Piano Suite IV Music from Fragile Light Spaces
After Rachel Whiteread, Nazarin Montag and Roberto Battista

The starting point for this work was artist Rachel Whiteread's sculpture piece where she'd cast into plaster the shape of the space underneath a bed.  I set out to try something similar in composition; at the time Whiteread was working in the Arctic so I began to think about the shapes of spaces within icebergs and to allow these imagined cavities define peaks, troughs and edges of the music.  Later on, I sought extra visual input so I collaborated with two photographers also preoccupied with the depiction of spaces.

I used a sequence of light drawings by Nazarin Montag to complete the first six pieces in the suite:  "Using the camera as a 'drawing tool' I sketched the transfer lounge of Newark Airport Terminal NYC; a transient space through which motion is defined by its architecture. As I passed through I drew traces of artificial light on the surface of the film and discovered a hidden world that lies within." (Nazarin Montag, 2005)

Photographs by Roberto Battista enabled the completion of the suite's final piece, Cloud Sky Fade; "Because of my habit of staring at the sky I've often hurt myself.  At the same time, I've read so many stories in the passing clouds that travel around the world witnessing the lives of countless people that I don't regret a few bruises." (Roberto Battista, 2005)

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7 Cloud Sky Fade


Piano Suite IV Music from Fragile Light Spaces

For String Quartet and Alto Sax (after Christopher Nolan)
Demo
Dublin writer Christopher Nolan (1965-2009) won Whitbread Prize aged 16. He began writing aged 4 but his cerebral palsy inhibited communication. Aged 11, when given the tools, he began to type out the works he’d been writing and memorising all those years, stunned the world and drew comparisons with James Joyce and Yeats.  His first offering was a thank you letter to his Aunt Eva. 

Dear Aunt Eva  Part 1  I Learn To Bow

Part 3 Isolation
From Now You See It
Music/Producer Lola Perrin
Co Producer Christian Dymond

3 Isolation

THEME 2 from Now You See It (Lola Perrin)

Piano Suite I: ‘Early one Sunday morning’ 1992
After Edward Hopper’s 'Early Sunday Morning' 

In this work I have made up the lives and dreams of people who are out of sight in Hopper’s painting of a quiet row of houses at dawn.  I wrote about different situations I imagined, from house to house. There are seven sections in the suite; the first and last sections represent the ends of terrace.

I 	Early dawn
II	Questioning
III	Explaining
IV	Love
V	Underhand
VI	Uncertain
VII	Dawn


5. Underhand: Early One Sunday Morning

Piano Suite II: ‘9 Images for Piano’ 1999
After Ansel Adams
This suite was written from memories of the atmospheres in Ansel Adams’ photographs. Rather than work directly from any single image, I recalled how his pictures had made me feel in the past and tried to capture those feelings in the compositions. In some pieces I was led to short,
imagined stories in black and white, in the style of Adams photography.
‘The man in the black hat below is probably sleeping’ is one such story. Its location is a small
town in America at the height of summer sometime in the 1800’s; a man, probably drunk and
passed out, is sprawled out on the ground in the noon sun, a large hat obscuring his undoubtedly handsome face. But a fly is at work on him and as its activities increase, a more ominous
explanation for why the man is motionless begins to dawn on the passers by.
‘Going on bird speed’ is an homage to my grandparents and imagines their thoughts while they watched birds circling their ship as they sailed towards a new life in America early in the 1900’s. 
Eighty years later and ‘Softer green sleeping’ is a portrait of two of their great grandchildren, sun baked and sleeping in their room after a long afternoon in summer-heat-park.

Page 1 Canyon Dusk
Page 4 The man in the black hat below is probably sleeping
Page 7 Going on bird speed
Page 12 The bridge the brook
Page 17 One step at a time
Page 18 One step, strolling
Page 19 One step, nearly skipping
Page 20 Fireflies and Ice
Page 22 Softer green sleeping


8. Fireflies & Ice (from Nine Images for Piano)

Part 7 Music From Fragile Light Spaces Cloud Sky Fade

Part 5 Music From Fragile Light Spaces

Part 4 Music From Fragile Light Spaces

Part 3 Music From Fragile Light Spaces

Part 2 Music From Fragile Light Spaces

Part 1 Music From Fragile Light Spaces



Piano Suite VII: Collection 2009
After Hussein Chalayan


During the spring of 2009 the Design Museum in London organised a debate at Shoreditch Town Hall, hosted by Cypriot-born designer/artist Hussein Chalayan, to explore what makes London such a magnet for the artistic community throughout the world.  I had been invited by the museum to create a music performance inspired by Chalayan who was on exhibition at the time.  Taking his interest in the issues of cultural migration and displacement as my starting point I ran a questionnaire at the debate to capture the family histories of his audience.  190 questionnaires were returned, and these created 190 unique family tales, each spanning three generations across a hundred years. 

The people poetry I collected through asking my questions allowed me to roam through a borderless sound-territory creating music that would otherwise not have been found but for the lavishly diverse family histories I was lucky enough to bask in.  I commissioned John Kennedy to create drawings from the tales which gave me additional triggers for the composition.  The complete tales, with Kennedy’s cover illustration “The Sea of Names”, are held in the Design Museum library.

After writing the music I had one final process to go through. I filtered words from the 190 tales and ended up with four narrations in the style of radio news reports.  The narrations were read aloud in between the piano pieces by the correspondent, Mihir Bose - whose voice I have admired from afar for many years.   And so “Suite VII: Collection” is a work that’s in the style of a live radio show.  The narrations are at the back of this book.   Pianists performing this suite are encouraged to have the narrations read aloud in this order: narration 1, piece 1, narration 2, piece 2, narration 3, piece 3, narration 4, piece 4.  

Metronome markings are indications of general tempo feel.


1		London is a rhythm (unrecorded)
2		First memory
3		The Sea of Names
4		Across one hundred years


2 First Memory

Piano Suite VIII: On the Gradient Road  2009

The last time I caught sight of my friend and fellow musician before his untimely passing he was walking down a road and laughing with his companion.  

His family asked me to play piano at his memorial, so I wrote a set of pieces.  In my mind I could see how he continues his journey still, along the gradient road.


1	Crossing the water  	(Still)
2	In the time of peace	 (Peaceful)
3	The Departure 		(Energetically)
4	The Ritual 		(Distant)
5	Untitled 		(Obscure)
6	The Arrival		 (Bright)
7	Surrender 1		(Very slow)
8	The Advance 1		(With movement) 
9	Water			 (Very still)
10	The Advance 2 		(With direction)
11 	Surrender 2 		(With acceptance)
12	On the gradient road 	(With ebb and flow)


3 The Departure

Piano 4-hands
5 minutes
Live recording - World Premiere Ivory Duo Piano Ensembble

Before Sleep (Lola Perrin)

Music published by Lola Perrin Sheet Music.  
Available as downloads and as printed books. 
Please email for information.  
lola[at]lolaperr[dot]in

Part 7 Music From Fragile Light Spaces Cloud Sky Fade

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