Original music written by Roland Orzabal (Tears for Fears)
Poem by Martin Hicks
Guitar and Production by Calum Kempton -(https://soundcloud.com/calumkemptonmusic)

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This poem was inspired by the people in the Channel 4 Unreported World series. People all over the world in times of trouble doing inspiring things
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Praise to the people!

Praise to the Doctor saving lives as barrels of terror are thrown down from above,
Indiscriminately, relentlessly, without remorse,
He's a Doctor, an engineer, a politician, a pastor, a leader,
It's 3am before he gets his first sip of coffee.

Praise to the man fighting poverty with paper, as he removes another child from the jaws of a predator,
Tonight they will sleep,
Tonight they will sleep on a mattress,
Tonight they will be taught how to sleep beneath the sheets.

Praise to the sportsman, who can't flee his country for fear of the pain he leaves for his Mother,
Praise to the sportsman who fled his country, leaving his Mother to take pills from a brown broken bottle, but buying a future for his one loving daughter.

Praise to the Mother looking for a home away from the beach,
Away from the reach and the screech of the gunships,
Away from the police station for fear of mortars,
Away from the rebels with their rockets of freedom,
All she wants is a home for her kids,
Everyone deserves a home for their kids.

Praise to the lawyer, saving death row kids from the executioners bullet,
6 or 7 hundred slain, and he sleeps well at night.
Praise to the surgeon, bringing beauty to the masses through the cut of his knife,
Everyone has the right to be beautiful.

Praise to the filmmakers, telling stories of hope, reality and truth, whilst they are tracked by the target of a snipers gun,
To the man making movies under the face of the taliban, in the name of his 8 fallen friends,
Praise to the woman ordering policemen closer into shot on her latest film, whilst her name is scribed deeply on the next murderous list

Praise to the men wearing iron jackets and hats, as they speed to the scene on the next broken street to remove a wire from a phone, 
Hoping that the call's not for them,
Praise to the man who took the call, and no longer walks on 2 feet,
Praise to his children who look upon their Father with pity and shame as their plates remain empty for another day,
Praise to his Mother, who rocks from side to side, covered in black, with dark, sunken eyes.

Praise to the cook, who keeps his doors open, despite the vile intrusion of an explosive stranger,
5 coats of emulsion cover the ceiling and their bitter remains,
Plates full of resistance and pans full of determination,
His door is open, once again.

It's a mad world full of wonderful people

Praise to the people!

Praise to the People - with Calum Kempton (C.K. Music)

Autumn Tone Records - Los Angeles. Out November 2014.

Springtime Carnivore - Name On A Matchbook

DRUMS BETWEEN THE BELLS
http://brian-eno.net

New album forthcoming on Warp Records.
CD, 12″ Double Vinyl, Hardback 2CD Edition, Download

http://enoshop.co.uk
http://bleep.com/brian-eno

Drums Between The Bells

pour it out

Brian Eno and the words of Rick Holland - pour it out (taken from Drums Between The Bells)

I created this track after watching the documentary Dogging Tales (by Leo Maguire) on Channel 4. The piano playing is a recording from a concert by my deceased grandfather (Dennis Murdoch). I recorded the woodland sounds in my local woods (during the day!)

Dogs

Mozart gets a mint makeover. 🙂 

One of his most earwormy tunes - the Rondo 'Alla Turca' - taken on a magical mystery tour by my trio project Cherry Mint Koala.

Appropriately playful visuals on YouTube here: 
https://youtu.be/Q3WPtaLkRj8

Out via Bandcamp and most streaming platforms. 

Taken from the forthcoming Cherry Mint Koala album 'Connections Drawn'.


A Series of Unnecessary Variations on the Rondo 'Alla Turca'

Top climate scientist Kevin Anderson: hard facts about climate change are not getting out, and never made it to the Paris climate talks.  Plus hot climate radio from Australia. Radio Ecoshock 151202

Kevin Anderson: Untold Climate Truth

Arrangements for string orchestra of the solo piano pieces "Inner Anthems". This experiment helps understand how the same music can have a distinctive effect when played by different instruments - from the intimacy and calmness of the piano to the grandeur and urgency of a string orchestra. Hope you enjoy these arrangements.

Inner Anthem Nº1 For String Orchestra

Ash-L'Amour Looks Something Like You

NOW AVAILABLE ON iTUNES AND AMAZON.

Please follow the following link to see Dances of Life and Death, the short film.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6kPJFfIhP8

Elizabeth Bailey (soprano), Brno Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Mikel Toms.

Music by Andrew Webb-Mitchell
Words by Joanna Boulter

“In Songs of Awe and Wonder, Andrew Webb-Mitchell has created a stunning set of symphonic songs on a grand scale. The music is full of passion and heroism, with glorious harmony and beautiful textures. The orchestration is beautifully detailed and the vocal writing creates a soaring line that carries the listener right through the vast canvas of the cycle. The work is dedicated to Mahler but, although the scale of the work is comparable to a Mahlerian song cycle, the music is in no way derivative and Andrew Webb-Mitchell has his own unique style and sound-world.”

Tasmin Little, violinist

Dances of Life and Death is an intimate portrait of Anna Pavlova as she prepares for the role in which she became most closely associated, The Dying Swan.

Anna Pavlova was a Russian ballerina of the late 19th and the early 20th century. She is widely regarded as one of the finest classical ballet dancers in history and was most noted as a principal artist of the Imperial Russian Ballet and the Ballets Russes of Sergei Diaghilev. Pavlova is perhaps most renowned for creating the role of The Dying Swan, a solo choreographed for her by Michel Fokine. The ballet, created in 1905, is danced to Le cygne from The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns. Pavlova was purported to have studied the movements of swans in depth before attempting her performance. In 1912, she bought a home in London called Ivy House, which had an extensive garden and a pond. Several pictures were taken during this time showing her entwined in an embrace with her favorite swan, Jack.

While touring in The Hague, Netherlands, Pavlova was told that she had pneumonia and required an operation. She was also told that she would never be able to dance again if she went ahead with it. She refused to have the surgery, saying "If I can't dance then I'd rather be dead." She died of pleurisy, three weeks short of her 50th birthday. She was holding her costume from The Dying Swan when she spoke her last words, "Play the last measure very softly."




Every movement seemed to be an understated reinterpretation of the swan.
And the people passing by wondered who on Earth she could be.

Her demeanour, so convincing.
Her charisma, so entrancing.

Each and every gesture that she made revealed a deep instinctive understanding of the role.
By the water it was plain to see one was learning from the other.

This was what she did and who she was, her nature,
servant of an all consuming art,
enacting a transformation and slowly becoming the embodiment of sound.

Dance, dance through the threshold of fear.
Dance, dance with abandon.

In the twilight, an ethereal look.
In the darkness, unforgettable words.

"Play the last measure softly."

Buy on iTunes

Dances of Life and Death - Brno Philharmonic Orchestra, Mikel Toms

'An excellent composer with a firm grasp on what he wants to accomplish' ALTSOUNDS
'Marvelously crafted tunes' SPUTNIK MUSIC
'A maverick genius' RHYTHM & BOOZE
'A treasure' BLUESBUNNY

Mark Northfield is a maverick pianist, composer, arranger and singer from Berkshire, England. He is also the founder member of piano trio Cherry Mint Koala (alongside violinist Charlie Brown and cellist Tony Woollard).

He produces precise, thoughtful and frequently melancholic pop/rock with a prominent classical and theatrical streak, often in collaboration with guest vocalists.

His professional work as a pianist for dance has helped shape his eclectic output. Cherry Mint Koala developed as a result of collaborative performances at ArtsEd in London, where he's currently Head Ballet Pianist for the Musical Theatre degree course. (ArtsEd was named School of the Year at The Stage awards 2016.) He manages a team of class musicians there and has composed music for short films made by acting graduates at the school.

This working environment is an excellent laboratory for both developing new ideas and twisting existing tunes from various genres and eras into unexpected shapes. The latter approach is exemplified by Mark's new album 'European Dream', which brings darkness and emotional heft to the generally maligned genre of Europop.

To date, Mark has self-released several albums and EPs, and also shown his visually creative side through promo videos featuring his own stop-motion animation, choreography, puppetry and drag/zombie action. His latest video - for his slightly sinister version of Whigfield's 'Saturday Night' - is one of his most colourful yet.

Further info can be found at his official website: marknorthfield.com

Contact: northfieldmusic (at) gmail (dot) com

A Series of Unnecessary Variations on the Rondo 'Alla Turca'

Mark Northfield

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