Yesterday morning, I was checking in at London City Airport (surely the most civilised airport in the world?) and was greeted like a long lost friend. It was equal parts ego boost and nice start to the morning. My suitcase was checked in and tagged HEAVY, my seats allocated and the usual glance to just above my head to check it wasn’t a growth…”it’s a cello – with a seat” – I moaned. This sentence, used verbatim hundreds of times a year by yours truly, has more tedious flying experiences and unfortunate arguments attached to it than you’ll ever know. … Continued
Blog
New Year, New Release!
As some of you will know, I spent most of the summer recording Gabriel Prokofiev’s gargantuan cello suite. It was a lot of work (really, really hard work) but as I sit, typing this update, I’m listening to it and it’s still as exciting to listen to as it is to perform (in my totally unbiased opinion) Quick backtrack: Nonclassical have this thing where they release an original composition alongside a bunch of remixes of that work. It’s de rigour for electronica/dance types, but for those of us over here in the classicalish world, it’s still pretty new… honestly, hearing these remixes … Continued
Pithy sign got me thinking.
Saw a sign in Giraffe at LHR T1: “whatever type of music you play, whether it be Mexican folk or rock n roll, if you’re sincere, what you are protecting has Life and Joy” It’s cute, it’s in a great, bright orange font (I would have taken a photo, but my Blackberry camera is terrible, and my shiny new iPhone is yet to arrive – thanks, o2!) It’s a sign on the side of a restaurant at one of the busiest airports in the world, but it got me thinking. We live with this “protectionist” mindset; we, the custodians, are … Continued
By way of an update.
Best intentions let me down again, I’m afraid. I performed Gabriel’s Cello Suite at the resplendent Kings Place on Monday night – first time since we finished ‘hyper mixing’ it all – was great to get them really polished, but much nicer to let them out into the real world…! We’re finalising artwork and such now, with the release looking like February following a number of shows in the UK, Paris and a number across the US. The remixes are coming back, too, and they’re sounding awesome – it’s incredibly exciting hearing other people’s interpretations of your work…quite weird, actually. … Continued
New music that acts like old music is not new music.
The whole “why can’t contemporary music be more like contemporary art” thing is tiring. Why not look at this another way: new music that is designed to act like old music is not new music. if you want to look at something exciting for the future, if you want something bright and shiny to commission that is changing the landscape, go and look at generative music. I’m convinced this is the right space in which to be commissioning right now. This stuff gets me so ridiculously excited, in fact, that Reactify and I are collaborating on a whole new performance … Continued