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这是decca在2004年出的新cd
cd名为“duel”,请大家支持
曲目大家或许听过,但这些二重奏我保证大家都是第一次听
两位主奏者是克雷格·欧文(Craig Owen)和格里格·斯科特(Greg Scott)
1. Danse Macabre - Saint-Seans (Jonathon Creek)
2. Chi Mai - Morricone (Life & Times of David Lloyd George)
3. Theme from Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence - Sakamoto
4. Ashokan Farewell - Ungar
5. Minuet - Boccherini (The Lady Killers)
6. Cavatina - Myers (Deer Hunter)
7. Canon - Pachelbel
8. Hungarian Dance No.5 - Brahms
9. Barcarolle - Offenbach
10. Nocturne - Borodin (Kismet)
11. In the Bleak Mid-Winter - Holst
12. Petite Fleur - Bechet
13. Bridal March – Wagner
The way things are going, it may not be long before music colleges start offering courses in advanced busking. It was singing to bystanders in London’s Covent Garden that launched the careers of the Opera Babes. Now, the violin-playing twosome of Craig Owen and Greg Scott, about to become much better known as Duel, also credit their time spent busking in towns across northern England with giving them their first vital professional break.
Greg and Craig were studying the violin at Manchester’s Royal Northern College of Music and were delighted to find an easy way of raising some extra cash to boost their meagre student incomes. "We were putting together some demo tapes to send off to record companies, so we were busking to make some quick easy money," Greg explains. "It was quite profitable — you could sometimes make as much as £2 a minute. And we learned how to get a crowd and keep them there, and got some great responses."
"We played in all the spa towns in the north — Chester, Harrogate, and St Anne’s Square in Manchester," adds Craig. "Greg and I used to go with each other but we’d play individually as well. But it was when we played together that the crowds really built up."
One day in Manchester, one of the faces in the crowd belonged to Pete Waterman, the flamboyant pop music svengali who launched the likes of Kylie Minogue and Rick Astley and has recently become a household name thanks to his TV appearances as a judge on Pop Idol. Although Waterman has built his reputation on selling chartbusting singles to teenagers, it’s a lesser-known fact that he also has a passionate enthusiasm for classical music, from Vivaldi to Wagner. When he heard classical violin music wafting across St Anne’s Square, his antennae began to twitch. "It’s not that unusual to hear buskers playing classical music, but I thought what’s that crowd doing there?" Waterman remembers. "Then I realised they were all young women and the guys playing were two good-looking young boys. So in some ways classical music is no different from pop."
It was only natural that Craig and Greg should have felt some mild apprehension when Waterman first approached them. TV viewers have nicknamed him "Poison Pete", because he doesn’t shrink from delivering blisteringly forthright opinions.
"We didn’t know what to expect really," says Greg. "We’d seen him a bit on television and we thought ‘he’s going to tear us apart’." Craig: "The first thing he asked us was ‘do you love classical music?’ And our response was ‘yes’." Greg: "We thought it was a trick question. But he was great. He sat there and said ‘right lads, what are you going to play?’ I think we played him some of the Bach double violin concerto and Danny Boy and he just sat there agog. To get Pete Waterman to sit there and shut up for five minutes was pretty good."
Before long they were deep in discussions about their favourite composers and pieces of music. When they picked up their violins and started playing Saint-Saëns’s Rondo capriccioso, Waterman experienced a flash of intuition. "I thought these are the boys for me! That’s fantastic!"
At that early stage, nobody was sure how the project might develop, but Waterman and his new protegés were certain about one thing — they wanted to find a way to showcase the qualities of classical music to a broad popular audience, with an emphasis on irresistible tunes and a dynamic performing style.
"Pete wants to take the violin to people, because it’s one of his favourite instruments, and it’s a great melody instrument," says Greg. "He didn’t want us to stand there and do anything avant-garde, he wanted us to play great melodies that really sing on the violin." They quickly agreed on the name Duel and started throwing around ideas for pieces of music that would lend themselves to the twin violin treatment.
Pete then embarked on finding management for the boys. Enter Paul and Katie Conroy, the major music industry players behind the newly formed Adventures in Music.
Ex-President of Virgin Records (1991–2001) and Stiff Records, Paul’s long and successful career has included some of the most influential campaigns and career launches in pop music, such as The Spice Girls, Madonna, REM, Blue and The Verve. Katie was Head of Media at Chrysalis and VP, Promotions and Artist Relations at EMI International, working on key projects for artists from Tina Turner and Geri Halliwell to Kylie Minogue, and playing a very important role in Robbie Williams’s international career.
On seeing the boys perform, these two very experienced music industry figures signed them up immediately. A record deal with influential classical label, Decca, stable to Bond, Russell Watson, Andrea Bocelli and Lucianno Pavarotti soon followed.
Greg and Craig have been steeped in music from an early age (Craig could hardly avoid it, since his mother is a violin teacher) and can list a string of classical accomplishments. Craig has been leader of the Young Northern Sinfonia and the Vacation Chamber Orchestra, has an Advanced Diploma in Music Technology at the Manchester School of Sound Recording and visited Beirut with the RNCM Sinfonia to perform at the Al-Bustan International Music Festival. Greg attended Chetham’s School of Music, toured with the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and won a violin scholarship in his final year at the Royal Northern College of Music. He continues to perform with the BBC Philharmonic and Lancashire Sinfonietta. Both of them performed, on alternate nights, on electric violin with the Goldberg Ensemble at the William Walton Contemporary Festival in Oldham and Manchester.
But as they progressed with their classical studies, Greg and Craig discovered that they shared similar misgivings about following a traditional classical music career. While they may be technically trained to an advanced level, they’re also young guys in their early twenties with an enthusiasm for football (Craig’s a huge fan of Middlesborough), pop music, night-clubbing and keeping themselves in good physical shape. They have a keen eye for an Armani suit, and Craig’s hairstyle would look right at home in the Manchester United dressing room.
They like artists who can fire up their performances with some extra zip and energy. Nigel Kennedy is one of their favourite violinists because, as Greg puts it, "he’s playing from his heart and he doesn’t necessarily care what he looks like. People love him because he’s very alternative and he’s a great player as well." From the poppier end of the scale, they give credit to Vanessa-Mae and all-girl quartet Bond "because they’re great entertainers and music is entertainment" (so their looks wouldn’t have anything to do with it then, boys?), and to Salford’s main attraction Russell Watson. "He’s been really instrumental in bringing opera to the masses and keeping classical music out there."
If they can take their own music as far as Watson has taken his, Duel will be a very happy duo indeed. "You need all the elements together," insists Craig, "the repertoire, the performance on stage, and a bit of a spark as well — hopefully a lot of a spark."
Adam Sweeting
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