Give it a bash

A little spiral spring thing' makes the ACO's instrument line-up.

- RICHARD BETTS

If you're someone for whom percussion means only bashy timekeeping, may I recommend Auckland Chamber Orchestra's Two Concertos and Pieces of Wood concert (Raye Freedman Arts Centre, November 26). ACO music director Peter Scholes always digs up something interesting, and here he has worked with Auckland Philharmonia principal percussionist Eric Renick to produce three rarely heard pieces from the US trio of Steve Reich, Steven Mackey and Lou Harrison.

Renick acts as soloist in Mackey's quirky Micro-Concerto, and Reich supplies the music for Pieces of Wood of the concert's title, but the most substantial work is Harrison's Concerto for Violin and Percussion, which features Auckland Philharmonia concertmaster Andrew Beer as the lone string player.