Paraorchestra with Brett Anderson & Charles Hazlewood & more collaborate on ‘Death Songbook’

Paraorchestra, with Brett Anderson and Charles Hazlewood, have announced ‘Death Songbook’, a collaborative 12-track album featuring original compositions and re-imagining iconic songs exploring love, loss and transcendence by artists including Echo & The Bunnymen, Mercury Rev, Japan, Black, Depeche Mode, Skeeter Davis, Jacques Brel and Suede. The album includes special guest performances by collaborators Nadine Shah, Gwenno, Seb Rochford (Sons of Kemet), and Adrian Utley (Portishead). It is due for release on 19th April 2024 via World Circuit / BMG.

During the pandemic, Charles Hazlewood (founder and Artistic Director of the pioneering Paraorchestra, the award-winning conductor who has led some of the world’s most celebrated orchestras, and Sky Arts’ Ambassador for Music) was struck by the idea of an album of “very delicate re-imaginings” of some of the most morbidly beautiful and poignantly sombre songs, entitled ‘Death Songbook’. Charles discussed the idea with friend Brett Anderson of Suede, who found it a concept close to his heart, agreeing to help curate and sing across the album’s 12 songs. “The only rule,” Charles says, “is that all the songs have to have a relationship to death or the death of love.”

Brett Anderson’s vocal performances, by turns chilling, passionate and wracked with desolation, lend a unique dark magic to the Paraorchestra’s re-imaginings. Articulated by composer/orchestrator Charlotte Harding, each composition offers little by way of adornment, instead twisting and reconstructing the songs. Released today, the album’s opening track, Echo & The Bunnymen’s ‘The Killing Moon’, becomes an unsettling concoction of shivering strings and stalking electric guitar – watch the live performance video BELOW:

Speaking about the project, Charles Hazlewood said:

“So much of the greatest art, certainly from my point of view, is intrinsically melancholic. Music which is about death, or the death of love, about loss, about anxiety, there’s a transcendence in that music. My go to, whether I’m feeling happy or sad or somewhere in between, will be melancholy music because that’s where the catharsis is, that’s where art is most resonant.”

Suede’s Brett Anderson said:

“The Death Songbook was an idea Charles came up with during the bleak days of lockdown. As soon as he suggested it, I was sold. I loved the idea of curating a suite of songs about loss and sadness and regret. I’ve always found happy songs depressing, it’s been the murkier themes that have somehow sounded more joyous to me. Songs about doubt and fear and grief confront feelings we all struggle with, so to know that we are not alone in that fight can be quietly life-affirming.”

Nadine Shah said:

“I’ve worked with Paraorchestra on a few occasions now, one on the hottest day imaginable at Glastonbury. Their talent is insurmountable and I love to sing with them. I’m a great admirer of both Brett Anderson and Charles Hazlewood so an opportunity to do this all again on Death Songbook was one I would be sure not to pass up. A moment of melancholic magic with a bunch of fellow goths.”

Gwenno said:

“It’s been amazing to be able to contribute to Death Songbook, joining Paraorchestra and Brett on gorgeous arrangements of songs that embrace death in all its facets.”

Paraorchestra recorded most of the ‘Death Songbook’ album live in an afternoon at the peak of lockdown, socially distanced across Europe’s largest opera stage – the Donald Gordon Theatre at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff. The project returned to the Wales Millennium Centre for a live performance in October 2022, where they recorded three additional songs.

Fans now have the chance to experience ‘Death Songbook’ live, as the album was recorded, firsthand. Two special live performances will accompany the album’s release: first, at London’s Roundhouse on 24th April, followed by a show at Manchester’s Aviva Studios, home of Factory International, on 26th April. The last remaining tickets are available here.

Paraorchestra is the world’s only ensemble consisting of both professional disabled and non-disabled musicians. It plays an unconventional mix of traditional orchestral, acoustic, and electronic instruments and uses assistive technology. This radical group intends to reimagine what an orchestra—and “classical music”—can be in 2024.

‘Death Songbook’ is due for release via World Circuit / BMG on April 19th. 

Track Listing

1. The Killing Moon

(Composers: Ian McCulloch, Les Pattinson, Will Sergeant and Pete de Freitas)

2. Unsung

(Composers: Brett Anderson, Leo Abrahams, Leopold Ross, Seb Rochford)

3. Holes (feat. Nadine Shah)

(Composers: David Fridmann, Adam Synder, Jonathan Donahue, Grasshopper)

4. Nightporter

(Composer: David Sylvian)

5. She Still Leads Me On – LIVE

(Composers: Brett Anderson and Richard Oakes)

6. Wonderful Life

(Composer: Colin Vearncombe)

7. The Next Life

(Composers: Bernard Butler, Brett Anderson)

8. He’s Dead

(Composers: Bernard Butler, Brett Anderson)

9. Enjoy The Silence (feat. Gwenno) – LIVE

(Composer: Martin L Gore)

10. The End Of The World (feat. Nadine Shah)

(Composer: Sylvia Dee and Arthur Kent)

11. My Death – LIVE

(Composer: Jacques Brel)

12. Brutal Lover – LIVE

(Composers: Brett Anderson & Charles Hazlewood)