The Black Glass Ensemble seek new music for the anthropocene in the margins of classical and experimental music. Combining the cream of Scotland’s chamber players with longstanding pioneers of the UK’s avant-garde electronic underground, the result of these liminal explorations is an emotionally resonant new music that challenges the senses, confounds expectations and breaks open new sonic ground.

Black Glass was formed in 2018 by New Music Scotland award winner, and Queen’s Hall associate artist in residence, Michael Begg. The Ensemble has been developed with support from Creative Scotland, HMUK and the Hope Scott Trust.

Central to Black Glass’s vision is solastalgia, the term combining solace and pain, coined by philosopher Glenn Albrecht in 2005 to articulate the sense of existential distress caused by living through environmental change. In it’s innovative use of technology, and palette of bespoke software instruments, the ensemble creatively imbues their work with the mechanisms through which the knowledge of environmental decline comes to us; sonified data streams, satellite and weather monitoring systems; low frequency atmospheric receivers; field recordings; resnonance audiograms, and more.

Black Glass Ensemble are: Michael Begg (scores, samples, data feeds, erosions); Ben Ponton (receivers, recordings, forensics); Clea Friend (cello); Aisling O’Dea (violin); Julia Lungu (violin); Neil Cuthbertson (trumpet); Jen Cuthbertson (French horn); Douglas Caskie (tuned and bespoke percussion)