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Update on voting

29/10/2015

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Martin Luther as the Devil's Bagpipe 16th C WoodcutMartin Luther as the Devil's Bagpipe 16thC Woodcut
Going Guising is currently in sixth place with 340 votes. Thanks to everyone who voted for me. As for the rest of you... there's a sinister piper abroad!

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The bagpipes are coming

24/10/2015

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Vote for me!Vote for me!
Voting has opened for the Hallow-e'en competition. There are 32 entries, and mine is Going Guising in the second group. Please vote (for me) here; there are links to all the music and scores, and also the results. 

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58 indices sur le corps

21/10/2015

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Two pieces of electronic music Danse et sarabande have been chosen to be part of a project to add music to the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy reading from 58 indices sur le corps.
The words mention the soul dancing, and the rhythm of the words seemed a bit like a sarabande to me, so I looked for inspiration from the Baroque period. The specific piece I used was the 25th of Bach's Goldberg Variaions. This is the slow, chromatic heart of the variations. It is not actually a sarabande (but variation 26 is).​
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The two tracks are called La danse de l'âme (Dance of the Soul) and La sarabande du corps (Sarabande of the Body). They relate to numbers 28 and 29 of the 58 indices sur le corps. 
I used the rhythms of Jean-Luc Nancy's readings as the starting point for the rhythms and structures of the pieces.
The two tracks are embedded below. The wonderful artwork, like that for Going Guising (for Halloween) is again by my partner Barry Thackray.
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Scary... the artwork

19/10/2015

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I have finished the one-minute piece for Hallow-e'en. It's called Going Guising, and my partner Barry has painted two pictures for the project. One is my (TheGuiser) avatar (the skull) and the other is the album artwork (the moon). In a couple of days, you can vote for your favourite Scary Hallow-e'en music.
Guising had become a tradition for children in Scotland by the end of the 19th century. Originally they dressed as spirits of the dead and carried lanterns made out of scooped out turnips to get cakes, fruit or money from the houses they visited. Burns wrote a long poem about Hallow-e'en that describes the old traditions.
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Hallow-e'en

16/10/2015

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Last year I sent a piece in for a Halloween competition called Scary. The call was for one-minute pieces for Hallow-e'en using computer-generated instruments. There was a public vote. I came 17th, but got many hundreds of votes, so some people listened to the piece. It was called Worms shall eat thee up (click to listen). To see the score, click on the flat cap (the whole thing has a slight Yorkshire theme).
I am doing it again this year.
As there were no practical limits, I went to town with the orchestra last year: double woodwind plus cor anglais and double bassoon, full brass (very high horn parts), lots of percussion, two harps, organ and strings. It is all very impractical, but essentially it could be played. Other pieces last year were not playable, so I think this year I will stick to actual (synthetic) instruments, without consideration for the practicalities of human players. It will also be much Scarier.
I have a new temporary blog for Scary 2015; I am The Guiser.

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Press notice for the concert in NYC this month

7/10/2015

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Below is the text of a press notice for the concert when Stephen Porter will play my piece Leise flehen die Lieder (The songs beckon softly) on 24 October at Symphony Space, Leonard Nimoy Thalia, 2537 Broadway, New York.

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Prayers from inside the ark

2/10/2015

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I have recently been really taken by a selection of poems by Carmen Bernos de Gasztold called Prières dans l'Arche. Carmen Bernos de Gasztold was a French nun of Lithuanian descent. From after the Second World War, she lived at the Benedictine Abbeye Saint Louis du Temple at Limon-par-Igny. She published two major sets of poetry: Prières dans L'Arche, and Choral de bêtes, Ed. du Cloître, 1955. Mary Medlicott told me about them some time ago.
As the title suggests, they are prayes from animals (and Noah) in the Ark. Intended for children, and in simple language, they are imaginative and moving views of what an animal values. The cat doesn't really want anything, but if there happened to be a mouse or some milk, it might know someone who would appreciate it. The dog wants security; the monkey wants to be taken seriously. The raven revels in the destruction of the flood, and the dove wants to bring hope to those in the Ark.
I have used five of the poems as inspiration so far, and will probably continue to do so, when I can. There are twenty-seven poems.
They are still under copyright, but the Smithsonian Institution has made some available as the sleeve note of a recording in their catalogue.
The picture opposite is by Jan Brueghel the Elder - The Entry of the Animals into Noah's Ark.
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