Spectre of the Spheres

performed by Stephen De Pledge at Te Uru, Wednesday 11 February 2015

Grand Piano

Za stakanam (tumanam)

Tsai Pei-lun, Clarinet
Chen Yu-fang, Violin
World premiere: Hong Kong, Jan 3 2017

"Notturno" and "con fuoco" were brought together to represent two contrasting musical ideas. They develop individually and occasionally become one.

Notturno con Fuoco for Clarinet in B Flat and Violin (2016)

Violon: Antoine Maisonhaute 
Violoncelle : Pablo Tognan 
Contrebasse: Nicolas Crosse

Alone, Together, Apart

Reading by the Juilliard Orchestra
Jeffrey Milarsky, conductor
Vivian Yau, soprano

Text:
	春眠不覺曉
	處處聞啼鳥
	夜來風雨聲
	花落知多少

	In spring one sleeps, unaware of dawn,
	Everywhere one hears tweeting birds;
	In the night came the sound of wind and rain,
	Who knows how many flowers fell?

	泠泠七弦上
	靜聽松風寒
	古調雖自愛
	今人不多彈

	Clear are the sounds of the guqin,
	Silently I hear the bleak notes of Windswept Pines;
	Even though I adore the tunes of antiquity,
	Today they are not often played. 

	前不見古人
	後不見來者
	念天地之悠悠
	獨愴然而涕下

	I see no one before me,
	I see no one after me;
	Thinking of the eternity of heaven and earth,
	Alone and overwhelmed, my tears fall. 

	千山鳥飛絕
	萬徑人蹤滅
	孤舟蓑笠翁
	獨釣寒江雪

	A thousand peaks: birds have vanquished,
	Ten thousand paths: footprints have vanished; 
	On a solitary boat, in straw cloak and bamboo hat is an old man,
	Alone, fishing the cold river snow.

Fallen Petals 落花 (song cycle for soprano and orchestra)

An incredible place in the Gnaala Karla boodja region on Wiilman Noongar country; I woke up very early to this soundscape and so set up microphones and listened for half an hour or so - here is a little excerpt. This place is one of the only areas in the world home to endangered marsupials such as numbats, woylies and marls. I was lucky enough to see a numbat and a number of woylies on this trip along with echidnas, rare birds and some amazing Noongar cultural sites including an ochre pit. This recording was taken in a brown mallet forest which has a really strange appearance - a lot of dead leaf cover on the ground, very sparse growth on the ground from a diverse array of plants and a pale green canopy with almost no green leaves within a few metres of the ground. Very amazing!

I acknowledge that sovereignty was never ceded and that this always was, always will be Aboriginal land. Much respect to Noongar elders past and present.

Wilgadjny, first visit

Poema 5 from Poema series.  Each poema was composed for a solo instrument.

Picture used from Sesshu Toyo "Habokui Sansui", 1495.

Poema 5

Tingle - “I Wanna Be A Tree”

Recorded by Josten Myburgh on Bibbulmun Noongar country in the Walpole-Nornalup National Park, under a giant tingle tree. Mastered by Mij Yelned.

Laura Altman (clarinet) - Sydney 
Andy Butler (mandolin) - Melbourne 
Jim Denley (flute, lead vocals) - Sydney 
Jameson Feakes (percussion) - Perth 
Noemie Huttner-Koros (bass flute) - Perth
 Lenny Jacobs (percussion) - Perth
 Josten Myburgh (alto saxophone) - Perth 
Éric Normand (electronics, backing vocals) - Rimouski 
Dan O’Connor (trumpet) - Perth
 Dharma (guitar) - Singapore

Tingle - "I Wanna Be A Tree"

The last six American presidents – Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump – ruled over a period of dramatic change: from the decline and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union, to 9/11 and the War on Terror, and to the growing political polarization of the recent years.

“American Music” looks at one aspect of their presidencies that is similar – their oaths of office.

“American Music” was written for Joe Qiu and James Oesi and premiered by them at 840: New Music for Bassoon and Double Bass on 9 April 2019 at Iklectik, London.

Alone, Together, Apart

Bin Li