it is interesting to note (at least to me) that although all of michael nyman's music from the peter greenaway film the draughtsman's contract was derived from a purcell chaconne and the ground bass (on which this piece is built) was subsequently discovered to have been written by william croft a lesser-known contemporary of purcell.

this arrangement started as a personal transcription/score study (because many of nyman's score are not available) of nyman's fascinating and economical use of orchestration and uses most of the melodic materials from the original, freely combing them to create a bizzaro world second cousin. the results of what i learned by studying this piece were later explored and applied to my own chaconne based romp;  "fearless leader"

this track is part of my upcoming alt-classical EP which will available in January.


An Eye For Optical Theory

pbailey