bet denagel is an ancient rock-hewn church, part of eleven such churches at the Lalibela world heritage site in Northern Ethiopia. One of the smaller structures on the site, bet denagel has little external vista and is instead is principally comprised from a subterranean space, delineated by columns into twelve smaller areas.

The piece is comprised from a network of interrelated blocks of musical materials through which the performer can travel at will. The gut strings of the Baroque instrument are also substantially detuned, creating an extremely unstable instrumental canvas on to which these materials are placed. In being executed on the instrument, the materials are effected and further transformed by a barrage of cracks, squeaks and pitch-falters: as if the musical ideas have become engulfed and encrusted by the timbres of the instrument itself.

The piece was written in collaboration with the violinist Emma Lloyd and is dedicated to her in friendship and gratitude. bet denagel was first premiered by Emma Lloyd on September 16th 2013 in St. Cecilia’s Hall, Edinburgh.

Credits
Peter Furniss - Audio Consultant; David Lloyd - Sound Recording; Emma Lloyd - Violin; Matthew Sergeant - Composer

bet denagel (2013) (for solo Baroque violin)

bete mika’el is an anacient rock-hewn church, one of eleven such churches found at the Lalibela World Heritage site in Ethiopia. Carved downwards into a rocky hillside, from the outside bete mika’el is almost entirely invisible, only a few characteristic akusmite windows can be seen via the chapel’s east trench. Inside however, the church is highly ornate – comprising a single large chamber, structurally assured by at least eleven ornate individual pillars (all carved monolithically from the solid rock of the hillside).

The piano piece is constructed from a group of materials, labelled as ‘archetypal forms’ in my musical sketches. Each ‘archetypal form’ could be described as material stereotypes, including contrapuntal forms, chorale-like forms and melodic forms amongst others. This group of materials are arbitrarily superimposed  - or perhaps collided is a better word here - in different combinations, often entangling together into a confused mass of highly dense music. Sometimes particular forms rise to the surface and become clarified, whilst others are mutilated and distorted by that which is layered upon them.

This is an excerpt from a workshop recording, mace by the dedicatee of the piece, pianist Ben Powell, in preparation for the premiere performance of the work in late 2014.

bete mika'el (2012) (for solo piano) [workshop sample]

three visions in a grove of trees - 2009

movement v of vii

commissioned by ensemble 10:10, performed by ensemble 10:10, first performance on 6th March 2009.

three visions in a grove of trees (v/vii)

An extract from my new extended duration/performance installation for solo violin and twine-bow, [kiss]. The complete piece lasts between 4-6 hours (of continuous violin performance). [kiss] is made mostly of noises and glitches on the edge of audibility. At a non-predetermined moment within its extended duration, a brief passage of music to the absolute contrary (bold/wrought) sounds. Either through absence of innocence, most will miss it.

[Notes: Live recording with limited background noise. Image taken at first performance. Emma Lloyd, violin]

[kiss] - Excerpt

Bête Gabriel-Rufael is a thirteenth-century rock-hewn church, one of eleven such structures at the UNESCO world-heritage site in Lalibela, Ethiopia. The church jointly commemorates the saints Gabriel and Raphael (more familiar as archangels in the Western canon) and the idea of conjoinment informs bête rabriel-rufael (the piece). Here, two disparate instrumental identities –saxophone and percussion – are fused into a hybrid. A sonic common ground is forged in loops of shrieks and squeaks from frictional percussion and multiphonics, the tempos of which oscillate around oneanother (following a computer-controlled click-track, which is generated in real time). bête rabriel-rufael is part of a larger set of pieces, collectively entitled The Eleven Churches of Lalibela, which together explores issues of decay, space and place.

betê gabriel-rufael

[shell] was written for a celebration concert to mark the departure of Laura Tunbridge from the music department at the University of Manchester in 2014. Using only the phonetic material derived from Tunbridge's name, this short work superimposed various vocal behaviours (vowel sound, consonant articulations, vocal fry, etc.) into a stuttering/quivering hybrid. Using only a single tone, pitch is gradually removed and at that remains by the end is an articulative guttural shell.

In this recording, [shell] is wonderfully performed by soprano and composer, Nina Whiteman

[shell] (2014, for solo unspecified voice)

Programme Note: 

"It's certainly not really about development, such as the word is usually defined. Nor is it really about contrast. In one way I suppose it's more like watching an earwig or a mountain goat weave its way across different planes - some steep, some high, some tight, some sprawling - and watching that same creature accommodate such different lands in its gait. And yet, in another way, it's about the land itself. A mountain not just as a relief but as an imprint in the sky. And how - just like the "Gestalt Vase" (is it a vase or two opposing faces?) - one's impression oscillates between foregroundings of these different states. Relief/imprint. Pitch/noise."

Written for renowned trumpet virtuoso and ELISION Ensemble member, Tristram Williams. This is an excerpt from the first performance.

[terrains] (2016, for solo quartertone flugelhorn with preparations) - excerpt

A tiny excerpt from Lichen (2017, for electric lap-steel guitar), as premiered by Daryl Buckley (ELISION Ensemble, AUS) on 08.

Lichen (2017) - Excerpt

The Velvet Rage (2017) for flute, cello, voice and electronics.
Matthew Sergeant http://www.matthewsergeant.com/

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Programme Note:

The Velvet Rage probably has more to do with Sara Ahmed’s text, Queer Phenomology, than the famous self-help book from which it actually takes its title (Alan Downs, The Velvet Rage, 2005). Either way, I suppose it’s a piece about relationships -  relationships between performers-to-performers, bodies-to-instruments and digital-to-flesh - bodies sometimes controlling instruments, instruments sometimes controlling bodies - and liquefying those relationships into a state of dialogue and juxtaposition - setting up mutual queerings between these kinds of relationships – prepared instruments, rich in glitch, accompanying the natural “human” rhythms of speech – perhaps - or the body as a bio-filter for electronic sound - maybe. The Velvet Rage was commissioned in 2017 by Trio Atem in celebration of their 10th anniversary, with funds generously supplied by Arts Council England. It is dedicated to Nina Whiteman, in friendship and camaraderie.

A truncated form of the The Velvet Rage was premiered at Oxford University on May 18th 2017, with the full version first performed at the Wonder Inn, Manchester, June 8th 2017.

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Trio Atem:
Gavin Osborn (flutes - https://gavinosborn.weebly.com/)
Alice Purton (cello - http://alicepurton.simpl.com/)
Nina Whiteman (voice - http://ninawhiteman.com/)

Recording Engineer (Audio): Ed Adams

Recorded live on 17.01.18 at Bath Spa University. 'The Velvet Rage' was commissioned by Trio Atem with funds generously supplied by Arts Council England.

The Velvet Rage (2017)

bet merkorios is an ancient rock-hewn church, part of eleven such churches at the Lalibela world heritage site in Ethiopia. There is archaeological evidence to suggest that at some point in the distant past the chapel was reappropriated for use as a prison. 
 
The piece is constructed from juxtaposed blocks of music, each defined by certain pattern- based materials (or ‘comportment’ to use terminology from my sketches). The panels were composed for each of the ‘cellist’s hands independently and then, retrospectively combined – although perhaps collided is a better word to use here. Essentially, this is a process of distortion – the ‘purity’ of each panel being corrupted (to greater or lesser extents) by that with which it is collided and/or superimposed. 
 
A cyclic procession of such materials is presented which itself breaks down. In a sense, the larger-scale architecture of the piece also concerns issues of disruption, although perhaps disorientation is  a better way to describe the experience. 
 
The piece was written for the ‘cellist Tom Bayman in friendship and gratitude. Tom gave the first performance of bet merkorios on 23rd July 2012 in the Nexus Arts Café in Manchester. 


bet merkorios (2012) (for solo violoncello)

bet maryam is a rock-hewn church, the smallest of eleven such churches situated on the Lalibela world- heritage site in Ethiopia. 
 
The piece alternates two perspectives on a single cyclic melodic line, which I label as a ‘cantus’ in my musical sketches; the first presents the cantus as two-part counterpoint (where it is accompanied by itself), whilst the second compresses the cantus into a series of four (strummed) chords. The alternating perspectives are separated by instances of monodic material that scrambles the cyclic nature of the cantus. Throughout the piece, both perspectives are presented in a variety of levels of focus; sometimes they are clearly stated and sometimes blurred or disrupted, often by the physical nature of the guitar itself. 


bet maryam (2011) (for solo guitar)

ymrehanne krestos is an ancient rock-hewn (former) monastery in northern Ethiopia. Unlike other such structures in this area, ymrehanne krestos is carved into a vertical rock face, whereas as the others are carved downwards into the region’s rocky plateaus. As such, the monastery has a much more singular viewpoint than its counterparts, only the ornate façade of the building is immediately visible.

The piece is constructed from four duets, originally composed for the brass, each utilising a single physical parameter of brass performance technique (articulation, valve/side patterns, the harmonic series and dynamics). Rather than being presented sequentially, the duets are superimposed, creating wild and frenetic material as the conditions imposed by the original materials collide and corrupt one another. This textural canvas this then ‘scrubbed’ and, at different moments, one or more of the duets removed, revealing (or semi-revealing) the more stable patterns that lie beneath the piece’s chaotic surface.

The piece was written for the ELISION ensemble (Tristram Williams (flugelhorn), Ben Marks (alto trombone) and Peter Neville (percussion)) and first performed by them on the 1st February at the National University of Singapore, Singapore, conducted by Tony Makarome. This (second) performance is conducted by Aaron Cassidy.

ymrehanne krestos (2013) (for brass and percussion)

Matthew Sergeant’s music currently explores ideas surrounding identity and hybridity, space and place. It is frequently performed throughout the world by acclaimed ensembles, including BCMG, Divertimento Ensemble, ELISION, EXAUDI and the Nieuw Ensemble, and regularly featuring at international festivals, including Festival Musica (France), HCMF (UK) and Sydney International Festival (Australia). @matthewsergeant

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