WHAT’S the first thing you think if someone invites you to a percussion concert?

Likely you would think there’s a lot of noise on everything percussive, perhaps even the kitchen sink, but no music in the sense of melody.

But this concert, performed by Tambuco Percussion (from Mexico) and Speak Percussion (Australia), was anything but “noise”; it was very stylish, tasteful and musical.

In the way of instruments, there certainly was just about anything you could imagine –bells, whistles, drums of every shape and size, bits of wood, sandpaper blocks, cymbals and gongs, a cowbell, a British bomb siren, even a stick through the bottom of a plastic drink cup and a bowl of water. Among the more unusual items were stones collected from a Canberra garden. I didn’t see a kitchen sink, but had there been one, it would not have been the odd-one-out.

There were tuned percussion instruments, too – bass, tenor, alto and soprano marimbas, a xylophone, a glockenspiel and a set of chimes.

And bringing percussion up to the 21st century were three works with a digital element.

One of those was “Temazcal for maracas and tape” by Mexican composer Javier Álvarez and played by Speak Percussion member, Eugene Ughetti. After a long introduction of electroacoustic sounds, Ughetti entered holding a silent pair of maracas. What he did with those maracas, including using the stereo effects of the two microphones standing in front of him was nothing short of amazing.

Another was Chilean/Australian composer, Andrián Pertout’s “Exposiciones for Glockenspiel and Tape”, played by the other Speak Percussion member, Kaylie Melville. Donning a pair of headphones, she set the recorded backing rhythms going on the computer and gave a truly virtuosic performance on the Glockenspiel of a piece written for toy piano. Interestingly, while it sounded and was structured like an extremely complex improvisation, it was note for note as written.

And then there were the stones. The members of Tambuco Percussion had selected stones from a local garden for a performance of English composer, Paul Barker’s “Stone Song, Stone Dance”. This is where untuned percussion really came into its own. While striking or rubbing the stones together, they produced not only rhythm, but were able to achieve pitch changes as well, depending on where on the one stone the other struck and how the musician was holding his fingers.

At one point, Tambuco leader, Alfredo Bringas, was even able to produce a few bars of Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and the theme for the Symphony No 40.

Then there was the piece “Rhythmic Structure of the Wind”, by Mexican composer Raúl Tudón, in which all six players from the two groups stood three abreast either side of a table. To very subtle electronic sounds, every bit of the dozens of bits and pieces on the table was scraped, shaken, struck, rubbed. It looked like a chaotic children’s game, but the whole thing had order, form and purpose as they explored the wind and its rhythms.

This was a highly intelligent and engaging concert by two percussion groups that surely must be considered among the best in the world. A standing ovation was the result for this penultimate concert of the 22nd Canberra International Music Festival.