The Horse

Accidental Records is re-issuing Matthew Herbert’s The Horse album (originally published last year via Modern Recordings /BMG) as a Special Edition with unreleased remixes and versions. The album in its original version has been awarded Best Large Ensemble Composition at The Ivors Classical Awards this November 12th. Based around a full-size horse skeleton and working alongside the London Contemporary Orchestra and an expansive cast of special collaborators, Herbert is here in full flight, restlessly curious and culminating in starkly original, ritualistic music loaded with intent.

In the final Episode 3, Chasing the Wind, Thompson takes viewers to meet some of the most fascinating and unlikely of the world’s 400 horse breeds. He meets the Yakutian, at home in the coldest inhabited place on Earth (Siberia). He meets the Arab, a spirited horse at home on the scorching sands of the Arabian Desert. And he encounters the most valuable horses on Earth: elite Thoroughbreds, a breed of super-specialized sprinters, descended from one of three 18th-century stallions. Hard to believe, but there are still a handful of wild horses. On Canada’s Sable Island, Thompson visits the only truly wild horses on Earth, now evolving in unexpected ways in their completely human-free world.

Accidental Records is re-issuing Matthew Herbert’s The Horse album (originally published last year via Modern Recordings /BMG) as a Special Edition with unreleased remixes and versions. The album in its original version has been awarded Best Large Ensemble Composition at The Ivors Classical Awards this November 12th. Based around a full-size horse skeleton and working alongside the London Contemporary Orchestra and an expansive cast of special collaborators, Herbert is here in full flight, restlessly curious and culminating in starkly original, ritualistic music loaded with intent.

The domestication of the horse has been a mystery of science for generations. In Episode 2, First Riders, Thompson travels to Kazakhstan to witness the groundbreaking discovery of a skeleton from the earliest culture ever to tame horses. In this episode, viewers get a set of genuine science scoops: we are the first to learn that our ancestors domesticated the horse twice and that early riders carried the world’s first pandemic of plague to Europe.

Discover how humans have partnered with the horse throughout the centuries, creating more than 350 breeds found all around the world.

From the moment humans mounted horses 6,000 years ago, these magnificent animals helped shape our world by allowing mankind to explore, conquer, and flourish on horseback. Join anthropologist Niobe Thompson on a global journey to examine the evolution of horsepower, discover the mysterious origins of our incredible partnership, and witness our enduring love of 400 breeds of horses today. Explore the fascinating evolutionary journey of the horse, from its tiny forest-dwelling ancestor called the Dawn Horse to the modern steed. Encounter scientists unlocking the genetic basis of horsepower and decoding their emotional intelligence.

"People ought to try to make their horses happy," wrote Jacob Biggle's wife Harriet in The Biggle Horse Book in 1894. "A happy, cheerful horse will do more work and live longer, and thus be more profitable to its owner, than one whose temper is kept constantly ruffled, whose disposition is soured by ill-usage, and whose peace of mind is often disturbed by the crack of the whip, the hoarse voice of the driver, the strain of overwork, the discomfort of a hard bed, or the pangs of hunger and thirst." When it comes to the treatment of animals—especially the horse—the Biggles were ahead of their time.

Challenging his considerable legacy with one of his most extraordinary projects to date, celebrated British artist, producer, composer and experimentalist Matthew Herbert presents The Horse. Based around a full-size horse skeleton and working alongside the London Contemporary Orchestra and an expansive cast of special collaborators, this is Herbert in full flight, restlessly curious and culminating in starkly original, ritualistic music loaded with intent.

We built the world around us with horsepower. But what is it that makes humans and horses so perfect for each other? And how have we transformed the wild horse we tamed 6,000 years ago into over 400 specialised breeds today? To answer these questions, anthropologist-turned-filmmaker Niobe Thompson takes viewers on an epic journey across eleven countries on three continents and back in time to the mysterious beginnings of the horse-human relationship. Over three spectacular hours of cutting-edge science and gripping adventure, Thompson explores the evolution of horsepower, discovers how our ancestors tamed the horse and discovers fascinating new insights into the body and mind of this unique animal.

When one of America's most promising young gymnasts, Samantha Wick, is cut from the Olympic team, she decides to follow her dreams of horseback riding by joining a girls horse camp. With financial troubles threatening to shut the camp down, Samantha uses her gymnastic prowess to start a horse-dancing team to raise money and save the camp!