Sandeep Bhagwati’s latest work “jaali” for sextet and screen ensemble will see its world premiere on Nov 18, 2010 at the Neue Staatsgalerie Stuttgart (Germany). The composer himself will conduct the “ensemble gelber klang” and a group of young music students who will play the screen. “jaali” is a Gujarati word and refers to the kind of ornamental stone screens used in Mughal architecture.

In “jaali, the screen ensemble is placed between the soloists and the audience. It plays a rigid, but airy framework of recurring rhythmicized melodies. The sextet of soloists have a very complex improvisation score that is grounded in the screen music, but also in a system of rapidly alternating soloists and imitating each other. Their music “wafts” through the screen, just as air and the reality of the world outside wafted through the people seated behind Mughal screens.

Around this world premiere, Bhagwati will also tour several German and Austrian music universities in Lübeck (Nov12/13), Graz (Nov 22/23) and Munich (Nov 24/25), giving lectures about his work and research as well as conduct master-classes for composition students.

Sandeep Bhagwati is the director of matralab