Sound Tracks - for sextet and electronics sampled from the London Underground - was commissioned by the Workers Union Ensemble for the Huddersfield Shorts November 2009.
Listen to the live recording:
Rain Dances - for solo alto saxophone and live electronics - was commissioned by the Workers Union Ensemble at the Leeds Festival, March 2011, performed by Ellie Steemson.
I wanted to explore the wide spectrum of emotions provoked by rain and rainfall, placing the saxophone in a world of drizzling, trickling, gurgling and occasional downpour, landscaped by melodic/harmonic arches.
for an evening mind - for solo modern violin, solo baroque violin and electronics - was commissioned for June 2011's Early Music Experiment at the Rag Factory, performed by Ivana Cetkovic and Sarah Titterington Ibbett.
An experiment in timbrel nuance and integration, the piece combines modern violin & baroque violin with a virtual ensemble comprised of sampled and processed strings, piano and percussion. These diverse forces are united by a passacaglia - a broad melodic arch that forms the bedrock of denser and denser textures.
Impulse Imagined - for ‘cello & live electronics - was premiered at November 2010’s Faster Than Sound concerts at Snape Maltings & Kings Place, performed by myself 'cellist Gregor Riddell.
The origins of music are rooted in the structure of our bodies. From the breath grows the melodic; from the pulse, the rhythmic. With a few special exceptions, most acoustic instruments must choose to be either melodic or rhythmic biased at any one time – breath or pulse – cantabile violin or drum groove. Sound manipulation technology allows us to break this rule, unlocking new ‘in between’ sounds once only imagined. Impulse Imagined uses vocoders to shape the tone of the cello with the rhythm of electronic drums, allowing the soloist to create both melody and rhythm simultaneously - following a simple chord sequence on a journey of exploration.
Impulse Imagined on Vimeo.
Cambrian Air - for horn duo and electronics - was commissioned for the June 2011 Seven Bridges street festival, an artistic regeneration project of Loughborough Junction. The piece was premiered outdoors under the Cambria Bridge by horn players Meredith Moore and Laetitia Stott.
On a theme of the Cambrian Explosion - of new life, evolution and regeneration - the piece takes the St Francis melody as the theme in a set of joyous (and chaotic) variations.