A new eight-minute piece for clarinet, horn and cello premièred by Kirkcaldy Orchestral Society players Stuart Smith, Andreas Morrison and Katie O'Neil 26 April 2016.

The music is a response to five paintings by Joan Eardley (1921-63), all of which are in the collection of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh. 

1. Street Kids (1949-51) 
2. Seeded Grasses and Daisies (1960) 
3. The Wave (1961) 
4. Children and Chalked Wall No. 3 (1963) 
5. Catterline in Winter (1963)


Five Joan Eardley Pictures - John Gourlay

Solo guitar piece - Seven Ages - inspired by Jacques' speech in As You Like It.
The piece was premieried by Stephen Morrison - to whom it is dedicated - at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe August 2016.

The Seven Ages of Man was already an established formula when Shakespeare gave it form in As You Like It, likening our worldly existence to that of actors in a play. We are first introduced to the infant in arms who grows into the scholar creeping unwillingly to school. We then meet the lugubrious lover who in turn becomes the swaggering soldier. The fifth stage of corpulent middle age is followed by the shrinking into old age and finally the return to the second childishness that precedes the end.


Seven Ages

Seven Ages - John Gourlay

The Weaving Midnight Moon - John Gourlay
London Contemporary Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Alan Taylor, recorded by Matt Dilley.

The Weaving Midnight Moon

Gourlay The Weaving Midnight Moon

No Hay Camino
This composition for medium-sized orchestra is a response to a short poem by Antonio Machado which includes the lines –
Caminante, no hay camino,
Se hace camino al andar.
Traveller, there is no road,
The way is made by going.

www.johngourlaycomposer.com

No Hay Camino

O Columba - John Gourlay
Inchcolm New Music Ensemble Conductor Steve King
Recorded at St Giles Cathedral Edinburgh 30 June 2018

O Columba

Capillaire Games - John Gourlay
Variations on the Capillaire Minuet by Thomas Erskine, 6th Earl of Kelly
Menuet - Fanfare - Waltz - Slow Air - Salsa
Fife Youth Orchestra conducted by Sandra Taylor
Lochgelly Centre, Thursday 1 November 2018

Capillaire Games

Now fades the glimmering landscape - John Gourlay
Edinburgh University Composers' Orchestra conducted by Sam McLellan
Reid Concert Hall, Edinburgh University, 29 November 2018
This piece was first premièred by the Edinburgh University Composers' Orchestra in 2016.  The inspiration is the second stanza of Gray's Elegy –
"Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds."

Now Fades The Glimering Landscape

The Tale of the Red Etin - John Gourlay
Kirkcaldy Orchestral Society, Sandra Taylor (narrator) and The Langtoun Singers (director Ella Wilson) conducted by Graeme Wilson
Première performance at Kirkcaldy Old Kirk, Sunday 16 December 2018

John Gourlay Composer

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