Cafe Oto hosted Blank Canvas featuring Schlomo, The Camberwell Composers Collective and vocal outfit Juice

Established in late 2007, and presented by Chimera Productions, Blank Canvas is a bi-monthly ‘club’ night reputed for its eclectic contemporary classical and experimental music programming.

Set in trendy Dalston I have to admit that I had already made my mind up that being stiffened up ready for a night fringed with irritation because I have a contradictory relationship with the super trendy ghetto of east London; love for its alternative leanings but I get extremely annoyed that it appears to be practiced much the same as some organised religions. However, neither, Cafe Oto- the host- or Blank Canvas- the guest- disappointed, they both appealed to my love.

So along with a trusted companion we set out for a night of beatbox meets classical- although side note it’s been done before reaching critical and commercial acclaim see ‘Medulla’ for Bjork’s (still) stunning collaboration with Rhazel on ‘Who is it’.

So we get to Cafe Oto and I am taken with the space, the crowd and the excellent range of beverages and cakes which included a cider that literally made my smile inside so within the space of ten minutes all my defences were broken down and I was pretty much a new lamb on fresh ground. The first act of the night was a female vocal three piece called Juice – not the most of inspiring of names but a decent act with some interesting experiments in vocal deconstruction, some original pieces and covers pieces from Africa, Alaska (Innuit groups) and a Cornish number; diversity in action. To be honest I found most of it quite polite nothing totally extraordinary but nonetheless lovely and watchable- also although I keep mentioning this but the last few Bjork albums set the bar pretty high and if you are going to do that kind of thing I felt like you have to be able to make those sounds whilst swallowing razors to make me feel like they were trying to push any real boundaries.

Next up the seemingly unassuming but talk about a heavy weight Rabbi Schlomo himself. For all those who might not yet have heard of him- seriously under a rock? Is that where you have been living? So briefly I first came across the human noise maker via a UK Hip Hop outfit called Foreign Beggars who I continually express love for that it’s almost shameful. Foreign Beggars are made up of a collective of music heads who pretty much span every musical genre. What continues to keep me hooked is their continued ability to distil all that love and discipline into one of the most musically creative Hip Hop acts for me EVER EVER EVER really EVER. So its 2005 and I ‘m listening to ‘Asylum Speakers’ (Foreign Beggars debut album) and at the end the Rabbi steps up and takes control of the congregation- not only that but he is an amazing drummer and I often wonder who would win in a drum off between him and Amir “Quest Love” Thompson one definitely to be considered- and I was pretty much hooked.

His set itself was mostly crowd pleaser rather than let’s rip their hearts out with the sound of this bass vocal but he threw in a few elements namely a reverb looping machine that created layers of sound creating a vocal pastiche that pretty much made me smile along with the cider. His style is mixture of humour, experiment, fever and homage: the Rabbi is clearly a music fan alongside being an accomplished musician. The audience, my compadre and I lapped up every minute of it. After his set he was accompanied by Juice on a combination piece- again I apologise for sounding like a broken snobbish stuck record but please please see Medulla for real instruction- I enjoyed it all very beautiful in terms of the arrangement and appeared to be a purely improvised piece so top marks but for me the bottom fell out a bit.

The Camberwell Composers Collective – could only stay for three out of the five numbers as I’m not a native Dalstonite- were nothing short of phenomenal which made me realise that I know nothing about modern classical music and its composers (although to be totally frank my knowledge of traditional classical music short of Rachmaninoff is pretty poor but alas I have always found most of it hard to swallow). The set up consisted of a group of composers whose original pieces are performed by a few musicians which included a cellist, violinist, a lady who was in charge of the drum pattern machine (along with comparing) and a drifting flute player. So based solely on what I was listening to I can only really describe it as layers of sound, distortion all tied up by a melody and all navigated by technology- the compare/composer pressed a button on what looked like a drum pattern machine. They epitomised the word experimental, really interesting and thought provoking and although I enjoyed Schlomo and will continue to follow him wherever he goes (if I can afford it) I think the show was pretty much owned by The Camberwell Composers Collective.

So now begs the question, where is modern classical music living and who wants to show me around?

Nana