Pandora’s Box

Emily White: alto & tenor sackbut, trombone, baroque violin, voice
Miguel Tantos Sevilliano: alto & tenor sackbut, trombone, voice
John Kenny: sackbut, alto, tenor & bass trombone, recorders, voice

La Harpe de Melodie by Jacob de Senleches
Pandora’s Box by John Kenny
Spring Awakening by Emily White

Pandora’s Box is a trio of hidden delights, combining music of the late medieval and renaissance periods with contemporary composition, improvisation, poetry and physical theater. Weaving a subtle tapestry of words and music, poetry of love and intrigue from the courts, pilgrim routes and cloisters of medieval and renaissance Europe to gritty modern sound worlds. Lift the lid and watch what flies out!

Music from the Chatilly Codex, Hildegard Von Bingen, Ortiz, Monteverdi, Benjamin Britten, John Kenny, Torbjorn Hultmark, Scott Lygate, Peter Cowdrey, Rachel Stott, Susumo Yoshida and many anonymous fellow travelers – exploring the world of folk music encountered along the way, as folk music is a life proof of the past living in the present. Inspired by the legion of anonymous poets, and by Petrarch, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Brian Nisbet and many more. Since 2015 they have also developed a unique soprano, alto tenor & bass trombone quartet with Swedish virtuoso soprano trombone layer Torbjorn Hultmark.

Pandora’s Box has performed throughout the UK and internationally, including the Edinburgh Festival, Galway Early Music Festival Ireland, Setubal Festival Portugal , Cumnock Tryst Scotland,  the conservatoires of Zaragoza, Pamplona and Tudela in Spain, and the 2017 International Trombone Festival at Redlands CA in the USA. The ensemble also features as recording artists on John Kenny’s sound track to TNT Theater Co.’s “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”

Read a revue of our recent performance at London’s October Gallery here:

See Pandora’s Box at Brancepeth Castle here:

Pandora’s Box:              Sample Programme:

Emily White               Miguel Tantos Sevillano                          John Kenny

“When I do count the clock that tells the time…..”

Fanfare for St. Edmundsbury     Benjamin Britten                1913 – 1976

Realisation for three trombones

Alle Psallite                                         Anon                                          13th C

For three sackbuts

Fanfare for “Adam”                       Francis Chagrin                  1905 – 1972

For three trombones

O Ignee Spiritus                                Hildegard von Bingen     1098 – 1179

For alto & tenor sackbuts, baroque violin, voice

Three Poems of Bryan Nisbet                     Emily White       2011

For trombones, violin, voice and bicycle frame.

  • Dastardly Deed
  • Spring in an Unreal World
  • Dark Awakening
  • Rust

Three Bulgarian 16th Century chants   
Realisation for three alto sackbuts

  • Reche Mama Da Me Jeni
  • Ne Otvrati Litsa Tvoego
  • U Radini Gosti Doshli

Pandora’s Treasure No 1: 
Improvisation on Shakespeare Sonnet  No 12

« When I do count the clock that tell s the time…. »

Alma Corte s’e bella                        Giovanni Gabrieli             1554 – 1612

Recorder, violin & sackbut

Scylla and Charybdis                                       Rachel Stott                     2012

For baroque violin, 2 sackbuts and narration

Three Songs from the Chantilly Codex,  for 3 sackbuts            14th C.

  • Dieux Gart                                                                          Guido
  • La Harpe de Melodie                                                    Jacob de Senleches
  • Belle, bon, sage,                                                               Baude Cordier

Equale pour trois trombones                                 Susumu Yoshida     2011

When time stood still – a lament for victims of the Fukashima disaster.

Pandora’s Treasure No 2 :
Improvisation on « The Horologists Trade Fair »

« Un tick untock,
            Un think unthought.
                    Into a miasma of blue.
                                  The madelaine remains mundane
                                                   Ca c’est pourquoi le temps reste perdu. »