Written for the Ten Wee Devon Pints project. Commissioned for Bays Brewery in Paignton.
Performed by Sarah Watts
Buy it here: https://sarahwatts1.bandcamp.com/album/ten-devon-pints

Ten Devon Pints

Topsail

Premiered 9 October at the Eden Project during the launch of the SOS Network. Sonification of sea temperature and salinity data combined with Wembury Beach field recordings.

Blyth - Eastbourne - Wembury (2015)

Ten Tors Orchestra - 25 February 2017 - The House, Plymouth
Conductor - Simon Ible

Wasgiischwashäsch revisits Rossini’s William Tell Ouverture to describe climate change in Switzerland. The climate of the Alps and its surrounding regions is complex, sometimes extreme but also  fragile. Switzerland has experienced climate change for decades, as evidenced by the rising average temperature. Alarmingly, the rate of climate change and the temperature anomalies are far stronger than the global average: the weather is more extreme. This trend is predicted to continue.

Rossini’s William Tell Ouverture is virtually universally known, but also strongly connected to Switzerland and its founding myth. In fact, the third movement, the tune Ranz des Vaches, is widely thought of as the unofficial national anthem. In Wasgiischwashäsch, the original score is modified according to climate collected from 1860 to 2015. Musical parameters such as pitch, rhythm, harmony, tempo, dynamics, timbre etc. in the score are determined by the data points in the bar’s allocated timespan. The third (Ranz des Vaches) and fourth (Finale) movements of the Ouverture are used. The first one is controlled by data covering the period from 1860 to 1920; while displaying expected variations in temperature, these are small enough to result in rather conventional music. As the decades move on and the rollicking Finale develops, the rising average temperature and anomalies are assigned to extreme tempo, dynamics and registers. The piece ends in an almost unrecognisable interpretation of the originally majestic and heroic material, which highlights the extent of climate change in the Alps.

Wasgiischwashäsch (2017)

The Voice Of The Sea Demo for BBC3

Queen Canute for clarinet and seagulls.

Commissioned for Peninsula Arts Contemporary Music Festival 2018 (cancelled because of inclement weather). To be premiered.

Recorded and composed over the winter of 2018.

Featured in i news: https://inews.co.uk/news/duet-seagull-clarinet-challenge-perception-angry-birds/

Nuria Bonet

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