‘In and Out of Day, Out and Into Night’ and ‘Terra Firma’. The CD has 20 tracks in total and is over an hour long. For purchases before 28th Feb there is a special price of £8.00 (including postage and packing). You can pay for the album securely via Paypal at www.myspace.com/neilcampbellguitarist

At 8pm on Thursday and Friday 4th and 5th February 2010, Neil will play his first solo concerts of the year at the Unity Theatre. A mainstay on the Liverpool music scene as a solo guitarist for many years, Neil will now perform two intimate concerts for solo guitar to include special guests adding cello and soprano for particular performances.

In 2009 Neil staged a series of high profile performance events including ‘Ghost Stories – A Night Opera’ at Liverpool’s St Luke’s (Bombed Out) Church (July 2009), St Georges Hall Concert Room (October 2009) and Birkenhead Priory, as part of the Wirral International Guitar Festival (November 2009). He also introduced, at St George’s Hall, a new composition ‘Frankenstein’ for The Neil Campbell Collective and Sense of Sound Choir. These new large scale works married grand concepts with great architecture and stunning visuals, and will continue to be developed and staged at national and international levels throughout 2010.

Neil is very much looking forward to these solo concerts. He says: “Playing solo brings me back to the source of my music – to the state it is in when it is first composed and before layers of other instrumentation, visuals and other concepts are added. It is about picking up an instrument – in this case the classical guitar – and using it to create a more intimate, more direct communication between myself and the audience”.

Tickets are £8 (concessions £6). To purchase tickets visit Unity Theatre, Hope Place, Liverpool, L1 9BG or call the Box Office on 0151 709 4988 or online at The Unity Theatre web site.

Along with soprano Anne Taft, Neil will be performing his atmospheric composition ‘Ghost Stories’ at Birkenhead Priory as part of the Wirral International Guitar Festival on Wednesday and Thursday 18th and 19th November.