Photo by Suki Mok

Kick start Chinese New Year (the year of the monkey) with a special performance from British Chinese musician and composer Liz Chi Yen Liew who performs her original blend of East West fusion with her band including highlights from her three albums (including Monkey King – A Modern Beijing Opera) plus new material. Featuring special guests including cellist Wayne Urquhart (Pest, Kosheen, Moby, Cinematic Orchestra), Chinese instrumentalist Dennis Kwong Thye Lee on Xiao (bamboo flute) and Guzheng (Chinese zither) and Eli Nott on an assortment of Middle Eastern percussion.

LIZ CHI YEN LIEW is a musician and composer whose music blends rhythms and melodies inspired by her Chinese roots on Chinese instruments with electric violins and electronics. As one half of violin duo Chi2 she performed and co-wrote Monkey King – A Modern Beijing Opera a brand new spin on the classic Chinese tale which they toured in the UK in 2008-9. Other commissions include co-writing (with Tom E Morrison) the soundtrack to Time is Like Water Flowing a poetic evocation of the four seasons collaborating with French aerial acrobatic group Les Passagers and Chinese visual artists for Greenwich and Docklands International Festival with performances in London’s O2 Arena. As one of PRS for Music Foundation’s selected composers for New Music 20×12 (part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad) her piece XX/XY premiered to 12,000 people at Trafalgar Square in January 2012, was featured on BBC2’s Review Show and broadcast on BBC Radio 3. As a session musician she has toured/recorded/performed with Moby, Lamb, Gnarls Barkley, Asian Dub Foundation, Goldfrapp, Jerry Dammers Spatial AKA Orchestra amongst others.

DENNIS KWONG THYE LEE was the principal xiao (flute) and guzheng (zither) soloist at the Zhuan Yi Chinese Orchestra. He has been playing various traditional Chinese musical instruments since his early teens, including the guzheng, xiao, dizi, sheng and pipa and also taught and performed the guzheng professionally for over 20 years. On the xiao Dennis specialises in traditional and crossover pieces and classical duets with the guqin in the “scholarly music” genre. He is a member of the London Youlan Qin Society and performs regularly with the UK Chinese Ensemble, the Yin Yang Collective and various other groups. Over the years Dennis has performed at various venues including V&A, Covent Garden Royal Opera House, Rich Mix, The Place (Euston), the Trafalgar Square Chinese New Year Celebrations and the Cultural Olympiad “New Music 20×12” at the Southbank Centre.

FRIDAY 5th FEBRUARY 2016 @ 8pm

KARAMEL, 4 Coburg Road, London N22 6UJ
nearest tube: Wood Green
0208 829 8989

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