Founded by Neil Leiter and Margaret Hermant, Brussels-based Echo Collective have forged in only a few years an enviable reputation in the post-classical world: sought out for their instrumental and arranging expertise by icons such as A Winged Victory For The Sullen and the late Jóhann Jóhannsson, or lending their interpretative intuition to genres as diverse as alt.rock, synth-pop and black metal Echo Collective are equally inspired creators, using their past accomplishments as a springboard to a new, illuminating vision.  

For Hidden Notes vol.4 Echo Collective will perform Jóhann Jóhannsson’s 12 Conversations with Thilo Heinzmann in full, a piece left unfinished before he passed away suddenly in 2018.

Based on conversations between the Icelandic composer and German painter Thilo Heinzmann, the piece explores arts, politics and unity. It is a score of absolute purity – unusual for Jóhannsson’s output as it is written just for string quartet and without his usual electronic threads. Containing a spirit of minimalism with echoes of Baroque bass, it builds tension at times and opens up a place of still reflection at others.

Having worked with them on Orphée, Jóhannsson invited the Echo Collective to be involved in finishing the piece.