Composed features

Spirit Of The Beehive

Nina Perry's BBC Radio 3 composed feature A Song of Bricks and Mortar explores composition, the creative process and the art of making. It takes its inspiration from this quote by Benjamin Britten:

"Composing is like driving down a foggy road toward a house. Slowly you see more details of the house - the colour of the slates and bricks, the shape of the windows. The notes are the bricks and the mortar of the house."

Via a compositional road trip, artists in the process of creating and making give insight into their own personal creative process, and what drives them to create. Like a play within a play or a documentary that documents itself - this feature dips its toe into the infinite and timeless nature of artistic creativity as an integral part of being human.

The fear of new beginnings, the pleasure of being in flow, moments of illumination, and of being lost; the artists' relationship with the environment and their own interior landscapes are revealed by Sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld, Art Student Imran Perretta, Composer Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Choreographer and Artistic Director of Rambert Dance Company, Mark Baldwin; and a group of people with Dementia and memory problems at a Creative Arts Session run by the Arts development company Verd de gris.

Their insights are woven together with a metaphorical motorbike journey performed by violinist Oli Langford and a soundscape of specially composed music.

First broadcast 06/07/2013.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b036hzcw

A Song Of Bricks And Mortar

A Guardian Radio Highlight of 2011

Nina Perry's composed feature 'Supermarket Symphony' reveals the beauty, musicality and personal stories found in supermarkets over a day. Specially composed music and the sounds of the supermarket are interwoven with some of the human encounters to be discovered along with the weekly shop.

Amongst stories and rituals of shoppers and supermarket workers, we hear from Michael, a theatrical cheese counter assistant, who now in his 70's reveals his many past lives, and the happiness he finds serving people with cheese; Father Pat, a priest who enjoys the chance to connect with his local community whilst wheeling his trolley down the aisles and Julie who works on the tills, and has a gift for turning a frown into laughter.

Composed and Produced by Nina Perry
Violin and Viola - Oli Langford, Cello - Danny Keane

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4, subsequent broadcasts on Re:Sound USA and Radio National in Australia.

Supermarket Symphony

Commissioned by BBC Radio 3 and supported in part by National Lottery Arts Council England grants for the arts.

Winner of the Phonurgia Nova Award 

Melting Point explores both the human experience and musicality of ice as it melts.

This "composed feature" by Nina Perry explores the icy landscapes of Greenland, Iceland and the Highlands of Scotland through recordings of environmental sounds, interviews with people going about their day to day lives and gathered music that expresses cultural and emotional connections to the weather.

The winter thaw into spring is a time most often associated with renewal and hope, yet paradoxically in light of climate change melting ice has taken on the more ominous connotation of disappearing ice mass and rising sea levels.

Among the voices heard are an Icelandic writer, a Greenlandic fisherman, a drama therapist for whom an ice cube provides a telling metaphor and an ice-climbing fiddle-playing mountain rescuer from the Cairngorms. Their words are interwoven with spectacular recordings of the Greenland ice sheet as it calves and destroys and a specially composed musical soundscape to reveal the dichotomy and emotional resonance of the thaw.

Produced and composed by Nina Perry
Violin performed by Pete Cooper, Voice Julia Traustadottir

Melting Point

What keeps you awake at night? Money worries? Your conscience? Traffic? Dogs barking? Or the shrill sound of a stressed robin forced to sing at night to find a mate?

This composed feature for BBC Radio 4 by Nina Perry explores the problem of sleeplessness and the crucial relationship between sound and sleep, all set within a soundscape of noises heard during a sleepless night interwoven with specially composed music.

Tinnitus sufferer Helen takes us on a journey through a sleepless night of thought and sounds of ticking clocks, snoring, a restless child, mysterious footsteps and a neighbour's late night party. How are these sounds perceived in a state of sleeplessness? How do we respond to sound emotionally, physiologically and hormonally. Are the sounds of the night changing? Are silent nights a thing of the past?

Answering these questions and elucidating the relationship between sound and sleep are: Professor of Acoustics and Dynamics Andy Moorhouse and Senior Lecturer in Acoustics Bill Davies, from Salford University; David Baguley, Head of Audiology at Cambridge University Hospitals, who discusses sound perception, the meaning of sound and the reaction to sound as elements within Tinnitus treatment; Dr Ken Hume, a sleep researcher specializing in sound and sleep, discussing the physiology and psychology of sleep and sound disturbance; and Rupert Marshall, Lecturer in Animal Behaviour at Aberystwyth University, describing how urban wildlife is changing its behaviour to cope with modern life (for example, robins nesting in urban areas who struggle to be heard during the day are more likely to sing at night than their country cousins).

Produced and Composed by Nina Perry 
Musicians: Roland Sutherland - Flute

Sleepless Night

A composed feature first aired on Radio National's Soundproof on November 25th 2016

Tomassi's Restaurant in the British Seaside town of Southend-on-Sea has been making a particular ice-cream sundae—called the Knickerbocker Glory—since 1932.

Layered with fruit, ice cream, syrup and topped with sprinkles and a cherry, it was a childhood favourite of composer Nina Perry.

So she's turned this magical, nostalgic treat is into a composed feature, poetically intertwined with sounds of the seaside, spoken word and music between dollops of ice cream and sauce.

The music in this work was performed by Nina Perry (voice), Oli Langford (Violin and Viola), and Danny Keane (Cello).

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/soundproof/knickerbocker-glory/8051310

Knickerbocker Glory

Radio Production

Mirror Mirror

Originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2006

In this ‘composed feature’, the experiences of four professionals 
who rely on an innate sense of good timing are considered and 
counterpointed.  Playing upon the rhythmic qualities of their
observations, composer Nina Perry reveals, demonstrates and 
celebrates the secrets of good timing.  

With drummer Dawne Adams, chef Brian Fantoni, squash champion 
Madeline Perry and comedian and ‘juggling artiste’ Steve Royle.