papay gyro nights orkney cello  
 
2OO7-2OO8:
RECORDING
JS BACH SIX SUITES FOR SOLO CELLO
AT ST.BONIFACE KIRK
 
2OO8:
BACH CELLO SUITES @ PAPEY LISTSKJUL
 
2OO7:
BACH MARATHON IN PAPAY
 
2OO7:
CELLORHYTHMICS IN PAPAY
 
 
 
 
ALFIA NAKIPBEKOVA
: MUSIC
papa westray alfia nakipbekova
Alfia Nakipbekova (Bekova) was born in Karaganda, a mining town in Central Kazakhstan, where, at the age of seven, she began her cello studies with exiled cellist and Gulag survivor, Roman Mazanov (originally from Rostov-on-Don).
She was accepted by the Moscow Central Music School for gifted children and 3 years later entered the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatoire to study with Mstislav Rostropovich, as well as receiving an extensive series of master classes from the Soviet cello legend - Daniel Shafran.
At the age of 15 she was awarded the First Prize at The Central Asian Republics Competition and performed Tchaikovsky Rococo Variation with The Kazakh State Symphony Orchestra. Her awards include: Diploma at The All - Union Tchaikovsky Competition in Vilnius, Diploma at the Piano Trios Competition in Belgrade and the Special Prize for Outstanding Mastery of The Cello at the Casals Competition in Budapest. As a concerto soloist, recitalist and a chamber musician, Alfia performed in numerous towns and cities throughout the former Soviet Republics, appeared in major venues in Moscow and Leningrad, was regularly broadcast on the Soviet Radio and Television and recorded for Melodya.
In 1981 Alfia defected to the UK where she realized her dream to study with Jacqueline Du Pré. She soon established herself as a leading soloist and chamber musician (with The Bekova Trio) and has appeared at major Festivals and concert halls throughout Europe, USA, Middle East, Canada and Australia.
A keen interest in new music led Alfia to take part in many collaborations/performances. The most notable works she has premiered so far are: Concerto for cello and chamber orchestra by Timur Tleukhan (first performance at the Moscow Conservatoire, Rachmaninov Hall, with Musica Viva), "Gethsemane Night" for electric cello, choir, piano and percussion, Concerto Mystery and Concerto Grosso by Sergei Zhukov (first performances at the Moscow Autumn Festivals, recorded for Chandos) and Triple Overture by Steven Gerber (recorded for Chandos).
The extensive discography includes major chamber music repertoire for Piano Trio, Cello Sonatas and Cello/Violin Duos, including critically acclaimed recordings of Brahms, Martinu and Shostakovich (Chandos). The BBC Music Magazine chose the Martinu album as CD of the year, and the Clarke/Ives album was Critic’s Choice for Gramophone magazine 2000).
In 1998 Alfia began a series of "Bach Marathon" solo recitals (playing all six Bach Suites in one evening) and since then has performed in various venues and festivals, including London, Oxford, Aldeburgh, Melbourne Festival, Cork Chamber Music Festival, Felcino Bianco Festival, PACT Festival, Brussels and the Orkney Islands.

ALFIA NAKIPBEKOVA 
 
 
2007 - 2008:
BACH CELLO SUITES @ ST. BONIFACE KIRK. PAPAY. ORKNEY
papa westray

CD RELEASED!

ALFIA NAKIPBEKOVA. SIX BACH CELLO SUITES, BWV 1007 - 1012
recorded @ ST. BONIFACE KIRK, PAPA WESTRAY (PAPAY), ORKNEY in December 2007 and November 2008

Alfia's recording of Cello Suites at St Boniface Kirk, Papay, is a great contribution to establishing Orkney as a Classical Music Centre and celebrating landmarks of Orkney as a recording venues. We hope this project will attract more world class musicians to perform and to record in Orkney.

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JS Bach . Suite No.6 BWV 1012 in D major . Sarabande . Alfia Nakipbekova .
Recorded at St Boniface Kirk, Papa Westray (Papay), Orkney
 
JS Bach . Suite No.4 BWV 1010 in E flat major . Prélude . Alfia Nakipbekova . Recording at St Boniface Kirk, Papa Westray
 
 
 
ALFIA'S PAPAY STORY
papa westray
I first came to Papa Westray in August 2007 to play a series of concerts, including a Bach recital at St Boniface. I fell in love with Papay immediately, not because it is beautiful in a traditional sense, but because of the simplicity and practicality of the place; an island that has developed because of the needs of the people who live and work there – hardy, honest, decent working people. Yet within that environment there is a beauty and complexity that is like no other I have seen before. The wind blows incessantly, transforming the lighting and appearance of the sky and the sea in an instant throughout the day. St Boniface, like the island, is a simple place; a small kirk made of stone with no architectural embellishments whatsoever, a meeting place for worship and community activity. During my performance there I felt the environment was guiding my interpretation. Rather than imposing any preconceived ideas that I had arrived at through many years of study and performances, I felt the music was speaking for itself and revealing its depths through its innate simplicity. I knew I had to go back to Papay and record there.

ALFIA NAKIPBEKOVA 
 
 
 
ST. BONIFACE KIRK, PAPA WESTRAY (PAPAY)
papa westray
St Magnus cathedral in Kirkwall and the little church of St Boniface on Papa Westray – one of the smallest and most northerly islands of the Orkney archipelago – are the only two medieval churches in Orkney which have survived into the 21st century intact and still in use for worship.
A late 7th-century incised cross found in the kirkyard at St Boniface is the earliest piece of hard evidence that Christianity had arrived in the Northern Isles. Although Papa Westray seems remote when viewed from the modern perspective of motor-car based communications, for all the previous centuries of sea travel it was on a main highway. It is likely that the first church on the island was part of a monastery, built as springboard for missionary expeditions to both Orkney and Shetland.
Sometime in the 12th century St Boniface became the parish church, as it remained for 800 years until 1929 when it became redundant and was abandoned. For the next 60 years the little stone church and its unusual early 18th-century furnishings slid into dereliction until at last restoration was undertaken by a team of local builders. In June 1994 St Boniface was rededicated (after a pilgrimage around the historic places of the island which has become an annual event) and is used again for occasional services.
Surrounded by fields and the sea, it is a peaceful place; the only sounds one usually hears there are the wind, the waves crashing on the shore below, or birdsongon a summer evening. The remarkably good acoustic makes it an ideal place for concerts (even if the performers sometimes have to contend with the Orkney wind!): Emma Kirkby and Anthony Rooley have performed Dowland and Monteverdi, and in August 2007 Alfia A performed her “Bach marathon”, the six suites, in its intimate small space and realised it was where she wanted to record them.
Jocelin Rendall, 2008
 
 
 
RECORDING CELLO SUITES IN PAPAY
papa westray
We set off from London in November 2007. We faced a two and a half day grueling journey - first by crowded train to Aberdeen, an 8 eight hour ferry crossing in a force 8 wind, another ferry from Kirkwall to Westray and finally a small fishing boat that would take us to our final destination - Papa Westray (a small island off the most northern tip of Orkney inhabited by 70 people, a few cows and several hundred sheep). Luckily by the time we left Westray the wind had dropped so the crossing was fairly mild but there was heavy cloud cover and the boat man had to rely on, what looked like, an antiquated radar system to get us through the pitch black darkness. Having seen the broken skeleton of a vessel that had recently run aground on the rocks of Papay, it was a relief to see Ivanov and Chan waiting for us on the pier.
The next day we went to visit St Boniface where we would record 3 of the Bach suites. It is a small 12 century church on the North side of the island near the sea. The building has recently been restored but there is no electricity or heating and even when the doors and windows were firmly shut, I could still hear the wind howling and the sea splashing against the rocks. This would be a problem. We borrowed a generator from a kind farmer and local residents leant us their portable gas fires. After dragging the generator through muddy fields with rain blowing horizontally into our faces by a 50 mph hour wind, I started to set up the recording equipment. Through the headphones I could hear the low frequency sounds of the wind and the sea rumbling against the diaphragms of the sensitive microphones. We had no alternative but to wait for a break in the weather which finally happened in the afternoon. Some days it was quiet and we managed to record quite a lot of material, but there were times when the wind was so fierce it became impossible to work and we had to retreat to Ivanov and Chan's studio on the other side of the Island where we would warm ourselves with hot tea and a a few wee drams of the local brew. After 7 days of work (most of which was downtime) with the help and encouragement from Ivanov, Chan and the people of Papay we completed the first half of the cycle. A year later we returned to Papay to continue recording. Again, the weather was stormy, but this time there was no respite from the wind so we had to make the difficult decision to record some of the suites in Ivanov and Chan's studio - hence the non - chronological order of the music. (The suites are grouped for consistency of the acoustics.) We decided to leave some of the sound of wind on the tracks - No. 5 particularly as we felt this was an honest representation of the recording conditions.
We celebrated the project's completion with our new friends from Papay. They treated to the traditional "Muckle Supper" followed by energetic dancing, accompanied by the local master of the accordion - Margaret Rendall - who kindly allowed me to play along with her on my fiddle.
James Hesford.
 
 
2008: BACH CELLO SUITES @ PAPEY LISTSKJUL
papa westray
NOVEMBER 2008: Alfia Nakipbekova is performing Bach Cello Suites at Ivanov + Chan Studio

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2007: BACH MARATHON IN PAPAY
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Alfia Nakipbekova, former student of Rostropovich, performed all 6 J.S.Bach Suites at the St Boniface Kirk as a part of her Bach Marathon series which she has played in Melbourne, Italy, Belgium, London, Oxford, and Aldeburgh with great critical acclaim.

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2007: CELLORHYTHMICS IN PAPAY
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James Hesford and Alfia Nakipbekova, founder members of the cutting edge, London based cello ensemble Cellorhythmics, played a concert in the studio of artists Ivanov and Tsz Man Chan. They performed original music by James, influenced by Jazz, Blues and World Music.

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IVANOV + CHAN
PAPEY LISTSKJUL (PAPAY ARTS CENTRE)
PAPA WESTRAY (PAPAY)
ORKNEY KW17 2BU
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© LAND ART - PAPA WESTRAY 2009