EXPRSN is a multi-track synthesiser composition using hardware by Arturia, Roland, ASM, Korg, Moog, Behringer, Waldorf, Expressive E and the Artiphon Orba for the first time. The work was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in August 2022.
The idea of trying to relay human expression via text (hence EXPRSN as the title) or social media was something that I found intriguing. The sounds and rhythms in the piece were created to represent thoughts, feelings, emotions and even heartbeats, communicated electronically to their respective recipients. Many of the sounds are unique to the piece as it was not possible to save and store the 'patches' after creating them – thus leaving unrepeatable moments in the recording.
Many of the techniques employed in EXPRSN were inspired by composers known for their innovative work with recording and in particular, synthesisers.

EXPRSN

A piece for two voices, oboe and piano based on a painting by American artist, John Collier (www.Hillstream.com)

The performers on this recording are those from 2009, when over a thousand people heard this piece at two concerts over 24 hours. Since then the work has to the best of my knowledge, been performed a number of times - most notably in 2010 when it was sung next to John's painting at St. Gabriel's, McKinney, Texas.
Published by Chichester Music Press: https://chichestermusicpress.co.uk/cgi-bin/chichestermusicpress.pl?chunk=scoreid&ismn=CMP395

01/09/2011

Annunciation

A one-note music piece for the lowest note on the piano written for the pianist, Juan María Solare

Underworld for solo piano

The Kyrie from my Missa Brevis (2015) - the melody was written in St Govan's chapel on the Pembrokeshire coast.
Missa Brevis is now published by Banks Music:
https://www.banksmusicpublications.co.uk/publishers/banks-music-publications/missa-brevis-24

The full first performance recording may be found at:
https://www.lfccm.com/media/recordings/nye-missa-brevis/

Purchase sheet music

Kyrie - from Missa Brevis (2015)

The Finale from Circus! (Oboe, violin and piano.)
The set of pieces, based on the Circus Prints by Eric James Mellon, were commissioned for the launch of Eric's book, 65 Years of Printmaking. 
Re-mastered January 2018

Finale (from Circus!)

The Prelude from Circus! (Oboe, violin and piano.)
The set of pieces, based on the Circus Prints by Eric James Mellon, were commissioned for the launch of Eric's book, 65 Years of Printmaking. 
Re-mastered January 2018

Prelude (from Circus!)

Programme notes below:

Tronow
A work for eight hands on two pianos
Staring into the skip shaft at Levant Mine is a strange experience. I was on my front lying on nothing more than a grill over an illuminated shaft that dropped away for hundreds on metres. The air from below pushed I guessed, by the running streams that now flowed through the tunnels, wafted up as if the place was actually breathing. Tronow is the Revived Late Cornish word for 'tunnels'. It is also a word that I believe is sometimes used for 'nose'.

In 2012 I began working on the 1 minute composition Bucca for soprano and piano. This one minute work was performed in New York on 24th March 2013 as part on the 15 Minutes of Fame Series. This tiny piece proved to be the springboard into a world I had viewed from a distance as child when on holiday. A research trip to Levant Mine in 2013 resulted in the collection of hundreds of sound samples and manuscript impressions (crayon rubbed over manuscript paper resting on walls and other objects in an attempt to create note patterns).

The two resulting works were quite different. Edge of the World, a 20 minute media work, was premièred at the mine comprising a symphonic soundtrack, video, photographs, paintings, sculpture and poetry. It won a Gorsedh Kernow Award in 2016.

Underworld, a one note piano piece depicting man-made underground spaces, was written for Juan Maria Solare. The work was performed in Germany on 24th June 2014 and uses the lowest note on the piano coupled with the manipulation of the string inside the instrument.

Tronow is the work that closes my Cornish Mines "project" - it features many of the note patterns created at Levant and utilises the string manipulation techniques from Underworld and the knocking effects from Bucca.

I have tried to focus on the individuals who occupied these subterranean spaces, the knocking of hammers and use of mining tools bringing the tunnels to life. The pauses in work are captured in short sections of music, attempting to recreate the moment tired bodies try to recover before continuing. There was also fear and uncertainty when working in a dangerous space hundreds of metres beneath the earth, or as with Levant, the sea.

The piece opens with the listener 'walking' through the tunnels towards the working miners. Tools are being struck and dripping water from above combines with the metallic sounds of hammers and drills. Rocks are split and tumble down. Men, working by lamps and candles break the rocks and load the trucks that will take the ore to the surface. Sound is everywhere. For the individual working in the gloom there are however, moments of stillness – men standing in the open shafts, listening to the distant sounds of their fellow workers with the strange air from the breathing tunnels curling around them. The superstitions and folklore come to mind - the Bucca and 'Knockers' inhabiting the mines were very real to the men in the tunnels - miners trying to preserve themselves in the darkness would offer food in return for warnings of rockfalls knocked on the stone by the spirits, thus giving the men time to escape. Work continues until finally, tired bodies are transported very slowly to the surface via a 'man engine' and fresh air fills the lungs once more.

The final bars of the piece remembers the moment when in the afternoon of October 20th 1919, a metal bracket at the top of the rod of the Levant man engine broke and 31 miners were lost.

Image by Erica Sharpe: https://www.ericasharpe.co.uk/art/

Tronow (Live performance)

This spellbinding performance of my motet "I Saw a New Heaven" for unaccompanied SATB is by The Seraphim Consort.
The piece was included in the 2018 London Festival of Contemporary Church Music.

I Saw A New Heaven

An instrumental work for saxophone and piano - influenced by my time living on the Isles of Scilly.

Random Breezes

This is the reference recording made at the first performance of my piece Hostias et Preces (Sacrifices and Prayers). The recording was made over a decade ago on some very old equipment - the choir did a great job singing the piece which I believe comes through despite the recording quality. I have tried to clean it up!

Hostias et Preces

This is the 2010 live recording of my ensemble work for violin, harp and marimba inspired by the deserted village of Tyneham. Melody fragments were taken in the form of wall rubbings from a number of the houses and used in the piece.

Whispering Walls

This is the third movement from my 1991 piece Three Pyrotechnics for Solo Clarinet. The recording is also from 1991 and taken from the original audio cassette made by the dedicatee, Nick del Grazia. Nick now lives and works in the USA: https://www.atu.edu/humanities/music/profiles/ndelgrazia.php 
The published work is now on the Trinity College Clarinet Advanced Repertoire: http://www.trinitycollege.co.uk/site/?id=1738 
The work is published by Forton Music: 
https://fortonmusic.co.uk/product/3-pyrotechnics/

Buy the sheet music

Jumping and Flying Things (from Three Pyrotechnics for Solo Clarinet)

Over Tyneham - (theme from a documentary)

A studio track inspired by old and new industrial technologies - using found sounds, sound samples, filtered audio of ice breaking and a number of digital and analogue synthesisers. This 'soundscape' was composed with the format of underscore for video in mind.

Elements of Industry

Richard Nye is a composer based in the UK.  His instrumental, electronic and choral works have been performed, broadcast (most recently on BBC Radio 3), recorded and published worldwide.
His first published work, Three Pyrotechnics for Solo Clarinet (1993 - pub. Cascade Music Publishing) is now included as part of the Trinity College Advanced Clarinet repertoire.

Richard was a chorister at Gloucester Cathedral and began composing at a young age. Guided by the Cheltenham-based composer Tony Hewitt-Jones whilst he was still at school, he later went on to study music in London, receiving his South Bank debut with 8 'til Late (8 hands on 2 pianos) performed at the South Bank Centre in 2001 by Piano 40. The work was later released on CD by Regent Records and his multi-hand piano works have been performed in the United States, Europe and Asia.

He has composed music inspired by works of art, most notably Circus! based on the Circus Prints by the late Eric James Mellon, and Annunciation based on the painting of the same name by American artist, John Collier.
Richard also works with synthesisers, samples, historical recordings and visual media. His orchestral work Icarus was used alongside a short animated film. Richard received his New York debut in 2013 with the micro-opera Bucca, a piece that formed the basis of the 20 minute multimedia piece, Edge of the World, a collaborative project that won a 2016 Gorsedth Kernow award. In recent years he has frequently collaborated with his sister, the writer Kate Aranda Nye, on a number of scored audio story projects.

Richard continues to combine experimental works such as Underworld performed at the University of Bremen in 2014 by Juan María Solare, with contemporary choral and instrumental compositions.
Recent projects have included Tronow, a new 8 hands on 2 pianos piece that received a first performance at the South Bank Centre in 2018, the score for the short audiobook story The Silence of Snow and two new anthems for SATB. His Missa Brevis was featured at the 2018 London Festival of Contemporary Church Music and is now published by Banks Music Publishing. 

2022 has seen a flurry of activity with the arrival of a new collection of pieces for solo piano which is to be published, a set of new electronic compositions and a series of concert performances of his music.  
Richard also provided some of the original music for a recent Skyrim game quest Prince of Lies.

Richard Nye | Composer

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