live improvisation on quarter tone bass flute and electronics

Carla Rees - Bass Flute (Kingma System)
Michael Oliva - Electronics

ImproMix

Premiered by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sakari Oramo. Velocity was commissioned to open the BBC Last Night of the Proms 2014

Velocity

'Wall of Water' by Deborah Pritchard
for solo violin and string orchestra
Written after the series of paintings 'Walls of Water' by Maggi Hambling. Premiered by violin soloist Harriet Mackenzie and the English String Orchestra conducted by Kenneth Woods on the 18th October, 2014 at LSO St Luke’s, London. Subsequently performed at the National Gallery in January 2015 and commercially released on disc by Nimbus. Commissioned by the English String Orchestra with funds provided by the Arts Council England and the Britten-Pears Foundation. 

'Wall of Water' responds to the power, movement and colours of the celebrated contemporary artist Maggi Hambling’s series of oil paintings: 'Walls of Water'.

Wall Of Water for solo violin and string orchestra by Deborah Pritchard

Rain, a piece inspired by a recording of heavy raindrops hitting the gutter outside the window of my childhood bedroom in summer. 

Performed by Dov Goldberg on Bb Clarinet. Recorded in August 2023 by Psappha for the ‘Composing For…’ programme funded by Arts Council England and PRS Foundation Talent Development Partner scheme. 

Rain

Recorded live by rarescale

Score available from Tetractys: http://bit.ly/1mUKDmI

Michael Oliva -  Summer Song (extract)

An excerpt of a recorded performance earlier this year by students of Royal Holloway, Time Lapse is inspired by Douglas Vincent’s photograph Star Trails over Death Valley,  which uses a type of time-lapse photography to capture the stars of the night sky. The long- exposure of the shutter displays the deceptive motion of rotating stars. The ideas of circularity and slow but constant motion are central to the work. The piece also uses the same combination of instruments that Messiaen used in his Quartet for the End of Time, and exploits the different timbres of each instrument; the colours produced from them both individually and when blended together. The melody and harmony originates from a single chord and its rotations, with a similar approach being used for rhythm, with all rhythmic material stemming from one rhythmic cell, thus exploring how far one small idea can be stretched near to infinity, creating a sense of timelessness.

Violin - Rock Lee
Cello - Carwyn Jones
Clarinet - Sophie Glenny
Piano - Will Farmer

Time Lapse (Exercpt)

'Into Nothingness' performed by Icosa.

Text 'Road to Aleppo, 1915' by Pulitzer Prize winning poet Peter Balakian, from 'Sad Days of Light'.

-

Road to Aleppo, 1915

There must have
been a flame
like a leaf
eaten in the sun,
that followed you -
a white light
that rose higher
than the mountain
and singed the corner
of your eye
when you turned
to find the screaming
trees dissolving
to the plain.

Even when the sun
dropped, there was a heat
like the ground
of needles stirring
up your legs,
and in a light
and dying wind
the throats of boys
droning like the sheep
beyond the hill
kept ringing in your ears.

The silence
of the ground
filled the high
empty sky.
Your breath
like horizon
settled into black,
and you stuttered
every mile
to your daughter's
shorter step -

The moaning air
almost gone
filled inside
your dress.

-

Which you can find here:

www.amazon.co.uk/Light-Carnegie-M…ry/dp/0887481604

A big thank you to Peter Balakian for allowing me permission to use his text.

www.peterbalakian.com/
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https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoKXeAKtwZ2xmcgN6kfgNjw
https://soundcloud.com/fentonhutson/
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https://www.facebook.com/icosa21/
https://www.icosachoir.com/

Into Nothingness - (Icosa)

Written for the 2018/19 Eötvös Mentorship Programme.

Performed by the UMZE Ensemble at the Budapest Music Centre on 14.02.18

Csaba Klenyán (Cl), Attila Jankó (Bsn), Tamás Pálfalvi (Tpt)
Róbert Káip (Tbn), Tamás Schlanger (Perc), Bálint Kruppa (Vln) & Marcell Dénes (Dbl Bass), Toby Thatcher (Conductor)

The Long March

Craig Charles + Elizabeth Alker speak with composer Benjamin Tassie about our classical club night, Baroque Remix. Aired on BBC 6 Music on 2nd June 2017.

BBC 6 Music feature on Baroque Remix

Rosie Coad - soprano
Carla Rees - quartertone alto flute
Sarah Watts - bass clarinet
Michael Oliva - electronics

the final movement of the song cycle "Dover Beach"

Dover Beach V

2nd movement from trombone concerto, The Book of Miracles. Performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Helen Vollam, conducted by Alexander Vedernikov.

Book Of Miracles - 2nd movement, excerpt

Composer and Sound Designer from Blackpool interested in resonance and dissonance - from contemporary classical to extreme metal, and everything in between.

Studied BMus in Composition and Ethnomusicology at Royal Holloway, University of London. Now working in live theatre production across the north west.

Rain

Abigail Hellam Music