In a cross-tuning of 84-tone equal temperament and 13-limit just intonation.

Amélie Berson, flute
Phoebe Bognár, bass flute
Mireia Pellisa Martín, alto saxophone
Thierry Madiot, bass trombone
Carlo Sampaolesi, accordion
Félix Lacquement, electric guitar
Paola Aviles, harp
María Alejandra Jiménez, violin
Adèle Viret, cello

Commissioned by GMEA – Centre National de Création Musicale d’Albi-Tarn. Recorded live at the Athanor in Albi, France on August 6, 2022  by Benjamin Maumus – GMEA's sound engineer.

Commande du GMEA – Centre National de Création Musicale d’Albi-Tarn. Enregistrement à l’Athanor à Albi le 6 août 2022 et mixage par Benjamin Maumus – ingénieur du son du GMEA.

Nocturne (2022) for harp, electric guitar and ensemble

for Margaret Lingas (2015)

(BE)NEATH (2016)

ABOUT (2016)

ATLAS, 2012 (Version A, 2015)

L'art de toucher... (2015)

(2014) 3 pages of 3 lines for 3 players (violin, mandolin, piano)

number three (2014)

DRIFT - descant on Benedetti's two examples of syntonic comma drift (2018)

A new version for acoustic guitar and viola with a stronger focus on 11-limit tuneable sonorities.
Plainsound Music Edition 2019

ATLAS, 2012 (Version B, 2019)

(Speculative) 5-limit just intonation of Palestrina's Sicut cervus desiderat (1587)

Sicut cervus desiderat (Palestrina intonation, 2020)

(Speculative) 19-limit just intonation of Gesualdo's Tenebrae factae sunt (1611)

Tenebrae factae sunt (Gesualdo intonation, 2020)

Electronic Music in 37-limit Just Intonation (3.5.7.11.13.23.37)

created in SuperCollider 3.9.3
April-December, 2020

dedicated to Marcus Pal

large scale modulation down a fourth ("I-V")
3:4  -->  6:8:9  -->  8:11:12

PORT (Rondo for Marcus Pal)(2020)

Physically modelled performance (NotePerformer) 
Orchestral music in 13-limit just intonation
(3.3.3.3/4.3.3.1/bd.timp.harp/strings)

N.B. The very last chord is to be played "as long and accurate as possible", with multiple asynchronous reattacks in the brass and strings (in this version, there is a simple fade out due to the limitations of physical modelling etc.)

PER (2018-20)

Thomas Nicholson (b. 1995) is a Canadian composer whose work investigates extended just intonation. His creative practice centres around a deep exploration of untempered frequency relationships, taking cues from acoustics, theories of perception, and sociology.
During his adolescence, he studied composition and traditional Western music theory privately with Dr. Martín Kutnowski at St. Thomas University in his hometown of Fredericton, Canada. From 2013–2017, he studied composition with Christopher Butterfield at the University of Victoria (BMus). In 2017, he relocated to Berlin, Germany to study at the Universität der Künste (MMus, 2017–2021) with Marc Sabat, whom he assisted teaching in intonation theory seminars.

Nicholson and Sabat have collaborated on several academic and artistic research projects as well as publications revolving around a mutual interest for examining various possible approaches to “Harmonic Space” that may be interesting in music composition. In 2020, they published a revision and extension of Sabat and Wolfgang von Schweinitz’s original “Helmholz-Ellis JI Pitch Notation,” which has already become a standard throughout Europe for notating music in just intonation.

Since 2018, Nicholson has been a member of the Berlin-based Harmonic Space Orchestra, a collective of 15 musicians who meet regularly to research their shared interest in searching for new ways to sound precisely tuned intervals (mainly produced by acoustic instruments) in an inclusive and pluralistic creative environment. He is also a member of Plainsound Music Edition, which is a curated, interdisciplinary virtual edition featuring open source, non-commercial sharing of experimental, perception-driven artistic work and research. There is a major, but not exclusive focus on the practice of microtonally extended just intonation.

In his compositions, Nicholson’s sources of inspiration stem from a broad range of fields and contexts, ranging from mathematics and physics to graphic design, music history, psychoacoustics, philosophy, and interdisciplinary artistic collaborations. Fascinated by the inherently microtonal nature of extended just intonation, his compositions since 2014 have engaged with the often-mysterious interactions between threads of counterpoint and the psychoacoustic phenomenon of harmonic fusion. He is repeatedly drawn to the intricate question of the “enharmonic,” in both historical and modern senses of the word, within the framework of extended just intonation. He often works with various miniscule, yet remarkably expressive connections between tones (points in Harmonic Space), which seem just beyond the reach of perception until contextualised by special harmonic conditions. He especially enjoys composing for smaller settings consisting of two to four musicians and is devoted to researching as well as developing tools and methods for navigating the practical challenges of realising microtonal music in various forms.

Thomas Nicholson

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