Some Shade of Blue: for solo undachin tarhu and centaur vibraphone [11min]
Some Shade of Blue is a microtonal work written for new violin-like instrument designed by Peter Biffin.
Some Shade of Blue was premiered by Anna McMichael (undachin tarhu) and Bree van Reyk (centaur vibraphone) as part of the Ensemble Offspring event, ‘Partch’s Bastards’: 2nd September 2011, Sydney Opera House.
Purchase the recording: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/ensembleoffspring2
The work is also available in a version for solo violin and electronics.


Some Shade of Blue (undachin tarhu & centaur vibraphone) (Excerpt)

Same Steps: for solo clarinet and modular ensemble [13min]
Commissioned by the Transit Festival (Leuven, Belgium) and premiered by Ensemble Plus Minus (2007).
This sample: Ensemble Offspring– Diana Springford (clarinet), Veronique Serret (violin), Geoffrey Morris (electric guitar), Claire Edwardes (percussion), Damien Ricketson (auxiliary instruments).
Purchase Stepping Stones education resource including score, recordings and written materials: http://www.australianmusiccentre.com.au/product/stepping-stones-teacher-resource-kit

Same Steps (Excerpt)

Ptolemy's Onion: for amplified bass flute and amplified string quartet [20min]
The work has been performed by ensembles including the musikFabrik, Ensemble Offspring and featured at the Gaudeamus Music Week in Amsterdam.
This sample: Kathleen Gallagher (flute), Emma West & Sophie Cole (violin ), Thomas Talmacs (viola) and Geoffrey Gartner (cello).
View an animated score: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmJiC599Mcg

Ptolemy's Onion (Excerpt)

So We Begin Afresh: string quartet [13min]
Imagination is best served by incomplete knowledge: the ruins of an ancient city, the unfinished symphony, the secret code, the partly clad human form. So We Begin Afresh is deliberately incomplete. The work is comprised of four short movements. The audience only hears three. The musicians select any three of the four movements and perform them in an order of their choice. Although they begin the fourth, they let the music “disappear” well before its conclusion notionally allowing it to be continued only in the imagination.
So We Begin Afresh was premiered by the Grainger Quartet, 18th July 2007, City Recital Hall, Angel Place, Sydney. Natsuko Yoshimoto (violin), James Cuddeford (violin), Jeremy Williams (viola) and Patrick Murphy (cello).
View an animated score on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qn1rCOo6nE4

So We Begin Afresh (Excerpt)

Trace Elements: quartet for any two wind and any two string instruments [approx 13min]
Inspired by an old lute tablature containing unidentified forms and genres, Trace Elements is notated in an invented tablature that can be performed across a variety of instrumental combinations.
Commissioned by the 46th Warsaw Autumn International Festival of Contemporary Music.
First performed by Ensemble Offspring on the 23rd September, 2003 in the 46th Warsaw Autumn Festival, Frederic Chopin Academy of Music, Warsaw. Mark Knoop [conductor], Kathleen Gallagher [flute], Jason Noble [clarinet], Thomas Talmacs [violin] & Geoffrey Gartner [cello].
View an animated score on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8v1eTh9rSA

Trace Elements (Excerpt)

Fractured Again: multimedia work for clarinet, violin, vibraphone, glass percussion, glass harmonica and electronics [60min] (Excerpt from Movement 4)

When Lucia kills her husband in Donizetti’s opera Lucia di Lammermoor, her ensuing descent into madness is accompanied by a glass harmonica: an angelic sounding instrument that fell from favour because it was thought to trigger insanity. When Ensemble Offspring, laid their hands on the only glass harmonica in Australia, Donizetti’s ‘mad scene’ was just the beginning of a startling yet beautiful passage through a fragile soundworld of glass. Created by Damien Ricketson, Fractured Again is a striking multimedia experience featuring electronica by Pimmon fused with live violin clarinet and percussion alongside interactive video by Andrew Wholley that illuminates a glass installation by Elaine Miles that is performed like an exotic instrument. Fractured Again was premiered in the magnificent Great Hall at The University of Sydney as part of the 2010 Sydney Festival and went on to tour China with performances in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Macau.

Damien Ricketson: concept, composer
James Cuddeford: violin
Claire Edwardes: percussion
Jason Noble: clarinet
Pimmon: electronic music
Elaine Miles: installation artist
Andrew Wholley: video artist

Limited edition DVD: sold out
Purchase the (audio only) album: https://itunes.apple.com/au/album/fractured-again/id671697870
View a video showreel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyU-2V0lLpY

Fractured Again (Excerpt)

Short sampler from the EP recording of The Secret Noise by Damien Ricketson.

The Secret Noise - EP sample

Sampler from the CD recording of The Secret Noise. This CD is part of a set of recordings (that also includes a vinyl EP and digital-only downloads) and a live performance (incorporating music, dance and physical installation) that collectively constitute The Secret Noise. The CD version of the work is a single spacious listening experience of almost 45min that includes extras peculiar to the CD media.

The Secret Noise - CD Sample

Heaven Only Empty
Damien Ricketson

Performed by Ensemble Offspring
- Jason Noble (bass clarinet)
- Claire Edwardes (vibraphone)
- Bree van Reyk (drums)
- Damien Ricketson (turntable)
- Daniel Denholm (recording and mix engineer)

Heaven Only Empty is an extractable quartet from The Secret Noise: a collection of works inspired by music-making that has been deliberately shielded from public life. Heaven Only Empty is a playful response to ‘backmasking’: the tradition of hiding secret messages in vinyl recordings. The work is a mashup of three golden-era rock songs that have variously been accused of containing subliminal messages when played backwards. The turntablist in the ensemble conceptually interferes with the bass clarinet, vibraphone and drumkit by skipping, rewinding and generally manipulating the speed and direction in which the rest of the band play their music. This recording was made while in residence at the Campbelltown Arts Centre, Australia.


Heaven Only Empty

The Howling Girls (2018) is an experimental wordless opera by Adena Jacobs & Damien Ricketson. The work is produced by Sydney Chamber Opera featuring Jane Sheldon & artists from The House That Dan Built.
Following 45min of dark anxiety-provoking music, this excerpt from the final lyrical section of the work features the voice of Jane Sheldon and an all-electronic orchestration performed by Jack Symonds.
Image by Polly Borland.
For detailed information on The Howling Girls, visit: www.curiousnoise.com/live

The Howling Girls

The Howling Girls (Excerpt)

Sound Touch - Aeolian Nervestrings
Audio excerpt from spatial sound-installation heard via custom cups and strings. Part of the project Sound Touch. www.curiousnoise.com/sound-touch
[Image: an experiment showing cymatic patterns visualising subsonic audio]

Sound Touch - Aeolian Nervestrings

Damien is a Sydney-based composer. Seeking a music for the body rather than the brain, his work is characterised by unusual instruments, open forms and often integrates sound with other media. Damien was the co-founder and Co-Artistic Director of the new music group, Ensemble Offspring (1995-2015), and the Program Leader of Composition at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music (2015-2019). Major staged works have included 'The Howling Girls' (2018), an experimental opera co-created with director Adena Jacobs; and 'The Secret Noise' (2014), a hybrid music-dance project exploring music and secrecy.

Damien Ricketson

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