The title of my piece is derived from a series of sketches of river views in J.M.W. Turner's “Trieste, Graz and Danube Sketchbook” of 1840, described by the artist as having been "begun in the  moonlight at St. Michael’s" (https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/turner-views-near-arnsdorf-sankt-michael-and-spitz-on-the-river-danube-stift-sausenstein-d30030). Art historian Cecilia Powell  has written that these sketches possess the quality of “rugged silhouettes”. The work is an attempt to suggest Turner's moonlit night journey along the Danube and the views he experienced in  music that mirrors the fragmentary, elusive, almost abstract nature of his sketches.  Views of Arnsdorf and Sankt Michael on the River Danube was written between 15th and 21st May 2024 and is based on material originally drafted in August 2020. It is dedicated to Sara Minelli.
This recording is the work's first performance, by Antonella Bini at Sala Piatti, Bergamo on 10th May 2025.

Views of Arnsdorf and Sankt Michael on the River Danube

British composer James Erber was born in 1951 in London of an Austrian father and an English mother. After studying Music at the Universities of Sussex (BA, 1973) and Nottingham (MA, 1975), he was appointed Music Editor at Peters Edition, London. He left Peters Edition in 1979 and began work as a freelance editor, writer and translator.  Still largely self-taught as a composer, it was at this period he produced his first acknowledged score, "Seguente" for oboe and piano (1976-1978, revised 1980). The guidance and encouragement he received from Brian Ferneyhough (whom he had met at Peters Edition) prompted him to a serious study of composition, firstly with Jonathan Harvey at the University of Sussex (MPhil in Composition, 1983), then from 1981 to 1982 with Ferneyhough himself at the Musikhochschule, Freiburg-im-Breisgau. In 1984, at Ferneyhough’s suggestion, he made the first of five visits to the Darmstadt Ferienkurse, winning a Stipendienpreis in 1988. From 1982 to 2016, he combined activity as a composer with teaching and lecturing. Since 2016 he has been able to concentrate solely on composition. 
James Erber's work reflects a wide range of interests, including Renaissance and Baroque music, the music of South-East Asia, Jazz, blues, Mediaeval and Renaissance philosophy, Kabbalah, green politics, recent scientific developments, film noir, Jacobean tragedy, the Gothic novel and historical slang.  His music is multi-layered and complex (especially from the point of view of rhythm and form). Its complexity is, however, combined with harmonic clarity and lyricism as well as a tenuous sense of optimism and a concern with intellectual and spiritual continuity.
It has been performed and broadcast widely by soloists such as Pavlos Antoniadis, Antonella Bini, Mario Caroli, Diego Castro Magaš, Matteo Cesari, Franklin Cox, Gianpaolo Antongirolami, Gleb Kanasevich, Carin Levine, Ian Pace, Jonathan Powell, Nancy Ruffer and Michele Selva, as well as by ensembles including 175 East, the Arditti Quartet, Duo Galeano/Javaid, Exposé, ELISION, Lontano and NOISE. James Erber’s music has been recorded on NMC, Metier, Centaur Records (USA) and Convivium Records. Many of his scores are available from Composers Edition. In July 2022, his complete writings on music (1978-2021) were published by Vision Edition under the title "Fragile Continuities".

New tracks tagged #J.M.W.Turner