...but if it were, (2019)
This was commisioned by the lovely Etherow Reeds for a concert of new bass clarinet music.
Listen here:
And they also recorded a piece for regular non-bass clarinets, which on reflection I actually think sounds better:
Carol for our Children (2018)
This was commisioned by fantastic chamber ensemble No Dice Collective as part of their Last Christmas show, around the dual themes of Christmas and The Apocalypse. Not everyone’s cup of tea.
Seeing Sounds:
A Chromesthesia Concert (2019)
Seeing Sounds:
A Chromesthesia Concert (2019)
This was a sold-out show in Chetham’s Carole Nash Hall, which
aimed to directly visualise the experience of having chromesthesia, a
neurological condition which causes people to see sounds and music as colours
in front of their eyes.. The show was part musical concert, part science
communication – a string quartet performed four pieces of music, directly
visualised by new technology which I developed, which analyses audio and
outputs it as coloured light.
“Seeing Sounds: A Chromesthesia Concert”, was developed as part of
Manchester Science Festival.
You can hear the audio from that performance of the show here:
Manchester Science Festival.
You can hear the audio from that performance of the show here:
Prior to the concert, I spent years developing the technology.
As part of my master’s degree, I built a system which analyses audio input and outputs it as light in any way the user wants.
Here are some examples - in these videos, the software converts pitch to colour, and loudness to brightness:
And here’s another example, in which I use coloured bells to control the colour of the lights:
This was all used for my final MA piece, Circles:
If you’re interested or want to know more, I’d love to
hear from you - get in touch:
As part of my master’s degree, I built a system which analyses audio input and outputs it as light in any way the user wants.
Here are some examples - in these videos, the software converts pitch to colour, and loudness to brightness:
And here’s another example, in which I use coloured bells to control the colour of the lights:
This was all used for my final MA piece, Circles:
If you’re interested or want to know more, I’d love to
hear from you - get in touch:
I Thought I Was Too Small (2017)
Film credit to Darkfield Visuals
As part of my master’s degree, everyone on the course was asked to write a piece to be performed in the Whitworth Art Gallery’s Andy Warhol exhibit, related to the exhibit. Taking influence from the pop art movement Warhol was part of I wanted to make a piece that would be accessible for any audience. To achieve this, I came up with a piece which used audience volunteers as performers - each performer puts on a different set of headphones, which tells them how to play their part in real time. One plays prepared guitars, one is on vocals, and one plays a thumb piano. All the sounds they make are sychronised to the same clock, using a Max/MSP program on my laptop, processed live, and played through the speakers.
I don’t actually like Andy Warhol that much really. The title of the piece comes from an advertisement I found, which Andy Warhol starred in for Drexel Burnham Lambert, a Wall Street investment banking firm, which I thought was the most Andy Warhol thing I’d ever seen.![]()
You can read a much more detailed commentary on this piece, submitted as part of my Master’s degree, here.
You can also read the setup instructions here, and read the score below.
NB: as all instruction to the players is given through headphones, the score is for reference only.
You can also read the setup instructions here, and read the score below.
NB: as all instruction to the players is given through headphones, the score is for reference only.
Shreds (2016)
This was a string quartet submission for my undergraduate degree. It was workshopped twice, once by the Villiers Quartet and once by another visiting string quartet.
This piece uses a lot of tapping and pinch harmonic techniques mostly taken from guitar and harp music. I’ll probably come back and revisit it one day if I can find some willing players.