Composer of the Month: Charlotte Bray

Charlotte Bray has emerged as an outstanding talent of her generation. Her music exhibits an uninhibited ambition and desire to communicate and is described as vivid, exhilarating,and richly expressive with a lyrical intensity. Charlotte has written for some of the world’s top ensembles and festivals, including the LSO, LPO, London Sinfonietta, Aldeburgh and Aix-en-Provence. In 2013, she was awarded a MacDowell Colony Fellowship and a Bogliasco Foundation Fellowship. Charlotte Bray's Those Secret Eyes will be performed by the Albany Trio at the next Late Music concert, Saturday 6th June at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York.


Steve Crowther: Can you describe the work to us?
Charlotte Bray: Those Secret Eyes is loosely inspired by Shakespeare's Macbeth, and principally the plays’ female characters: Lady Macbeth and the Witches. Set at night, it holds dark undercurrents of suspicion, sin, superstition, and mistrust. Governed by the principal themes of appearance and reality, and ambition and guilt, the piece is driven by a cruel, dry energy. This work forms part of an ongoing cycle of Shakespeare-inspired works that the composer is writing for piano trio.

SC: Do you write at the piano, do you pre-plan? Can you describe the compositional process?

CB: I sometimes use the piano, sometimes my cello and sometimes just paper. I write by hand, usually until I have an entire draft of the piece, and then I transfer to Sibelius. I pre-plan to have a clear overview of the piece and refer to the plan throughout, adapting it along the way as the piece evolves.

SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind?

CB: Of course it is wonderful when one does know the performers one is writing for and this makes the experience special- to be able to imagine the exact sound and expression of a performer. If I don’t already know a performer or ensemble I search for recordings to listen to first. 

SC: How would you describe your individual ‘sound world’?

CB: Personally I would describe my work as a journey of expression, of self discovery, if you like. Others have described my sound world as: highly diverse textures, emotional breadth, relentlessly energetic, a lightness of touch.

SC: What motivates you to compose? 

CB: Hopefully whatever commission I’m currently writing! But more generally, the desire and impulse to create and explore through music, to discover, to develop particular fascinations further….  

SC: Which living composers do you identify with or simply admire?

CB: Unsuk Chin

SC: If you could have a beer and a chat with any composer from the past, who would it be and why?

CB: J.S.Bach and his wife- I’d like to ask them which pieces she wrote!

SC: Now for some desert island discery – please name eight pieces of music you could not be without, and then select just one.

CB: Bach Goldberg Variations, Beethoven Symphony #9, Schubert Nacht Und Träume, Stravinsky Petrushka, Bartok Piano Concerto #1, Copland Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson (#5), Oliver Knussen Ophelia’s Last Dance, Wayne Shorter Infant Eyes

Bach Goldberg Variations

SC: …and a book?

CB: a huge poetry compilation

SC: …a film?

CB: Game of Thrones (if that can count instead of a film)

SC: … and a luxury item?

CB: my camera

Composer of the Month: Philip Cashian

Philip Cashian's music has been commissioned, performed and broadcast worldwide - recent performances have included the Ojai Festival (California), Musikmonat (Basle), Cleveland Performing Arts Series, the St.Paul Chamber Orchestra, BCMG, Aldeburgh Festival, Spitalfields Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and the BBC Proms as well as performances in Germany, France, Spain, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Holland, Greece, Denmark, Sweden, New Zealand and China. Philip Cashian’s Dark Inventions will be performed by the ensemble Dark Inventions at the next Late Music concert, Saturday 2^nd May at the National for Centre for Early Music.

Steve Crowther: Can you describe the work to us?

Philip Cashian: It’s in five sections; the first is a solo for alto flute, the second, waves of minimalistic-like textures, the next section is a low line that slowly rises, growing all the time, then a cello and piano duo and finally a dark coda built around the amazing sound of a low 5 octave marimba.

SC: Do you write at the piano, do you pre-plan? Can you describe the compositional process?

PC: I write mainly at the piano but, since Gary Carpenter told me about Wallander Note Performer (which is superb), increasingly also on the computer using playback. I pre-plan to the extent that I know the overall feel and character of a piece - like a snapshot- before starting it. I accumulate lots of sketches and fragments before actually starting to write. I hate scratching around for ideas once I’m writing a piece.

SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind?

PC: I’m writing a piano concerto for my friend Huw Watkins at the moment. If it was for another pianist the piece would be completely different. Of course once the piece is written any pianist could perform it but thinking about Huw’s playing whilst I’m writing it directly affects the choices I’m making. Yes, I always write with a sound in mind.

SC: How would you describe your individual ‘sound world’?

PC: Last year I had a review in Tempo magazine for the recent House of Night CD and there’s a paragraph which I think describes my music very well: Several Cashian hallmarks emerge in the course of this CD: bold melodic gestures for instruments in unison; a kind of 'broken machine' texture in which uneven rhythms lumber almost out of control; motor rhythm sections pointing up a relationship with minimalism; and contemplative passages, akin to Morton Feldman, in which musical objects are carefully placed in 'static fields'. Above all there is a brisk intelligence behind the music, unsentimental certainly, but never arid.

SC: What motivates you to compose?

PC: That’s very difficult to answer. I’ve accumulated lots of ideas that I want to hear and articulate in all sorts of different ways and contexts. Also, trying to correct the errors I can hear in previous pieces. I can’t not compose - which I can’t explain.

SC: Which living composers do you identify with or simply admire?

PC: Harrison Birtwistle

SC: If you could have a beer and a chat with any composer from the past, who would it be and why?

PC: Stravinsky, do I really need to explain why?

SC: Now for some desert island discery – please name eight pieces of music you could not be without, and then select just one.

PC: Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring, Birtwistle: Silbury Air, Beethoven: Symphony No. 7, Sibelius: Symphony No. 5, Schubert: Death and the Maiden Quartet, Bach: Goldberg Variations, Ligeti: Violin Concerto, Radiohead: Kid A (the whole album)

Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring

SC: …and a book?

PC: Salman Rushdie: Midnight’s Children

SC: …a film?

PC: Pulp Fiction

SC: … and a luxury item?

PC: an iPhone 

Late Music 2015 featured composer: Judith Weir

Judith Weir's interests in narrative, folklore and theatre have found expression in a broad range of musical invention. She is the composer and librettist of several widely performed operas whose diverse sources include Icelandic sagas, Chinese Yuan Dynasty drama and German Romanticism. Folk music from the British Isles and beyond has influenced her music for solo instruments, and she has had strong links with performers from non-classical traditions.

In July 2014 she was appointed to the 388-year old royal post of Master of the Queen’s Music, in succession to Sir Peter Maxwell Davies.

Judith Weir’s music will be programmed throughout the concert series, with a new piece being premiered by the Albany Trio on Saturday 6^th June.

Steve Crowther: Can you describe your music to us?

Judith Weir: I’d say the musical events in it are clear, but it’s not simple. I enjoy fast tempi and rhythmic subtlety. The character/world of the instrument or the voice is something I try to emphasise; I like virtuosic energy, the sense of the instrument or voice doing what it’s really built to do.

SC: Do you write at the piano, do you pre-plan? Can you describe the compositional process?

JW: Conceptual thinking (it can be very vague at first) is important – in the back of my mind I’m asking myself some questions about why I’m writing the piece, for what outcome. I start sketching – just scribbling really. Somehow this activity clears my mind, I start to concentrate and after a while I can see which material will be useful or important in the piece. After that I might start building up lengths of melody or chords to form a short section of the composition. When I get to this point I do need to use the piano a bit to check pitches. From here onwards I write many more versions of the material which have progressively more detail in them.

SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind? What motivates you to compose?

JW: Knowing the performer is my great motivation. That person’s sound, their approach and the brief they have given me (even if unintentionally) is my clue to creating the music. Music for me is a live activity, a social gathering and I feel my job as a composer is to facilitate that, as a colleague to both performers and listeners.

SC: Which living composers do you identify with or simply admire?

JW: I listen reasonably widely and often – I get sent and given a lot of music, I like to keep up with music by my friends and ex-students or people I’ve recently encountered – so it is a constantly changing diet, not based on any particular contemporary figures or movements/tendencies.

SC: If you could have a beer and a chat with any composer from the past, who would it be and why?

JW: I don’t get the impression that many of these people were friendly beer-drinking types. At present I’d appreciate talking to Bartok – ask him about the maths in his music, and his experiences as a folk-music collector.

SC: Now for some desert island discery – please name eight pieces of music you could not be without, and then select just one.

JW: Picking eight titles would cause me an endless crisis of comparison. Cutting to the chase, the ‘just one’ is the St Matthew Passion.

SC: …and a book?

JW: You would want a fairly long book, so perhaps Life: A User’s Manual by Georges Perec.

SC: …a film?

JW: Something singalong I think, so maybe Everyone Says I Love You, the Woody Allen musical.

SC: … and a luxury item?

JW: A well-stocked deli.

Launch Day programme: Steve Crowther in conversation with David Power

Steve Crowther: David, you have programmed a launch day for the 2015 Late Music concert series which will take place at the Unitarian church in St Saviourgate on Saturday 28^th February 2015. What can we expect from this day?

David Power: The day will comprise two events. A lunchtime concert at 1pm by Sounds lyrical and an evening multi-media event at 7pm by the Vestiges group. Both events are free and there will be wine, juice and nibbles. The idea is that Late Music followers can come along to a relaxed environment, meet their friends at the start of the new season, have a drink – or two! - and hear and see a variety of interesting work.

Steve Crowther: What can we expect from the Sounds lyrical lunchtime concert?

Well, Sounds Lyrical is a group of local poets and composers that I formed a couple of years ago. They are myself, David Lancaster, Tim brooks and Peter Byrom-Smith (composers) and Alan Gillott, Rose Drew, Lizzi Linklater and Andy Humphrey (poets). The idea is that the poets and composers work together to create new songs and these songs are then performed in both concert settings and at poetry events. The poet reads their poem and then this is followed immediately by a performance of the composer’s setting of that poem. In this concert we will be presenting 5 Sounds lyrical pieces this way. We will also be playing songs by Britten, Schubert, Gershwin, Kurt Weill and Gerald Finzi so it will be a fascinating and varied lunchtime concert.

The performers are Josephine Peach (piano) and the excellent young baritone Ben Lindley. The concert is free and starts at the Unitarian Church in St Saviousgate at 1pm on Saturday 28^th February.

For more about Sounds Lyrical, please visit http://www.soundslyricalproject.org.uk/

Steve Crowther: In the evening of the Launch Day, we have a multi media performance by Vestiges. What can we expect from that?

Vestiges is a combination of music, art and film. The music is a joint seven track pre-recorded composition by myself and David Lancaster. My contribution is eight short two track electronic pieces which are relatively dramatic in character and are played through speakers on the stage pointing out to the audience. They are punctuated by silences, sometimes of several minutes. David Lancaster’s piece is a five track work, more ambient in character and more continuous. We now have wireless speakers for David’s music so there are all sorts of new options as to where we can place these. The duration of this overall piece is variable but, in the Late Music launch day concert, we will play it for about 40 minutes.

The art will be by Linda Ingham. We are still working on the film as our usual film contributor – Annabel McCourt - isn’t available.

The Vestiges performance will be topped and tailed by piano music played by Edward Caine. These will be extracts of pieces that can be heard later in the 2015 Late Music Series so they form ‘tasters’ of what is to come, so to speak, and will include music by Schoenberg, Messiaen and Ligeti.

For more about Vestiges, please visit http://vestigesofspirituality.com/

Steve Crowther: How did Sounds Lyrical and Vestiges come into being.

I got the idea for Sounds Lyrical at a Late Music ‘song day’ a few years ago. I approached some composers and poets and told them my idea. After some discussion, we were up and running. Shortly afterwards, we did a guest spot at the Ryedale Book Festival to a markedly larger audience than we could have expected for a contemporary music concert and our work was very well received. We knew then that we were onto something and it went from there. Last year we got an Arts Council grant to do 4 concerts at the Basement at City Screen plus a one hour radio show on Leeds East FM. The next Basement concert, by the way, is on Thursday 5^th March.

Vestiges came about through discussions between Annabel McCourt and myself. Annabel is a very gifted film maker whose work ranges from gritty social realist work with hard-to-reach people right through to art house work. I have supplied music for the soundtracks of a number of Annabel’s short films but we had never conceived a project together from scratch. For Vestiges, we wanted to do multi-media work in churches. We got a grant and undertook a short tour of northern English churches presented Vestiges. It went very well and, in total, just over 3,000 people came

Steve Crowther: What are the advantages for a composer of working collaboratively with artists in other art forms?

I have found that I really enjoy collaborative work. The different artists bring such different ideas and different perspectives. Sounds Lyrical and Vestiges have stimulated me to write some of my best music to date. I also find collaborative work attracts markedly larger audiences than I am used to when performed in contemporary music concerts and it is very gratifying to have my music appreciated by larger audiences who do not have a specific interest in contemporary classical music.

Composer of the month: Eve Harrison

“A sensitive and refined imagination” Eve’s music features in Michael Hall’s forthcoming book British Music Theatre. John Casken and Anthony Gilbert supervised her MusB (Hons) and MMus respectively. Eve’s critically acclaimed chamber opera Hera’s List toured to Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival 2012 and she was awarded first prize at Heriot Watt Composer Competition. Shapeshifters was premièred by the Hebrides Ensemble as part of the prestigious composers’ course at St Magnus International Festival, Orkney in 2013. Recent commissions include National Youth Orchestra of Scotland, Big Noise - Sistema Scotland, Durham Brass Festival and Phoenix Clarinet Quartet with vocal sculptor Jason Singh (PRSF). Eve co-directs performer and composer collective Sounds of the Engine House who recently toured the north of England, co-produced by Sound and Music. Her new piece of music theatre, commissioned by the Bridgewater Hall, was part of this touring programme of music by living composers. This year, in collaboration with BREAD Arts, Eve was commissioned by the London Sinfonietta as part of Blue Touch Paper to develop an engaging piece of contemporary music and light artwork that invites an audience to interact and participate using their smartphone.

In addition to her own composition Eve is a passionate educator and leads composition and song writing workshops for Opera North’s Youth Company, In Harmony Liverpool, Manchester Camerata and Yorkshire Young Musicians, amongst others. She is also a keen trumpet player, performing both orchestrally and with Balkan Stomp band The Rubber Duck Orchestra.

www.eveharrison.co.uk

Eve Harrison’s New Work will be premiered by the Ebor Singers, conductor Paul Gameson, at the next Late Music concert, Saturday 4^th October.

Steve Crowther: Can you describe the work to us?

And Now, Exhale… responds to an evocative text by my collaborator Bruce Arthur and has inspired a colourful palette of vocal textures and resonances to heighten the poets’ response to an experience with nature. When discussing his text Bruce describes a huge sense of relief  and unburdening whilst walking along the coast in Sunderland. I'd like to find some of that lightness in contrast to the dark and percussive weight of an oppressive figurative and literal ocean. I hope to provide the audience an immersive and spacial journey, bringing to life both the emotional and aural sensations captured in the text.

SC: Do you write at the piano, do you pre-plan? Can you describe the compositional process?

EH: I usually plan an harmonic outline, often graphically representing dramatic tension and texture. I’ll do some work at the piano during this stage until I’ve established my framework then work away from the piano, writing by hand at first and once I feel I have a good grasp of my material I’ll move to notating on Sibelius.

SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind?

EH: I think it’s extremely important to be familiar with the skills and strengths of the performers to get the most out of the opportunity to write for them and to give them the opportunity to communicate what you’ve written. In addition, as a trumpet player, I’ve always valued enjoying playing the music put in front of me and this stays with me when composing, but there are always exceptions…

SC: How would you describe your individual ‘sound world’?

EH: I’m interested in colours/timbre, spacial placing of sound, modes,  transcribing birdsong and the phoenetic sound of text, non-Western rhythmic patterns and harmonic fields. I find it a difficult thing to describe so here are some words that other people have used:

“witty” “vivid” “imaginative” “impressive instrumental colours and dramatic pacing” “meticulous”

SC: What motivates you to compose?

EH: As a child I painted and worked with clay a lot: my dad is an abstract artist and I think I soaked up that kind of experimentation and curiosity in building layers. There is something of this in my love of composing. I also love telling stories but am not very good at doing so verbally! Through music I have a way and this comes through increasingly in both my vocal and instrumental writing.

SC: Which living composers do you identify with or simply admire?

EH: Harrison Birtwistle, Charlotte Bray, Mira Calix, Gary Carpenter, Anthony Gilbert, Roger Marsh, Anna Meredith, Matthew Sergeant, my colleagues at Sounds of the Engine House Steven Jackson and Ben Gaunt and numerous others whose names escape me at this particular moment.

SC: If you could have a beer and a chat with any composer from the past, who would it be and why?

EH: I’d probably be absolutely terrified but it would have to be Olivier Messiaen. His work with birdsong and instrumental colour have been extremely influential in my development as a composer. Chaser with Ligeti please...

SC: Now for some desert island discery – please name eight pieces of music you could not be without, and then select just one.

EH: Messiaen - Chronochromie for large orchestra

Ligeti - String Quartet No. 2

Lutoslawski - Grave for cello and piano

Birtwistle - Punch and Judy

Toru Takemitsu - Rain Tree Sketch II

Ravi Shankar/Alla Rakka - Three Ragas

Stravinsky - The Rite of Spring

Schoenberg - Pierrot Lunaire

Tricky to choose but I'll go for the Takemitsu!

SC: …and a book?:

EH: Haruki Murakami: The Wind Up Bird Chronicle

SC: …a film?

EH: Persepolis

SC: … and a luxury item?

EH: Decent coffee and associated paraphernalia please!