Welcome to ‘Small Ensemble Waves’, our celebration of new Australian music being written for small forces in abundance. In some ways we’re going back to where it all started (Playlist 1: Chamber Waves January 2015), with another chamber music playlist.  This time we’ve kept to quite small ensembles, of 3-6 acoustic instruments.  When we were considering chamber music for inclusion in this playlist, we distinguished between works written for uniform or homogenous ensembles, of instruments from one family (string quartet, clarinet trio, brass quintet), and works written for mixed chamber configurations, with a wide spectrum of tone colour. The playlist here includes works from both groups. We hope that you enjoy!

Small Ensemble Waves - March 2016

2nd movement of String Quartet no.2 by Paul Stanhope, performed by the Pavel Haas Quartet

String Quartet no. 2 - 2nd movement

This is from 2010 - commissioned and performed by Eclectica Trio (Amanda Lovelock, Anna Coleman and Charise Altmann).
The clarinets take on the role of storyteller for this piece – they growl like a wolf, squeal like a pig, and huff-and-puff with increasing vigour to blow the house down. Unfortunately, they do it all in the wrong language (“this contemporary music just sounds like random notes to me!”). Will you still be able to follow the story? Don’t stress, it all ends happily ever after.

The Three Little Pigs

Elegies And Dances

“In January 1788 the First Fleet arrived in New South Wales and a thousand British men and women encountered the people who would be their new neighbours—the beach nomads of Australia. ‘These people mixed with ours, ’wrote a British observer soon after landfall, ‘and all hands danced together’”.

Dancing With Strangers

String Quartet No. 2 in E minor by Connor D'Netto
recorded live @ MICMC 2015 - 18 Jul 2015

Winner of the Australian New Works Award, presented by Chamber Music Australia

Performed by the Noga Quartet, winner of the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition

String Quartet No. 2 in E minor - live @ MICMC 2015

Minimalist saxophone quartet recorded at Melba Hall at the University of Melbourne. 
The Jive is a lively piece in three sections. It employs minimalist techniques such as canon, adding rhythmic cells, cross-fading, resulting patterns and mensuration canon. Some of these techniques are used more freely than in strict minimalism. I experimented with different canonic textures and the resulting patterns created when shifting motives between the different saxophones. Motives in rhythmic unison as well as cross-rhythms are explored in the last part of the piece. Dynamic swells and funky rhythms make The Jive somewhat unpredictable…

The Jive

I. Suddenly for soprano, flute, and piano (A. Mellos 2014)
Madeline Cain, soprano; Daniel Pesca, piano; Caroline Sonett, flute
Live recording, November 12, 2014 Kilbourn Hall, The Eastman School of Music


I. Suddenly from 'Three Poems of Yannis Ritsos' - for soprano, flute, and piano

Performed by Julia Bentley, mezzo soprano, and Kuang-Hao Huang, piano. 

The text for “What is the Grass” was taken from lines 90-101 of Song of Myself, the first book of Leaves of Grass by the American poet Walt Whitman. The text is modified from its original version, cutting lines and reworking sentences, in order to get across the message clearly in the music – that all humans are created equal; we share the same world and are made of the same stuff, much like the grass of the earth.

What is the Grass

Awarded the 2016 WSOC/102.5 Fine Music Young Composer Award.  Performed by the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra with clarinet soloist Som Howie. Conducted by Paul Fitzsimon. Audio Engineer - Jayson McBride. Composed by Elizabeth Younan.

Clarinet Concerto

Performed by Claire Edwardes. Composed by Elizabeth Younan (2016).

Agitation

VERVE | composed for and performed by percussionist Claire Edwardes [2016].

Ella Macens's Album

VERVE for Solo Marimba

Composition Masters Folio USyd

Moonlight

Performed by Arcadia Winds at the Musica Viva Festival (23/04/17). Recorded by ABC Classic FM. Composed by Elizabeth Younan (2015).

Shoreditch Grind

Awarded the Fine Music FM 102.5 Young Composer Award for 2017.

Performed by the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra under the baton of conductor Matthew Wood.

FLIGHT | For Symphony Orchestra

for two flutes, percussion, piano
Music X, Blonay, Switzerland
July 2010
Timothy Munro and Pethrus Gardborn, flutes
Jeremy Malvin, percussion
Erika Dohi, piano

These dark notes drifting takes its title from a poem by 9th-century Chinese poet Li Po.  Inspired by a Chinese folk tune, the piece evokes distant flutes, coloured by the sounds that one might hear across a valley at night in the spring.

Spring Night in Lo-Yang hearing a flute
In what house, the jade flute that sends these dark notes drifting,
scattering on the spring wind that fills Lo-Yang?
Tonight if we should hear the willow-breaking song,
who could help but long for the gardens of home?

These dark notes drifting

Making Waves is a monthly series of curated playlists streaming one hour of quality, new composed music.  Founded in 2015, Making Waves shines a spotlight on the music of Australian composers. Fresh playlists are released on the first day of each month and older playlists are made available all year round via our archives; perfect for those with just a few minutes to explore one track or for hours perusing a myriad of diverse sound-worlds.


The project offers wider exposure to emerging composers, their music and the talented performers who champion it. We also provide an easy-to-access platform for listeners to sit back and enjoy a curated hour of exciting new music or explore our living composers more actively.  The playlist themes (and media through which they’re shared eg. Soundcloud, YouTube) evolve each month depending on the content received directly from our talented composers.

At its core Making Waves is a curated listening space. In 2016 we branched into producing our own content through a special project, Making Conversation, thanks to a successful crowdfunding campaign. Making Conversation: Australian Composers Project is a series of podcasts and vodcasts presenting the human side of living Australian composers, released on popular audiovisual and social platforms mid-2017.
Composers Lisa Cheney (Melbourne) and Peggy Polias (Sydney) are curating this project.

 Listeners, we encourage you to explore current and past playlists and discover more about our featured composers. 

Composers, we encourage you to send us links to your streamable audio via our website. Visit: www.makingwavesnewmusic.com for more information.

Clare Strong (née Johnston) is an Australian composer, based in Melbourne.
Clare has composed works for some of Australia’s leading performers and ensembles including: the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, the Goldner String Quartet, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, Plexus, Claire Edwardes (percussion), Sarah Curro (violin), Stefanie Farrands (viola), Virginia Taylor (flute), Alice Giles (harp) and Louise Johnson (harp). She has completed a Masters as part of the inaugural National Women Composers' Development Program run by the Sydney Conservatorium. 

Clare completed a Bachelor of Music from the University of Melbourne in 2013, where she was awarded the Esther Rofe Award for Composition. In 2015 she won the David Henkels Award for Composition and had her Gypsy Trio performed at the 3MBS Performer of the Year Awards.

In 2015 Clare was selected to participate as a composer in the Walden School Creative Musicians Retreat in New Hampshire, USA. She studied with composer Martin Bresnick and had one of her compositions performed by the Wet Ink Ensemble from New York City. Clare was also selected to participate in the Atlantic Music Festival in Maine, USA where she studied with leading American composers and had her works performed and recorded by the Contemporary Ensemble at the festival and the AMF Orchestra.

Clare was chosen as one of four composers at the AYO National Music Camp 2015 where her music was conducted by James Judd and performed by leading international musicians.

The Jive

Clare Strong

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