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Two new pieces

I finished two new pieces in recent months, both of which will have to wait till next year for their premieres. The first is Laughter Through Tears, a concerto commissioned by and written for Giora Feidman (actually a double concerto with violin solo along with the string orchestra). After a bit of too-ing and fro-ing Giora tells me he's scheduled the premiere of this piece for next March at the lovely looking Prinzregententheater in Munich (see above). The performance will feature the Russian Chamber Philharmonic conducted by Juri Gilbo.




Also completed earlier this week is my flute/harp/viola trio for San Diego's Art of Elan series. I'm particularly pleased with this rather delicate series of four 'nocturnes' which I've called The Eye of Night. No date has been decided yet for the premiere, but hopefully it will be next season at some point. With a bit of luck and good timing, a first trip to California beckons!



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Tango in Iford

At the premiere of Saudades with Chroma in the atmospheric grounds of Iford Manor near Bath.







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Saudades in Bath and Berkamsted

My tango-inspired piece Saudades made its first transition from abstract page to vibrating air yesterday at the hands of the always splendid Chroma. There are two performances coming up, in Ilford Manor in Bath on 25th June (now sold out I understand) and also at the Quaker Meeting House in Berkhamsted on July 11th, details of which can be found on the flier below.

Read about Saudades and the Borges poems and ideas that inspired it here






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Parallel bars and pummel horses

Here's a short interview with clarinettist Todd Palmer courtesy of WDAV Classical Public Radio in which he compares playing Gumboots to riding a pummel horse, doing the uneven parallel bars, and other olympic disciplines...



and here is Todd and the St Lawrence String Quartet 'sticking the landing' at Spoleto last week (in the last two dances of Gumboots):







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Raising the roof

It sounds like the St Lawrence Quartet and Todd Palmer really blasted the roof off with their performances of Gumboots at Spoleto a few days ago. Check this out from the Charleston City Paper:



A quote for the c.v. if ever I saw one! (there is another review of the concert here)

A shame I couldn't be there, but I was busy sojourning with friends and family in the heel of Italy (and experiencing the joys of Ryanair - the airline with a banknote where its heart should be).

The next Gumboots performance is with my old friends at Ensemble ACJW (about whom more exciting news shortly) at the end of July, in the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival in Germany.

Speaking of old friends, Chroma will be premiering a new piece later this month. I will post a bit more about that later this week after popping to see them rehearse in the dear old Union Chapel.



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Indian melodies, Indian ornaments

Ornaments are one of the many things that fascinate me about music from outside the Western tradition. Indeed, outside of early music circles, the use of ornaments in classical music is largely limited to grace notes, trills and perhaps the occasional mordent. If you write anything more 'advanced' than that in a new piece there is a good chance it will get overlooked, or played wrong - indeed even mordents often get a 'do you mean..' response from players.

Compare that to say the Indian tradition where there is literally the concept that you never play a note 'as is', the pitch is always on the move, pretty much every note has some kind of embellishment. And any Indian musician will know (and have a name for) each of the myriad types of ornament, and be aware of the subtlest of differences, the speed of vibrato, how that speed accelerates, the type of staccato the embellishment ends with etc etc.

I don't have any desire to imitate Indian music, but I do long to find ways to expand the expressive capabilites of my music by accessing some of these ways of playing. I find them a far richer and more interesting area to explore than, say, quarter tones, or developing some new tuning system. So many of them are tantalisingly beautiful, not that difficult once you get the hang of things, and offer so much to add to our 'straight' way of playing in the Classical world.

One resource I have found quite useful in this regard is called Indian Melodies for Violin by Candida Connolly, published by Schott



It goes through some of the standard ornaments, and crucially, includes a CD so you can listen in and get a sense of them in practice.

I think my use of 'folk' ornaments has been gradually expanding over the years as I find ways to notate and use them that Western players can deal with. One of the problems of course is that our instruments are different and often designed specifically to play the 'pure' note itself, and not the subtle shades in between. Take the flute for example, an Indian Bansuri flute:



there are no keys, allowing the fingers to roll on and off the hole to bend the pitch. That's just not possible on a keyed Western flute. But you can bend the pitch with the mouth, so some of the effect may be possible.

I'm currently writing a piece commissioned by the San Diego-based Art of Elan series, for flute, violin and harp. Although it's only a small aspect of the piece, I'm hoping to integrate some of the more Indian-style ornaments for the first time. I've arranged to get together with the fantastic flautist Alex Housego who, having spent some of his childhood in India, is familiar with and plays both Indian bansuri flute and the traditional Western flute. My plan is to write the ornaments I want to, check them over with Alex, and then get him to record them on a Western flute so I can give the San Diego players a better idea of what I'm after. It's an experiment, but hopefully should yield some really interesting results.







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Spoleto 2010

A busy writing time for me at the moment, but I'm delighted that the month of May brings three performances at the 2010 Spoleto USA 2010 Festival of Gumboots by the group John Adams recently called "my favorite of all groups" - the St Lawrence String Quartet. It's now 18 months or so since the quartet premiered Gumboots at Carnegie's Zankel Hall; and the piece has since had a thrilling life of its own with performances on three continents. But in its heart and indeed its inspiration it belongs to Todd Palmer at the St Lawrences. Only a shame I can't be there!



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Tears, Puffes and Bums on Seats

I was going to draw attention to Metropolis Ensemble's forthcoming concert which features my new recorder+string quartet arrangements of Dowland pieces, Tears, Puffes, Jumps and Galliards; but according to their website it seems to be already sold out.

Last time I was in New York I had a long chat (naturally featuring more bottles of wine than people present) with Andrew Cyr about Metropolis's approach to audience building. These guys have a truly diverse and engaged audience, they invariably sell out their concerts, despite the fact that the majority of what they offer is contemporary music. Andrew confirmed that it takes a lot of thought and effort, but what his group shows is that it really is possible, there is no crisis in classical music, given the right leadership. It's encouraging that people are beginning to take note of Metropolis's work now. It has the future written all over it.



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The art of bowing

From my post over at the CompositionToday blog:


I still find it a quiet source of pride how few composers are ready for that moment in the spotlight, we emerge tramp-like and awkward - the epitomy of uncool, uncommercial - we come on stage in our un-ironed jackets, or with a sock still stuck in one trouser leg. Then we scurry across the stage as quick as we can, not knowing where to put ourselves, and take an awkward bow. There's an interesting paradox in the way so many composers are so unnatural on the stage: we spend our entire lives trying to create something that is after all intended for performance 'on the stage'. We are aware of the finest, subtlest details of how certain effects in our music will come across - we can subdue an entire crowd, get them laughing or crying with our notes; and yet when we have to present ourselves in person on the stage we are likely as not to stumble on the steps before we even get there...



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Joana Carneiro; Ghent; John Adams in cartoon

Yesterday I went over to Paris to meet up with my friend the wonderful soprano Jessica Rivera who was singing - with her usual effortless grace and expressivity - in John Adams's gobsmackingly beautiful opera A Flowering Tree, conducted by the incredible force of nature that is Joana Carneiro. I'd heard lots of great things about this young conductor who was Esa Pekka Salonen's assistant at LA Phil and recently took over the reins at the Berkeley Symphony, but nothing prepared me for what she's really like. I don't think I've ever experienced such power and energy combined with nuance and control from a conductor. She's an amazing life force and is without any question in my mind destined for the absolute peak of the profession. An amazing concert all round.



And tomorrow I'm back on L'Eurostar. This Tuesday sees the Belgian premiere of Gumboots performed by Eddy Vanoosthuyse and members of the Brussels Philharmonic in the historic city of Gent (or Ghent depending on your preference).

Speaking of John Adams, I was the book shop the other day and saw a kids introduction to classical music. Alongside Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, to my delight the book included this page:



"John Adams is the odd one out in this book. Why? Because he's still alive!"

The book by the way is Naxos's My First Classical Music Book.



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